There seems to be a disconnect between the technical media which overseas new gadgets, and the customers which buy the aforementioned gadgets.
The iPhone? The skeptics laughed. The customers bought by the hundreds of millions. The iPad? Skeptics called it a big iPod touch. Customers bought it by the tens of millions. Who on earth is not expecting Apple to introduce an iPad mini to the masses? May he speak now, or forever hold his peace. But please change the name, Apple.
Change The King’s Name
Forgive my hubris. I don’t get up on the Apple soapbox often (I’m afraid of heights). Allow me a moment of over caffeinated attitude and predict Apple’s soon-to-be-released new iPad will be a hit.
How could it not? The iPad, now in a third generation, rules the tablet roost, despite being heavier and more expensive than the competition?
Competition? Up and down the line most of the iPad’s less expensive competition lose money with every Kindle Fire or Google Nexus or Samsung Whatever they sell.
The business plan appears to be to make up the losses by increasing volume. Regardless, there’s a vacuum in the pricing between the $199 Fire HD and the $249 Nexus 7 vs. Apple’s iPad which is priced at $399– for last year’s model.
The latest iPad starts at $499, so there’s room for Apple to play in the space between iPad maxi, and the also-rans of plastic city.
By all accounts, the new 7-inch or nearby iPad will be named iPad mini. It’ll be smaller, yes, but slightly larger than the competition, and probably feature a great screen (not as good as the Retina display), and run all iPad apps.
But, please, Apple don’t call it the iPad mini. Be innovative. Be revolutionary. Why? Because iPad mini means the larger iPad will become, by default, the iPad maxi, and MaxiPad carries a completely different connotation to women of the world.
Trust me, Apple. Just don’t go there.
Whatever the name, Apple is sure to have customers line up by the hundreds at each store to pick up an iPad mini instead of trying out an Android tablet or Google tablet or a Samsung tablet.
Related: The Stupidest Name Ever For An Apple Product, and 6 Reasons The iPad Doesn’t Suck Anymore, And 4 Things That Would Make It Better
There is speculation that an iPad mini would also crush sales of Apple’s iPod touch. I don’t think so.
Try putting a 7-inch tablet into your pocket. What I expect to see in the next year is a fist fight for second place in the Tablet Wars between Google, Amazon, and Samsung, with Apple, again, taking the lion’s share of revenue and profits from the market segment.
News reports indicate that Microsoft and their former partners will ship competing tablet devices based on Windows 8 and Windows RT, so competition is anything but non-existant for Apple.
