Will the iPad Change Everything?

I haven't bought into all the iPad hype, but like many things Apple has rolled out, this one is going to be a game-changer.

Except on a whole new playing field.

From the rollout announcement last January to the huge amount of sales the day they became available on April 3, Apple's iPad has been dominating the news. On the surface, it's a simple product: an always-on tablet device that lets you browse the Web, read books, send email, watch movies and play games. That surface, though, is really one of what author Jeffrey Kluger calls "simplexity."

Apple has, once again, made a complex thing simple.

In an article from the April issue of Wired magazine, Steven Levy chronicles how the iPad is going to change things - from the way we read books to the way we play games to the way we do business - and everything in-between.

An illustration: my pastor used a brand new iPad for his sermon notes on Easter Sunday - and then gave it away to a new Christian high school student. It came preloaded with a Bible, study guides, and worship music from our band. In his sermon a week later, my pastor is using his personal iPad for sermon notes again.

Which brings me to my posts of the last few days. My grandson Jack (and my next grandchild, to be born in September) are going to be growing up in a whole different world than their parents did. Wired editor-in-chief had a great description of this world of the tablet: "Bigger than a phone, funner than a laptop, more cuddly than a Kindle."

Welcome to a new world.