iPAD killing our way of life?

Nope.

Some friends and I were having a discussion where one was lamenting the passing of local book stores and CD shops among other things. This partly in response to the hype regarding the iPad.

My take on this:

I miss record stores.
I miss having to go to the movies to see.. well movies.
I miss having to go to multiple stores to comparison shop.
I miss them all like I miss having a hole in my head 🙂

Gotta keep moving forward!

I LOVE buying my music a single track at a time! I fantasized about this from early high school.

I LOVE that I can see a movie within a month of its release in the comfort of my own home with absolutely wonderful fidelity.

I LOVE popping onto Amazon.com, browsing a few books and ordering one or two to read either physically or having them magically appear on my kindle within seconds.

I LOVE being able to easily compare dates and costs for different flights and then getting the best possible deal for my circumstances and then booking the flight and rental car immediately.

I LOVE that in less than 20 years, I’ll probably be able to book a sub-orbital flight on a Virgin spaceship and experience weightlessness.

I also disagree with the theme of the iPad sounding the death knell for libraries. Books and normal libraries will have a place in the mainstream for another few decades. The libraries especially will have to adapt as people gain more access to information from other sources but it will be their own fault if they, as an institution, fail.

It is valid to have the discussion regarding whether or not the iPad will usher in a new mode of information consumption but I think we’ll find that this is just another tiny, $600 step on an already lengthy road that began with PCs and has been landmarked by laptops, tablets, netbooks, eReaders and the like.

Nothing really new here folks. Very cool? You bet. New… not so much.