Having just watched the latest Apple keynote, I have to admit at being quite impressed at the latest products. Even John Gruber got it wrong! After flat-out claiming there would be no iPadPro announcement, there we have it! But the internet seems rather pre-occupied by the smile issue, and the pencil.
Regarding the smile, I couldn’t care less.
Regarding the pencil, I kind of think is works. Or at least, it’s the right time for a stylus.
“It’s like we said on the iPad, if you see a stylus, they blew it.” - Steve Jobs, 2010.
Having said that (in my best Seinfeld voice), I think in 2010 Steve’s statement was correct. The iPad was a brand new product, it hadn’t even entered the market, and all other tablets were beyond terrible.
However, now, with increasing phone sizes, the difference between and iPhone and an iPad is very small. I myself sold my iPad and bought an iPhone 6+ because I found myself doing everything I wanted to do on an iPad on my phone because it was more convenient (and always on my person). The iPad is great for people who don’t need a laptop and love surfing from the couch. But when their phone can do all that and is easier / or at least more convenient, where does that leave the iPad?
The pencil then is the differentiator. Not just between the iPhone and the iPad but between the iPad and the Surface and the Macbook One. The Pencil opens up the iPad to all those people who wonder why we aren’t all taking notes by hand using tablets in 2015, all the people who want to sketch out changes to a document yet find themselves having to print a hard copy in order to do so, and all the people who want to create images / art or whatever without using some archaic touch pad.
The only thing I am wondering, is whether the iPadPro is able to effectively ignore hand inputs when using the stylus, as drawing/writing with your hand elevated from the screen for an extended period of time would quickly become a pain. If the software, or the hardware I’m guessing can effectively ignore hand input while the Pencil is on the screen then this could be a really neat tool.