It has no front or back camera. Having to buy a camera kit to connect a camera does not count.
It has no card reader, standard USB or standard video output ports of any kind. Overpriced proprietary cables need to be bought.
It has a low resolution 1024x768 screen.
It has a non-removable battery.
Multitasking is primitive at best.
The on-screen keyboard is only functional for touch typing or practical typing speeds when in landscape mode. When in portrait mode, it's too small for practical typing. You can only type with one hand if you're holding it. The on-screen keyboard is close to a full sized keyboard (when in landscape), but it misses many of the standard characters, so if moving regularly between iPad and normal keyboards, it can be tricky. When it comes to keyboards, tactile is always better than touch. External keyboard docks or a case stand is irrelevant. We’re talking about the product, not the extra accessories you have to buy.
Its "Hybrid" OSX OS, dumbed down for the average idiot. Barely any configuration is allowed. Typical of Apple’s “protecting you from yourself” approach to OS design.
It has no flash. Arguing about HTML5 is irrelevant at this point in time since flash is the standard. Apple would rather have you only use their apps to access flash sites, play games, read the paper, watch movies, etc. which cost money. If flash was allowed, you could do these all for free, and Apple would lose money. They don't want this.
You’re forced to live in Apple’s walled garden. Jailbreaking is irrelevant. The majority don’t jailbreak, or even know what it means. Jailbreaking isn’t a guarantee, since it uses the A4 chip, and since Apple tries its best to stop it from happening with firmware updates. In other words, a good product doesn’t need a jailbreak.
The iPad is an overall consumerist product. It sells on reading, listening, interacting and watching media. It’s hardly a serious product for content creation.
It has no digitizer, which means no handwriting recognition. The iPad is designed for hands, so you can’t write notes, only type, regardless if you have a stylus. A stylus must be purchased separately.
It's overpriced. It may be base-priced at $499, but that’s the watered down version. Paying $120 more for a 3G chip is not right. Paying $100 more for an extra 16GBs is not right.
You must use micro SIM cards only.
The video/audio codec playback is immensely limited.
The built-in speaker is mono.
Gaming on the iPad is designed only for casual gamers.
You can expect a second-generation iPad to be released with a few extra obvious features listed here. Then another. Apple do this increase the life cycle of their product, and of course to make more money off their customers.
That Jobs himself said that the iPad is to fill the market gap that is between the macbook and iphone. This seems gluttonous to me. The idea of having an personal entertainment device in-between your laptop and your phone is too much while people around the world don’t even have the luxury of even a basic computer.
That even the cheapest netbook with the lowest specs can achieve more than the ipad. Even installing OSX on a touch netbook will be more useful than an iPad. By useful I mean being able to run a fully fledged OS with the ability to run any piece of software required. The iPad doesn’t even come close to a replacing a laptop, or anything else really. While it isn't meant to be a replacement, many uninformed people will still buy it expecting it to replace their laptop or netbook purchase.
While Jobs publically makes fun of netbooks, he fails to realise those same low-cost devices help people around the world afford portable computers to get their job done design software, learn computing and run industrial real world software. Personally, a netbook gets me through university. Now It costed less than an iPad, but if I had bought an iPad for uni, it probably would’ve been a lot harder for me to graduate since I needed to run many industrial programs (Maple, MATLAB, SPSS etc.) and type long essays. I even got through fine reading entire textbooks on my netbook. I know I’m not the target buyer, but who really is? Someone who professionally works with tablets? No. Industrial workers? Not at the moment, and doubt it’ll happen. Business people? Maybe, but for the majority it will be a no. People who can’t use conventional computers? Yes, but who’s to say they can’t learn how to use a real, proper user friendly OS? People who like shiny new things? Yes. People who like to show their wealth? Yes. People who are gullible when it comes to marketing and the media? Yes. Irrational macheads? Yes.
I’ll conclude with this. The iPad is the attractive bimbo of the gadget world. Pure style over substance, inside and out. I’ll say it, the iPad is a completely unnecessary device of no real practical use except to make Apple's pockets fatter.
