Apple has recently announced a “Back to the Mac” event for this Wednesday. The teaser invitation shows the Apple logo slightly pivoted with a lion peeking out from behind it.

We are almost certain to see at this event:

1. The next version of iLife

2. The launch of a new MacBook Air

3. A preview of the next version of OSX

But let’s indulge in some wild speculation. The invitation shows the Apple logo pivoting, like a convertible tablet would. There’s also an interesting choice of wordplay in the invitation, reminiscent of the MacBook Air’s original launch:

The MacBook Air is also the most likely candidate for an initial laptop-tablet hybrid model. It is the lightest MacBook, and also commands a premium price. If Apple enters this market, it would make the most sense to enter at the high-end, as the iPad is already entrenched at the low end ($500-$1000). Introducing a premium (say $1800) tablet hybrid model will allow new Apps to transition to the desktop space without cannibalizing the existing iPad market.

It’s also clear that OSX is coming to the end of its (almost 10-year) lifecycle. The time is perfect for Apple to introduce the next generation OS (OSXI?). It’s clear that multi-touch is going to be a big part it, and Apple will undoubtedly want to take advantage of the thousands of Apps written for iOS that could be easily ported over.

As I have written before, adding iOS emulation on top of OSX would be technically trivial to do. The real challenge is going to be in getting the physical form factors right. A problem with existing convertible tablets like the Lenovo X201 is the awkward hinge. It’s hard to imagine something similar on a MacBook Air. But if anyone can solve that problem, it’s Apple.

Quote from Paul Graham (of Y Incubator) during the Google I/O conference:

“I’m very afraid of a world in which we are all Steve Jobs’ slaves,” Graham said. “If anything can save us, it might be Chrome.” When Costolo asked whether he would invest in a company building for the iPhone versus Google’s Android platform, Graham answered, “Of course iPhone. I’m talking about what I hope will set us free, not what will generate opportunities.”

I woke up at 8am this morning and stood in line for almost an hour to pick up my reserved iPad. There were probably 100-150 people in line when I got there. I then spent the better part of the day downloading apps and putting the iPad through its paces. Here are my initial impressions with using the actual device:

1. Yes, it’s fast

Coming from an iPhone 3G, everything feels about 25% faster. Web pages load as fast as on my laptop, maps feel better than a laptop experience, and in general everything feels very responsive.

2. Browsing the web, reading text and watching videos are Class-1 experiences

I’ve changed my mind about content. The iPad is a better way to consume the web, text and videos.

Web browsing feels as good if not better than browsing on a laptop. It feels more like flipping through a magazine, which suits most general surfing.

I tried out 3 major free news apps (NPR, Reuters, and AP News). All look great, and are definitely superior to browsing their respective websites. The Marvel Comics app is also very well done. I sure wish we had iPads when I was a kid!

I also watched streaming video on the YouTube, Netflix and ABC Player apps. Both worked great. Hi-def video looks fantastic. Definitely like having your own personal TV.

3. Text typing is fine (for limited amounts of text)

A big concern of mine was how good the virtual keyboard would stack up. In a word, it’s functional. As good if not a little better than the iPhone keyboard for limited text entry. You certainly don’t want to be typing on it for longer than a couple minutes. One positive surprise was how well the landscape keyboard feels like a standard (physical) Apple keyboard. It’s almost the same size and shape. Typing with the Apple case in landscape mode works fairly well. However, it will not work at all if you have long fingernails.

4. It’s just the right size, but heavier than expected

The device itself feels like just the right size to be holding in the hand, and browsing with. However, it does feel heavier than I anticipated. My hand felt tired after holding it in one hand for more than 5 minutes. Works much better sitting down and holding it in your lap.

Overall, the iPad delivers as expected. It is a great content consumption device out of the box. Time will tell if it is able to build upon that base into other areas.

This is the most inspiring video I’ve seen this week:

I guess there’s something hardwired in me that makes me love the idea of exploring the unknown.

NASA absolutely Rocks!

Like most other self-proclaimed commentators, I had pretty mixed feelings after watching the iPad launch. The good news is that Apple delivered on pretty much everything that was hyped about: A marathon 10 hour battery life, eBook reader, great built-in apps, and an aggressive $499 price tag for the base model. The problem is… Apple delivered pretty much everything that was hyped about. They failed to exceed expectations, and that’s why there’s so much fan-boy moping going on right now.

After a few days of contemplation, I’m sold. I believe the iPad is going to be a game-changer, but it’s going to take a while. The reason is, as Walt Mossberg puts it: “It’s about the software, stupid.” Right now, the iPad isn’t much more than a super-sized iPod Touch. In fact, it is much worse at being a video iPod than the iPod Touch: You can’t put it in your pocket, nor operate it with one hand. It is also much worse compared to a notebook computer at being a computer: The keyboard sucks, it’s less powerful, and you can’t run desktop-style apps on it. The only thing it is better than anything else at, of course, is being a tablet. The billion-dollar question then is, what are tablets going to be great at?

Steve Jobs pitched the iPad at excelling at browsing, email, photos, video, music, games, and eBooks over smartphones and PCs. I find this list hard to believe (RDF notwithstanding). I can’t imagine listening to music while tethered to a tablet, nor holding a tablet through a whole movie vs. just connecting it to my TV. Reading emails is probably fine on a tablet, but probably adequate on an iPhone. Writing long emails on a tablet sounds painful. eBooks are still arguably better served by the Kindle (although I haven’t jumped on that bandwagon yet, still preferring audiobooks myself). There will certainly be plenty of revolutionary games written for the iPad, but I don’t believe Nintendo or XBox has much to worry about in the short term. It’s never going to replace console or portable gaming.

Casual browsing is the one experience I can see the tablet excelling at, but the lack of Flash support prevents it from being a full replacement for a PC. The photo demo is likewise the best-in-class, but I consider that a minority feature on a $499 device.

Here’s the problem: The list represents current activities. The tablet form factor, in order to be successful, is going to ultimately excel at things people can’t yet do well on existing platforms. But it’s impossible to pitch it that way. Apple is facing a chicken-and-egg problem: They need to sell plenty of iPads so developers will build revolutionary apps for it, but it will be hard to do this until there are more revolutionary apps. I believe they made a tactical error in not having more launch-day showcase apps: The un-ported iPhone apps weren’t as impressive on the larger screen. It’s like showing DOS apps in a window during the Windows launch.

However, there was one new and exciting thing in the whole launch keynote that surprised me: The new iWorks apps. Building these was a great move, as is pricing them at $10 each. It shows everyone that the iPad can (one day) run serious productivity apps. Strangely enough, most of the blogosphere seems to have completely missed this. I believe that this is where the promised next app gold-rush will be: Multi-touch productivity apps. Established companies are going to ignore this at their own peril. Using Photoshop with a mouse is one day going to sound insane, as will any other kind of graphics-heavy wysiwyg app. Heavy text entry is probably still less-than-ideal on a tablet (although I may change my mind after actually trying it), but alternatives could bridge that gap (voice recognition perhaps?).

The other thing Apple did most brilliantly with this launch is the pricing: $499 guarantees that no competitor will gain a foothold. ASUS, MSI, and HP might as well cancel their tablets now. They cannot possibly out-do Apple in terms of features and software in the consumer space, and they cannot go low enough on price to be competitive. If they were smart, they would re-think the whole tablet proposition, e.g. focus on larger productivity tablets for businesses, where performance and a full OS is more important than portability and battery-life.

So, my take is that the initial iPad will be a modest success – there will probably be lines on first-availability-day, but not as long as that for the iPhone. Like the first iPod, the naysayers will outnumber the faithful for a year or two. Then once a couple of killer apps emerge, and Apple fixes the bugs in the next iterations, v3 will be the breakthrough people hoped V1 would be.

Apple tablet mockup by nDevilTV

After reading Joe Wilcox’s attempt to pull us back to reality regarding the (rumored) Apple tablet’s potential, I figured it was time to jump on the speculation bandwagon.

I believe the Apple table will be another game changer.

Computers have long been trying to converge on the tablet form-factor, and for good reason. Notice that the folk in Star Trek use tablets, not notebooks. Everyone loves to curl up in bed with a good book, but when was the last time you surfed the web on your notebook in bed? Notebooks are conversation killers in meetings, but pens on (paper) tablets work great.

I have both a desktop and notebook computer at home, but I find that I use my notebook far more often. It’s great to be able to blog from the kitchen, or watch Hulu from the sofa. However, daily use makes the shortcomings of a notebook pretty clear.

Notebooks were literally designed to be portable desktop computer replacements, and their form-factor has hardly changed in 20 years. This means that they are only really optimal for one thing: Single-user data entry. If you need to do intense and interactive work, such as creating a spreadsheet, away from your desk, then a notebook computer is an ideal tool. However, if you are just browsing the web, or playing a casual game, or watching a movie, then the notebook is less-than-ideal. It’s too unwieldy to carry around easily with one hand. It takes up too much room on a table if you just want to watch a movie or photos on the screen – it would be better if the keyboard folded the other way, or didn’t exist at all for that. Free e-books have been around for a long time, but the idea of reading on a notebook never really caught on.

The point is that we have been long satisficing with notebooks, stretching them to do things they were never originally designed to do. This is a ripe problem for someone to solve. And who better than Apple?