The iPad from Apple – which sold 1 million devices in the first month of its US launch – has finally gone on sale here in the UK and as always, people queued through the night to be amongst the first to get their hands on one.

Culturally iconic, technologically average

The question I’m asking is why?

Having had the opportunity to mess around with one a couple of weeks ago, I can safely say that my initial view that it was a slightly improved and much bigger iPod Touch proved to be true…almost.

Let’s deal with its plus points first.

The screen resolution and performance is amazing. It’s truly wonderful. Never before has any app looked so crisp or any video NOT from a DVD looked so sharp.

The improved size makes using the keyboard a joy, especially if you prefer a touch screen to actual keys as I do.

It is brilliantly future proof too – but that is also one of its downfalls. The iPad IS just a big iPod Touch…for now. At least it is unless you’re prepared to spend the time getting to know it. And I would be if it wasn’t for its other major problem, but I’ll get to that in a little while.

There are some good uses for the iPad in all fairness. As a travel companion I can’t think of a better option now. Ignore the relative difficulty of getting things on and off the iPad (no DVD drive etc) and with a little preparation and the help of iTunes and you have a superb little music and film player that is the ideal size for travel.

It won’t quite replace the laptop for really practical uses just yet, but there’s no reason you can’t manage a database or do a bit of office work on it. Apple provide the software to do so. The laptop remains King for now though because of its sheer versatility, something the iPad cannot be accused of being.

There are two downsides that I can see and both of them or either of them stop me from investing. Firstly, there is that issue with Apple’s tight control over what you can and can’t have on the iPad. No USB port, no way of doing anything except through your Mac and iTunes. Limiting for those of us without a Mac at best.

The second downside is the big one for me. Given its current limitations the price of the iPad is ridiculous. The cheapest version on offer is £429. That has a pitiful 16Gb memory and is WiFi only, no 3G. Want the top of the range iPad? That’s a cool £699 for 64Gb and the 3G.

Want to add a dock, keyboard, case, camera connection kit? Another £110 or thereabouts

I’m sorry but the price does not justify the product, it really doesn’t. The iPad is a piece of cultural and cosmetic genius but it is not a step forward in technology or even, really, the use of it.

What the iPad will do is open the market for everyone else – and with competition comes development, progression, innovation and competitiveness. Just as the iPod kickstarted the boom in MP3s and the iPhone spawned Android, the iPad will create new interest in the ‘tablet’ and will be the catalyst, I think, for ever more useful and user friendly versions.

For that reason alone I welcome it. I just won’t own it.

As is traditional at this time of year, Apple held a media event to launch…

No…not The Beatles finally available on iTunes. Instead it was…

…the return of Steve Jobs on stage. Very nice to see and despite looking very gaunt after his recent medical troubles it should bring confidence that he is back at the helm and guiding the direction of the company. A pity then, that much of what he had to say and introduce was underwhelming. Here’s the highlights.

• NEW iTunes 9
• NEW iPod Nano with video camera
• NEW iPod Touch and Shuffle range (with lower prices)

I’m interested in this…

iTunes 9

The features introduced in the latest version of iTunes are not min-blowing, but some deserve a mention. Take, for example, iTunes LP.

This allows you, with certain albums, to enjoy an interactive world of lyrics, photos, video and other “bonus materials” within iTunes while you listen to said album. If you’re interested in that sort of thing then you’re going to enjoy this. It’s one of Apple’s ‘nice touches’ and not a ground breaking development as far as this music listener is concerned.

Similarly, the iTunes store has been redesigned. Aesthetically more pleasing though it is, I’m not yet ‘feeling’ the improvement. I’m sure over time and with more experience I will find new features that do make life easier, but right now it’s just prettier.

Home Sharing, however, is an improvement. Allowing you to share everything purchased through iTunes with up to five computers on the same network, importing from them and automatically updating new purchases bought on any of them, Home Sharing could make family (or, let’s face it, work life) a lot fairer – and cheaper? More on this if and when I ever get to play with it.

Meanwhile, downloading movies through iTunes has now become even more like buying the DVD. The introduction of the unimaginatively named ‘Special Features’ means you get interviews, trailers and photos related to your chosen movie. Nice. But not stunning.

Not stunning is a common theme as we continue, with Genius Mixes (searches your library and returns songs that go well together, mixing them automtaically to create playlists (or channels as Apple likes to call them)), improved syncing (it is better – but for me, it NEEDED to be) and the late, late introduction of ringtones through the Store proving just as underwhelming – but at least welcome.

One feature I do want to look more closely at, however, is iPhone app management.

You know how moving apps around on your phone is a pain, especially when you have four or more pages of them? How moving one app from page five to page one usually messes up the other pages – even with Apple’s improvement of tha in OS 3.0? Well, now you can organise your apps through iTunes. Check out the screenshot on the right. This, frankly, is brilliant.

iTunes App Management

Drag and drop one or more apps from page to page within iTunes and then ‘Apply’ and your iPhone takes on the set up. You can check and uncheck those you want to include onyour phone too, taking management to a new level. Check…it…out.

…what?

Is it:

• The Beatles on iTunes (Yoko says so…)?
• iPod Touch to get camera / video?
• iTunes 9 (with Facebook and Twitter integration)?
• Next iPhone OS?
• Apple Tablet (this looks really cool…)?

It’s underwhelming is what it is. Nevertheless, I shall report back soon. But basically it’s iTunes 9 with a few nice but unamazing features and iPods with cameras…including the Nano!!

More soon, when I have formulated an opinion.

Facebook. Google. Apple.

Names already linked with the purchase of Twitter. Microsoft has probably been mooted at some point too.

But the question is – who would be better off buying it?

Who will buy Twitter?

Twitter is a wonderful thing but it is not a business. It is currently unprofitable and I have yet to hear a good enough method of turning that around. Advertising is, of course, the most obvious and would suggest that the best suitor to Twitter is advertising king

Perhaps the question is, then, who needs Twitter more, not who can do more for Twitter.

Google grasps the free and open landscape of the internet, to which Twitter is an integral part. Google’s many fingers are everywhere and it seems unlikely that owning Twitter would enhance their position much. But when did that ever stop them? They bought Blogger and haven’t changed it much. It just rolls on the same as it ever did. It’s done nothing for Google itself though, really.

The same cannot be said for Facebook, Apple or even Microsoft.

Facebook has adopted a Twitter-esque interface in its latest design but I find it hard to understand how they would benefit from Twitter, technically or commercially. Facebook can’t even make itself profitable. Integration could only really mean replacing their current status update model with the Twitter feed. Unless you have any ideas?

Which leaves Apple and Microsoft. Apple is traditionally a hardware company. One of the best. Its online forays, however, have been disappointing at best and completely ignored at worst. Could Twitter, then, give it not so much a new lease of life online as signal its official entrance?

Apple can certainly afford it. Twitter turned down a $500 million cash and share offer from Facebook based on the fact they couldn’t decide how much Facebook stock was worth. A cash-only offer from Apple is a very real possibility, however. And likely to be significantly more than the original $500m offer too.

The iPhone has many Twitter apps, such as Tweetie, which are a nice litte earner for Apple. But the company doesn’t need to OWN Twitter to benefit from it in that sense. This article explains the benefits to Apple better than I could (and credit for sparking this off in my head must go to the author too!).

So finally – Microsoft. To my mind, Microsoft have been strangely silent on the social media front outside of their own endeavours. And their own endeavours, such as Windows Live, have been met with a mixed reaction. While I use Live Messenger, I do not like anything else to do with it. And even Live Messenger is a bloated piece of software, even if it is almost Google-esque in its useability.

The idea that Microsoft would branch out into the wider, freer world is almost unthinkable. It wouldn’t be the first time the company has surprised us though and if they did emerge as a possible suitor to Twitter I wouldn’t be surprised.

Though I may be horrified…

But which one of these would make Twitter profitable? And how? Outside of Google and its advertising model, I’m at a loss.

I’d love to hear your ideas.

EDIT (27/04/09): Seems this video has been made private. Not only that, at the time of writing, the Vollee website is down! Something is amiss for sure. Blizzard throwing their wait around, perhaps? I have no idea – does anyone else?

It’s not often I get to combine a World of Warcraft story with a technology one, but thanks to Vollee (and Massively) now I can.

Vollee are already in the process of bringing Second Life to the mobile market, but this video (below) suggests they are doing the same for WoW. It is an apparent demonstration of WoW running on the iPhone. MMO gaming on the move in a workable, playable fashion? I’m not sure – and Massively haven’t proven that it’s legit yet either.  But still…promising!