I applaud, you applaud, we all applaud the ipad

This was my speech last night. I didn't win, but I also didn't get to say the whole speech, because I went over the 5 to 7 minutes. Six years of toastmasters and I still can't get my whole speech within the allotted time--oh well, I hope you enjoy it.

I Applaud, You Applaud, We All Applaud the ipad!

So last year the ipad came out and I thought—that’s just a glorified iphone without the phone. I don’t need that. Sure, I LOOOOVVVEE my iphone, but the ipad is just a bigger version. I’ll just wear my glasses. I didn’t need an ipad.

I got dad an ipad and he absolutely looovveed it. But I already had my beloved iphone. I didn’t need an ipad.

Then Adam, my favorite nephew who’s lived with me since he was a baby moved to Australia. I was bereft, miserable, inconsolable, lost, so very sad. I need an ipad (and a trip to Hawaii).

OMG I love my ipad. It is my iphone, but bigger. AND you can watch movies on it. AND, well, let’s go through the main features about the ecstasy that is the ipad.

First and foremost—there’s no phone and there’s no camera, but otherwise it is very like the iphone in versatility and for the apps. I have heard that they are actually coming out with an ipad with a phone, but that just seems silly.

Next, there are several types of ipads (not to mention the other notebook computers that are following in ipad’s very large footprints, but I digress). There is an ipad that only gets 3G which is what my phone uses to get onto the internet and to sync with my computer. There is also an ipad that only gets the wifi wireless internet connection. My dad has that one, since he has wireless internet at his house--he's at his house most of the time. I have wireless internet at my house, but I leave my house all the time for most of the day, and I do not have wireless internet at my office. Now there are all of these advertisements that McDonalds and bookstores and airports and even some entire cities have wireless internet available, but I tried it at Borders bookstore for my iphone and it actually erased my ebook application—I guess it was trying to sell me Border’s version, but I digress.

So the final type of ipad (currently available—they are always coming out with something new) is the 3G and wireless. It costs a little more, but when you are grieving over missing your pseudo son who moved 18 time zones away, you don’t really care how much it costs.

So my ipad has 3G. This involves a monthly fee, but there is no contract. So it was $14.99 per month for 250 M Bs (whatever those are). After about four days, I received an e-mail that said I was about to go over my 250 MB’s, but for $25 I could get 2 GB’s—M stands for mega and G stands for Giga. So I think of it as 250,000 and 2 million. That’s not it really, but that’s how I think of it. Anyway, I got the 2 GB’s and I’ve got thousands and thousands of MB's left for the month. I think I’m going to be ok going back down to the 250 plan next month. The real explanation from a live guy at at&t said that if I tried to download a movie one time using 3G and not the internet, I’d use my entire 2GB--$25 for one movie, I don’t think I’ll be making that mistake now that I know.

But, the data plan allows my ipad to sync to my computer at the office even if I am away from the internet—so I get my e-mails. There is a cute little noise when something comes up on my calendar that I haven’t silenced yet and I’m thinking of leaving it, because it is just so darn cute—but I won’t keep any noise to tell me about e-mails—I just get too many.

Anyhoo, I had the ipad (didn’t blink at the price tag--didn't look either, but I digress), I had the data plan ($14.99 or $25 per month) and I was ready to go. The apple store guy said would you like a free consultation to get you started. Now normally, I’m a “I don’t need to read the directions kind of gal”, but I thought, what the hey—it’s free. OMG, how lucky am I that I still wanted more distractions from missing Adam, because the free consultation guy showed me how to get kindle books for the ipad. There is an apple book store and a kindle book store—well really it is Amazon, but if you go through the kindle app, then you don’t have to do anything after it is set up and when you buy a book, it magically appears on your ipad. Oh, it is so beautiful. AND the free book that the apple store gives you is Winnie the Pooh with pictures—the kids love looking at that. And the free consultation guy spent the time to find the complete works of Emily Dickenson and showed me how to use the search key so that I could find a needle in a haystack (long story) that I now know with a fair amount of certainty doesn’t exist.

Back to the ipad. So I got back to my office and synced to my computer. It goes through itunes. So everything that I had on my iphone (also purchased through itunes or the apple app store which is in itunes—synced to the ipad. Now I had all of the apps from my phone on my ipad (except ebooks—that’s odd—I blame Borders).

The apps that came from my iphone are small on my ipad or I can press a key and make them twice as big. The picture of most things on the ipad is amazingly clear and wonderful, but not so much on the apps that came over from the iphone that have to be enlarged to the ipad. No worries—so many apps are free, I just went and found them for the ipad.

The pictures—all the pictures on my computer—hundreds of pictures—all synced to the ipad. My e-mail, my calendar, my contacts list and I just tried something today—if I scan a court document and e-mail it to myself, I can open it in my e-mail and not have to bring the court file to court—I have it on my ipad. I am so spoiled.

Now I was incredibly aware that all I really had was a larger iphone without the phone or the camera, so I went looking for things that I would use the ipad for that I didn’t use the iphone for. Newspapers and magazines. I have USA today on the ipad (for free) and I read it everyday. I never have the patience to read newspapers. I also have subscribed to my favorite magazine (although it was in the grocery store one day earlier than it was available on the ipad—bummer). It is so cool not to have the paper copy taking up space, but I don’t have to worry about not saving it because I might want to reread an article—it’s on my ipad.

I have to say I love, love, love my ipad, but my poor iphone is feeling neglected. I just don’t make that many phone calls or take very many pictures. When it dies, I probably will not replace it—but I may be tempted to trade it in for the next generation of ipads that have a phone.