‘Why the iPad Is My New Laptop’

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Shawn Blanc:

Within my circle of friends, I know several people who are also using their iPad as their portable computer. I even have a handful friends who have an iPad as their only computer.

It is not a sacrifice to use the iPad as a primary device.

[…]

The iPad is a compelling computer, and it is quickly maturing right before our eyes.

My MacBook Pro sits at home more than it used to. Like Shawn, I wouldn’t go back to a desktop computer, because the times I do need to take my Mac somewhere, it is really nice to be able to do so.

That said, I can do the majority of my daily computing tasks done on just my iPad.

The Kid's Table

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Rene Ritchie at iMore reports that Apple has replaced the iMacs at the kid’s table with iPads at their retail stores.

Whenever I go to the Apple Store, my son runs straight for the kid’s table. I was always amazed that at three years old he learned how to use a mouse pretty quickly at that table (he has an old iPod touch, and uses my iPad often).

I had been wondering at each visit for some time now when Apple would make such a move, as it seemed like a natural fit. When I told my son a few moments ago that the Apple Store now has iPads at the kids table, he replied, “When can we go play with them?”

Verizon Wireless to launch shared data plans this summer

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BGR:

Now, during the company’s first-quarter earnings call on Thursday, McAdam clarified that shared data plans will become available to Verizon Wireless subscribers by the middle of the summer.

Both times I have bought an iPhone, AT&T was the only option. A family data plan would be great for my wife and I. Not only that, but it would ensure I would always buy the cellular wireless model of iPad in the future.

I’d be surprised if my wife and I stay with AT&T when the next iPhone comes out.

This is the Mail System

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Sebastiaan de With points out how broken email is:

the list of comically broken anachronisms in email as a system — a system we rely on and use every day — just goes on and on. This isn’t just an ‘oh, that’s kind of bad’ type of thing: email has to be fixed.

His mock-up of a first step in making email systems smarter and more human-understandable is great. I wouldn’t be surprised to see more ideas like this come from Sebastiaan.

iCloud vs. the web

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Manton Reece, creator of the awesome Tweet Marker service, discusses iCloud:

It’s a step forward on user convenience and a step back on interoperability.

I like iCloud for document storage. It is fast and, so far, reliable. However, it scares the crap out of me that iCloud document storage is essentially trapped within little app silos.

If you ask me, iCloud should stores files by file type, with apps able to read and write to the file type silos. For instance, all .txt files are accessible to any app that can read and write them. The same goes for images file types, and so on and so forth.

It’s still early days for iCloud, but I hope some of the obvious problems are corrected sooner rather than later. Until then, I’m a huge fan of Dropbox (referral link).

5 Reasons Why You Should Take A Nap Every Day

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Michael Hyatt takes a nap every day and has some good reasons for doing so. Personally, I tend to be a “keep going until I have no more energy to expend” person, and I can feel that it isn’t good for me.

Some days, I take a break and use pzizz energizer [App Store] to help me adhere to a 20-minute nap. The days I nap I feel much better. Maybe there’s something to it.