Is the Apple iPad just another gadget? Or will it make its mark on history?

The Apple iPad is loose in the world. More than 500,000 of them as of last report. Does it matter? Will it make a dent in the world? Or is this just another gadget: a new package, an iffy name, with lots of hype, soon to be overrun by the next media blitz?

No denying, this is another gadget. Some claim it’s the best thing since sliced bread. Others are sick of hearing about it. There are plenty of things it won’t do. Yet, as the hype settles, there may be reason to believe that the iPad is more than “just another gadget.” Having held the thing ourselves, we’re betting the iPad will make its mark on history. Here’s why.

The “Gadget”

It used to be said that books would never die; no one wants to curl up with a computer. The iPad changes that. The interface is so effortless, so natural, that it is book-like in simplicity — yet in some ways, better. Want books? iBooks and the Kindle app provide an enjoyable e-reading experience, complete with page flips and resizable text. Want something better? Try an animated book, such as Alice in Wonderland (see the video demo below).

Meanwhile, things once categorized under “computing” — surfing the Web, reading the news, viewing a movie, perusing Facebook, or tweeting your status — all become intimate in a new way. You can have all this while curled up in your favorite chair, and you can read your beautifully rendered (e)books, too.

We aren’t making this up. This recognition has been a common refrain among early users. Stephen Fry of TIME Magazine writes:

“I had been prepared for a smooth feel, for a bright screen and the “immersive” experience everyone had promised. I was not prepared, though, for how instant the relationship I formed with the device would be.”

Another reviewer comments:

“The iPad has a familiarity that it shouldn’t…. Nothing so artificial and synthetic should immediately seem so natural and organic.”

Designer, Craig Mod tweeted:

“I have never seen a piece of technology so instantly transform grown men into wide-eyed wonder boys.”

There’s a secret sauce working here: a rare combination of elegant hardware and exquisite user interface. “It’s about the software, stupid,” as Walt Mossberg has put it.

From the iPod’s scroll-wheel to the touch interaction of the iPhone, Apple has devoted itself to the enhancement of the user experience. Critics often complain about the lack of a keyboard or a camera on an Apple device. But Apple has concentrated relentlessly on the reduction of complexity. The result of that focus: Technology gets out of the way. Content comes to the fore. Users’ interaction with that content takes center stage. (See the iPad demo for WIRED Magazine, for example.)

Admittedly, the device is not for everyone, nor for every use. Content creation is easier done while seated at a computer. But when it comes to consuming and interacting with media, the iPad greatly humanizes the experience. As David Pogue puts it, “The haters [of the iPad] tend to be techies; the fans tend to be regular people.” We wager there’ll be a whole lot more regular people with iPads in their hands come Christmas.

But there is another reason why the iPad will make its mark on history. As effective as Apple has been at creating innovative hardware and software, the company has proven just as adept at realigning media industries.

The Market

The iPod could never have been what it became without iTunes. No matter how simple and elegant the device, it needed an equally simple and elegant purchasing-and-loading mechanism. By making music-shopping so easy and music-loading so effortless, one could argue that iTunes sold the iPod. It was no small feat to shift major music labels from selling CD’s through a variety of distribution chains to selling MP3′s through Apple’s online store. But Apple made it happen, transforming the music industry in the process.

With the iPad the story is similar, but bigger. Between the iPod and the iPad came the addition of movies, TV shows, podcasts, and audio books to the iTunes store. Hundreds of universities now offer more than 250,000 lectures, videos, and other resources through iTunes University. When the iPhone launched in 2008, the new App Store came to iTunes, opening new horizons for software developers. At the time of this writing, more than 150,000 mobile software applications are available for free or cheap through that store.

With the launch of the iPad, we have seen major news, magazine, book, and textbook publishers join the Apple bandwagon, all hoping that the new platform may help save their struggling industries. “The Elements,” an interactive introduction to the periodic table, brings enough interactive whimsy and hard information to the task that it could almost give one hope for the future of education.

Whether the iPad can save book publishers remains to be seen. But salvation stories are already out there. Apparently, iTunes sales helped save NBC’s “The Office” from cancellation. Others, in the meanwhile, anticipate a new wave of creative destruction, suggesting that Apple’s new device may signal the end, not of books, but of cable television as we know it. (Here’s hoping.) Others point with fascination to a war for world domination shaping up between forces like Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Apple.

Clearly, this will be something to watch.

With each new distribution agreement and each new app, the iPad is etching its mark on history. Two weeks after launch, the device is proving to be a game changer. Judging by the huge effort made by book, television, newspaper, and magazine companies to have their wares ready beforehand, the iPad had already changed the game on day one.

So … What?

What does the iPad mean to you? Two things, at a minimum.

First, this will shape your technological future for awhile. Not everyone will have iPads. But nearly every computer company is working to roll out their own similar devices. On one device or another, there’s going to be a lot more iPad-like stuff going on. As that happens, audiences will develop new expectations for interacting with content — whether books, magazines, movies, or video games. Be aware and be savvy.

Second, the demand for designers of interactive media is getting yet another boost. HTML, CSS, and Javascript — the core languages of the Web — now play an increasingly important role for design-in-general. Not everyone needs to know these languages, but the advantage will go to those who do — and in particular to those who know how to use them well.

For Further Reading

iPad Reviews, Introductions, and Demos

• An Introduction to the iPad :: WIRED
• Video: 5 Sweet Apps to Break in Your iPad :: WIRED
• Apple’s Own iPad Introductory Videos :: Apple.com
• David Pogue, “Looking at the iPad From Two Angles” :: New York Times
• MacWorld’s iPad Review

The iPad and the Media Marketplace

• Apple Racking Up Victories In Its War With Flash (Netflix, Hulu, etc.) :: BusinessInsider
• Condé Nast Adds 4 Titles to iPad Initiative :: WIRED
• Colleges Dream of Paperless, iPad-centric Education :: WIRED
• Book Publishers Welcome Apple Pricing, Mixed on iPad Features :: PBS.org
• Comic Book Publishers Plot Comeback via Apple IPad :: BusinessWeek
• Major League Baseball Brings MLB-TV to iPad :: BusinessInsider
• How Apple became a global trendsetter :: BusinessWeek

iPad Competitors

• 9 Upcoming Tablet Alternatives to the Apple iPad :: Mashable.com
• Reading the tea leaves of iPad competitors :: CNET.com

The iPad’s Implications for Design and Publishing

The iPad and the Future of Computing and the Web

• iPad OS “represents a head-butt” to Google’s Chrome initiative :: WIRED
• iPad Model May Portend the Future of Computing :: stevenf
• Sproutcore: Apple’s Javascript Flash Killer :: RoughlyDrafted

iPad App Recommendations

• 25 Insanely Useful iPad Apps Available Now :: MacAppStorm
• Gizmodo’s Essential iPad Apps Roundup

On Building iPad Apps

This website is devoted to Communication Majors at Oklahoma Wesleyan University. For our faculty and students, the site provides a launching-off point for many of our courses and online projects. Others are of course invited to poke around!

• improved layout
• improved navigation bar (already in place, but not yet optimized for Internet Explorer 7 or 6)
• new color scheme (obviously not yet implemented at the time of this post)
• various nice touches here and there, to be gradually implemented

So that’s what’s up.

Hopefully the contents will remain accessible, even as the design touches take shape.

A snapshot of the results of CSS3 experiment with this site, as of June 23, 2009, 11:08 p.m. EST (Boston).

In a refrain sure to cause trouble for mere mortals — or perhaps to help us immensely(!) — one industry leading web designer after another stepped up to the podium at An Event Apart, Boston to reinforce the following points:

1. Not all browsers are created equal.
2. The browsers that have done the best job of integrating latest web design standards enable designers to do better work more quickly, saving time and money for themselves and for their clients.
3. Because of the real advantages of #2, everyone needs to start getting used to the idea that A WEB SITE DOES NOT HAVE TO LOOK EXACTLY THE SAME IN EVERY BROWSER. Can you easily find and read the content? Is it meaningful? Are there any design elements that DISTRACT your efforts to reach the content? These are the key questions.
4. Now, as certain (unnamed [IE6]) legacy browsers are fading from the scene (more or less), and as more and more browsers (particularly Firefox, Safari, Chrome, and Opera) are implementing advanced and time-saving CSS technologies — NOW is a great time for designers (including mere mortals) to begin experimenting with advanced CSS and discovering the best implementation techniques.

So, at this moment, I’ve discovered:

1. Safari, Chrome, and Firefox all allow the designer to code rounded corners on elements, including borders.
2. FIREFOX has this FANTASTIC way of tapering a wide border as it rounds a corner into a narrower border. (Thus, the screenshot attached to this post.)
3. Safari and Chrome don’t allow this, at least not yet.
4. So this site doesn’t look great in Safari and Chrome at the moment. View it in Firefox instead. It looks great (IMHO)!
5. I’ll be doing some more working, tweaking, and adjusting after I get some sleep. (“Iterations” we call it.)

It will look relatively bare for a bit (and it won’t always look exactly “good”), but it will continue to morph (and hopefully improve) over time. (THE ADVANCED CSS TECHNIQUES WILL LOOK BEST IN ADVANCED BROWSERS, LIKE FIREFOX — AND EVEN BETTER IN SAFARI OR CHROME.)

The experimentation will incorporate advanced CSS techniques such those as reviewed in the article “Take Your Design to the Next Level with CSS 3.”

Interested in growing your web design skills? Here are a few choice recommendations.

Learn (X)HTML and CSS

1. HTML Dog Tutorials
2. W3 Schools

Recommended FREE code editors:

• PSpad (Windows)
• TextWrangler (Mac OS X)

Work on your Design Skills

1. Design a Beautiful Website From Scratch – Nettuts+
2. 8 Great Web Design Tutorials – Powerusers

Convert your Design into a XHTML/CSS Website

1. How to Convert a PSD to XHTML – Screencast – Jeffrey Way @ Nettuts+
2. Converting a Design From PSD to HTML – Screencast – Jeffrey Way @ Nettuts+

Turn it into a WordPress Theme

This step enables you to integrate your design with the powerful WordPress content management system. It’s a bit more complicated, and so the best resources tend to cost a few bucks. But here are two good options, well worth the price:

1. How to Be a Rockstar WordPress Designer – Downloadable PDF Book – $29
2. The Best PSD to HTML to WordPress Video Series Available – Nettuts+ “Plus” Tutorial – $9/month subscription

Looking for a free option? Try this:

• Designing for WordPress: Part One – CSS Tricks
• Part Two
• Part Three

What if I get Stuck, Frustrated, or Confused?

1. Drop me a line. (Use the form below!)
2. Sign up for my Introduction to Web Design course this fall at Oklahoma Wesleyan, where we’ll tackle these things and more.

cforms contact form by delicious:days

In this article David Airey provides the five elements that can be seen in every iconic logo. When designing a logo, these are key. Neat!

Logo Design and Branding Trends 2009

Looking for inspiration as well as things not to do? This article covers all the fads, good and bad, of 2009 and explains them. What more could you look for? Overall not a great resource for designing a logo, but useful in that it offers places to start. Again, the comments provide an interesting counter-point to the article, and should definitely be considered.

Seven Ingredients of Good Corporate Design

Another astounding resource from our friends at Smashing Magazine, this article outlines all the basic ingredients that need to go into the corporate design of a company, including the logo design. While not specifically about logos, this article provides the broader view that directly effects logo design.

In this tutorial, they explain how to create an illustrated poster and how to set up your own crop marks in a few easy steps. This tutorial is aimed at the beginning Adobe Illustrator user. Creating this poster is relatively easy, so let’s get started!

Illustrator Quicktips: Live Trace

Here’s a basic explanation of the Live Trace function in Adobe Illustrator. Using Illustrator’s Live Trace function, bitmap and rasterized images can quickly and easily be converted to highly malleable vector objects. Zoom In Online Pro Producer Matthew Hendershot demonstrates the Live Trace workflow, outlining all of the options available for creating traces. This movie doesn’t give a specific tutorial, rather it includes the principles and foundations of the function. Neat!

7 Things You Didn’t Know Illustrator Could do.

Have you ever just started playing with Adobe Illustrator and wondered just what this program could do? Here’s a good place to start, with 7 interesting features of Illustrator featured on the Attitude Design Blog. Interestingly enough this was posted way back in June 2007 and since then they’ve also added another article like this: 7 More Things You Didn’t Know About Adobe Illustrator. So really, you get two great articles in one. When you get to the bottom of the first article click on the next! Enjoy!

This tutorial will show you how to use type along paths, and inside of Shapes. Using these techniques, type can morph to take shapes that would ordinarily be very difficult to create and modify.

How to Make a Photoshop Brush

A quick, deceptively simple walk through to making your own photoshop brushes. For the next time that you make an image that you think you’d like to use again, here’s how to save it.

Photoshop’s Pen Tool: The Comprehensive Guide

I don’t know about you but I found this pretty exciting. Brought to you by the wonderful people at psdtuts (a sterling resource for web design as well as graphic design) this article includes such tasteful nuggets as Functions, Keyboard Shortcuts, and an Exercise File that will allow you to practice all you’ve learned. Neat!

The School of Arts and Sciences and the School of Business at Oklahoma Wesleyan University have teamed up to create a new hybrid bachelors degree program, Graphic Design and Marketing Dynamics. Designed to equip students with professional-grade graphic design skills and an informed understanding of the contemporary marketplace, the degree includes coursework in Graphic Design, Web Design, and Portfolio development, as well as Advertising, Marketing, Public Relations, Business Research Methods, and Consumer Behavior.

“In our highly competitive, media-saturated marketplace, graduates who bring this combination of skills and understanding will carry an edge as they apply for high-demand positions in advertising agencies, public relations offices, graphic design firms, businesses, churches, and not-for-profit organizations,” said David Cochran, Assistant Professor of Communication and a lead professor in the new program.

Graphic Design courses include:

• Introduction to Graphic Design
• Introduction to Web Design
• Advanced Graphic Design Electives
• Production Lab
• Portfolio
• Communication Internship
• Capstone Project

Business and Marketing courses include:

• Personal Finance
• Principles of Management
• Principles of Advertising
• Public Relations
• Principles of Marketing
• Business Research Methods
• Marketing Management
• Consumer Behavior