According to a report released by Strategy Analytics, the Apple iPad has gained a 95 percent share of Tablet PC sales at the end of second quarter 2010. And during the second quarter 2010, Apple had sold 4.19 million iPads around the world.
The iPad runs the same operating system as the iPod Touch and iPhone. It can run its own applications as well as ones developed for the iPhone. Withoutmodification, it will only run programs approved by Apple and distributed via its online store.
Like iPhone and iPod Touch, the iPad is controlled by a multitouch display, a break from most previous tablet computers, which used a pressure-triggeredstylus. The iPad uses a Wi-Fi data connection to browse the Internet, load and stream media, and install software. Some models also have a 3G wireless data connection which can connect to GSM 3G data networks. The device is managed and synced by iTunes on a personal computer via USB cable.
Media reaction to the device has generally been neutral or positive, with more positive reaction after the device was launched.
Books, news, and magazine content
The iPad has an optional iBooks application that can be downloaded from the App Store, which displays books and other ePub-format content downloaded from the iBook store. For the iPad launch on April 3, 2010, the iBookstore is available only in the United States. Several major book publishers including Penguin Books, HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster and Macmillan have committed to publishing books for the iPad. Despite being a direct competitor to both the Amazon Kindle andBarnes & Noble Nook,[citation needed] both Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble have made Kindle & Nook apps available for the iPad.
In February 2010, Condé Nast Publications said it would sell iPad subscriptions for its GQ, Vanity Fair and Wired magazines by June.
In April 2010, The New York Times announced it will begin publishing daily on the iPad. As of October 2010, The New York Times iPad app is ad-supported and available for free without a paid subscription, but will transition to a subscription-based model in 2011. Major news organizations, such as The Wall Street Journal, BBC, and Reuters have released iPad applications, to varying degrees of success.
Censorship
Apple's App Store, which provides iPhone and iPad applications, imposes censorship of content, which has become an issue for book publishers and magazines seeking to use the platform. The Guardiandescribed the role of Apple as analogous to that of the distributor WH Smith, a main distributor which for many years imposed content restrictions on British publishers.
Due to the exclusion of porn from the App Store, YouPorn and others changed their video format from Flash to H.264 and HTML5 specifically for the iPad. In an e-mail exchange with Ryan Tate fromValleywag, Steve Jobs claimed that the iPad offers "freedom from porn", leading to many upset replies including Adbustings in Berlin by artist Johannes P. Osterhoff and in San Francisco during WWDC10.
