Content, content, content...

The way I see it, this whole argument Amazon and Apple are having is moot. The iPad will flop (as Spindle has done). I heard a popular radio host here recently advise to hold up on buying the iPad because of its various deficiencies. For one thing, it was said, you cannot perform two or more tasks at the same time on iPad; another, it doesn’t have a camera.

All the jokes about the name itself, point to a bigger problem with the device. The trend is toward combining all things in one reasonably portable device. People do not want to have to go to different devices for different functions. Neither do I believe (and many, including JB, will disagree with me on this) that an electronic alternative to a book constitutes a lasting alternative. The recent shift to the internet for information at the expense of books, newspapers and magazines is not a function of the written word (on paper) having become obsolete. The reason for the shift is content and content alone.

The public is not stupid. Yes, price is a factor. Yet, it is well known that content trumps delivery; that simply putting ideology and spin out there in any form no longer cuts it, especially when it goes against the grain of common sense. That is why Newsweek got only 35 paid subscribers when they made their internet offering. That is why The New York Times and others are drowning in a sea of red ink. That is why neither the iPad nor the internet will save them.