Psychologically this is interesting because Apple is pulling at a lot of strings here. They want consumers to feel good about buying the product. Not resentful it's not the thing they really wanted but couldn't afford. Part of it is almost Pavlovian. The customer pays more but in the process is rewarded in different ways. For having the taste to pick the perceived superior brand for example. It's an item coveted by others, again if only because it's perceived to be superior, and it's an item that broadcasts it's premium price tag like a badge of honor with a striking design. The customer enjoys the experience of everyone swooning over their new purchase. They like the idea thousands of people are waiting in line to get this thing they are holding in their hands right now. This is even more important in the context of giving Apple products as gifts. Buying someone the cheap but acceptable option sends one message. Buying someone the expensive and also acceptable option sends a different message.
Basically Apple cracked the code of getting people to pay more and be pretty happy about it.
Which is very clever, they know their competitors are going for price, but now they've forced them to commit to seriously low margins. Always helpful to keep your competition struggling to make meaningful profit.
[edit: math (doh!)]
I've been really critical of Apple lately, but I can't find any reason to get upset over this announcement. I find it funny how people are railing against this announcement just because its not useful to them. There are a million different needs and uses out there for different people.
I can answer my own question: Apple doesn't want people to share these devices: fewer sales.
Not saying they won't look at it in the future but We have a family iPad and its no problem. My wife can see my email but she's my wife so I honestly don't care. Our neighbours have two between six of them and similarly have no issues.
People with a tech background worry about this more than most people but they also tend to be the sort of people who have their own devices. For normal families the current situation is a relatively minor problem - considerably less of an issue than both kids wanting it at once I suggest.
I also tend to enable Airplane mode by default when I hand my phone or iPad to my daughters.
Apple has trapped itself into a corner with the Apple ID. Apple puts on regular seminars for local school districts every 6 months or so in my area about how to integrate iPads for K12, and it is just brutal. At least 60% of the answers from the Apple rep is usually "you can't use it like that".
The hardships all come from the way that the Apple ID works. Apple wants the iPad to be a "personal device" for one person, but obviously in a school setting it doesn't work that way. The workarounds they have for school districts are laughable to the point that the Apple rep(s) always admit it to us when talking about manageability, security and tracking.
I love my iPad, but its just not enterprise/public school/multiuser friendly yet.
Bingo.
Apple wants people to share iPads only to the extent that doing so gives other people a trial of the product, and ideally, a burning desire for it. Apple doesn't want the kids sharing Mom's iPad; Apple wants kids bugging Mom half to death for their own iPads.
A and B do not contradict. B does not invalidate A.
For this reason alone, I truly hope that digital textbooks become viable.
Should they use something new? I don't want governments to pay (even more?) bazillions to Apple or Samsung, but making their own will also come expensive.
Ideas?
Districts probably aren't going to care, as they are looking for a cheaper way to stay current. I recognize the prices are not as good as they should be, but realize the logistics are removed from the situation. The monster of having to manage all those books goes away with a keypress, but lands them squarely on a treadmill with the publishers controlling the dial.
Open school books? Maybe teachers will collaborate and make their own material? There's a lot of room in there...
That said, my Samsung Galaxy S III has 1280x720 resolution which makes it really nice for watching Netflix, TED videos, etc. And the Galaxy phone is very light weight.
I have decided to not buy anymore Apple gear, but if not for that, if I was in the market for an iPad, I would rather have this smaller one that is less than half the weight.
I see the mini competing more with 'super phones' like the Samsung Galaxy S III.
There are plenty of great iPad specific apps.
Care to share?
Musical apps is something you won't get in the Android Eco-system basically because the OS itself sucks at it(although 4.1 seems to have improved a bit on that side).
With this in mind(musical apps), I will always favor the iPad (mini) over an Android tablet.
Been using them for lives & recording demos (iPad+MiC+Jam). the iPad never crashes(not like Android that freezes a lot).
Obviously you do no get a full pc stack and the quality is still not there so I resort to the Mac for more functionality/sound treatment but you can enjoy quite very much if you can't afford the thousands that cost Native Instruments softs or real hardware synths/drum machines.
Also (IMO) latest versions of Android wipe the floor with iOS when it comes to user experience and options. And N7 is quad core with Tegra, superb build quality and larger resolution for less money.
do the pixels weigh more? Seriously, would faster graphics weigh more? Or are you saying juicing the graphics would eat more battery, and therefore, it would weight more?
The backlight being the lion's share of the battery consumption, this requires a significantly larger battery.
(iPad 3 was launched with the retina screen a year after the iPad 2. And 2 years after the iPad 1)
I honestly can't tell whether it's the 'new Apple product' shine, but I like the idea of a 7.9inch screen better than a 7inch.
Less conceptually fragile, less expensive, more portable, same software stack, same media stack, same OS, same UX, same premium experience, same monstrous manufacturing and distribution reach, same monstrous advertising and product awareness engine.
Every single one of the children you see in restaurants working an iPad so mommy and daddy can eat in peace will have one of these by January.
Schools will buy in by the hundreds of thousands, regardless of actual utility or how successful digital textbooks eventually become.
This is the new travel iPad. This is the status gift for the developing world. This is the throwaway iPad if you're rich or the first one you look at if you're less so.
It's priced to make Apple the margins they want while still inviting comparisons with less expensive and similarly sized tablets. It's going to suck the oxygen out of the $300-$500 price range for anything with a screen.
And it's cheap enough to substantially distinguish itself from the main iPad line, which is selling millions a week. That's all it had to do, pricing-wise.
I don't want or need this, and I don't think it was particularly necessary for the health of the iPad line, but they dotted all the Is and crossed all the Ts when designing this product.