College students can rejoice. On April 3, Apple will provide a device to clear out the backpack and today the blogsphere is abuzz about the slim $20 student discount. Two great reasons to be excited about the Apple iPad.
Now caution should be applied to the student discount. Apple has not announced pricing to educational institutions. In fact, this may be quite some time. The discount is for purchasing a 10 pack.
Tim Carmody has it right as he explains the reasons that Apple is good for students and educators:
The iPad wants to conquer your backpack.
Yes, the Apple iPad is all about the backpack for college students. The Apple iBook application will have limitations during the first year, for example, the application is not installed by default and users must download the application. Regardless of this minor challenge, book publishers will warm to the ability to have students download textbooks. Actually, publishers will realize they are able to sell more books.
Consider my graduate school career. For four years I was purchasing new books every 8 weeks. Some classes required up to 5 textbooks. Additionally, there were hundreds of journal articles as required reading. The iPad would have been a spectacular way to do this reading. While I mainly used my Tablet PCs – the weight did become a reason to put the book down and stretch.
I doubt the course load taken over those four years is less than other graduate students, therefore, I imagine publishers to figure out ways to get more textbooks into the hands of college students and the profits will soar.
It’s also about a companion device for bloggers, too.
Starting April 3, bloggers will be able to comfortably update their website from anywhere in the world: The iPhone applications will be available for updating WordPress or simply go through the browser.
Bloggers no longer have to worry about having an idea and not being able to get to your computer to update the blog. Imagine using the Overdrive from Sprint with your iPad and being anywhere in the world to update your blog. Now that would be cool.