The iPad - Does it have to change the world?

Yesterday Apple launched the iPad. The frenzy of speculation over the specifications is over but the hyperbole isn't.

"Can the Apple iPad iBook Store take on Amazon?" asks T3. "Apple’s iPad Tablet Could Slay eBooks and Netbooks" shouts Digital Trends. Nicholas Carr in The New Republic goes even further; "The PC Officially Died Today" he tells us.

Calm down people.

Why does the iPad have to take on Amazon, kill the netbook or in any other way fundamentally change the world?

The reality is that yesterday Apple launched a large, flat, iPod touch with optional 3G data connection.

Whether you personally love it or hate it Apple will sell millions of them and make plenty of money. In a year or so they'll launch iPad version 2 into a market crowded with with tablet devices and e-readers all jostling for their own particular niche. But to claim that this changes the world really is misunderstanding how innovation in technology works.

Oh, and if you think the Apple iPad triggers a little sense of deja vu, you might want to take a look at the "oh, so nearly made it" Crunchpad.