Introducing the iPad: Coverage of the Apple 'Come see our latest creation' Event

Jan 27th 2010 by Alex Jordan

10AM: Steve Jobs is on stage.
10:03AM: Apple has 284 retail stores.
10:04AM: Over 140,000 Apps now in the App Store.
10:05AM: $15.6B in FQ1 2010 revenues.
10:06AM: Apple is the largest mobile product company in the world.
10:08AM:Talking about the first Powerbook
10:08AM: “SO all of us use laptops and smartphones… the question has arisen; is there room for something in the middle. We’ve wondered for years as well — in order to create that category, they have to be far better at doing some key tasks… better than the laptop, better than the smartphone.”
10:09AM: “What kind of tasks? Browsing the web. Doing email. Enjoying and sharing pics. Watching videos. Enjoying music. Playing games. Reading ebooks.””If there’s gonna be a third category, it has to be better at these tasks — otherwise it has no reason for being.”
“Now some people thought that was a netbook — the problem is that netbooks aren’t better than anything!”
10:10AM:

10:14AM:

10:15AM: NO Flash Support.

10:18AM: “Next, photos… this is what photos looks like. I can look at everything as a list of photos. I can tap on it…” Flicks and gestures just like the iPhone.

10:22AM: iTunes on iPad

10:24AM: Maps app.

10:25AM: YouTube and Movies

10:30AM: Tech Specs Runs 1Ghz Apple A4 Chip. Apparently designed in-house.

10:32AM: Runs all iPhone apps right out of the box. Can pixel double games to full screen.

10:35AM “So all of the iPhone apps will run on this. In fact when you buy it, download all the apps you have right onto the iPad. Now if the developer spends some time modifying their app, they can take full advantage of this display.”

10:36AM “We rewrote all of our apps for this display. the iPhone SDK supports development for this now… and we’re releasing it today.”

10:36:AM: App Store

10:40AM: Game Demos

10:45AM New York Times and other print media demos.

10:49AM: Need for Speed Shift. Graphics are reportedly smooth.

10:50AM: Chad Evans from MLB.com — “We were excited to build something for the iPad. We had to create a whole new experience for this display.”

10:52AM: Scott: “While we wait for those apps to come out, we can all run our existing apps… and that is the app story for the iPad.” Steve Jobs is back on stage.

10:53AM “Isn’t that awesome? These guys only had two weeks. So we’ve seen some really great apps. Let me show you another… one of our apps. That’s an ebook reader. Now Amazon has done a great job of pioneering this… we’re going to stand on their shoulders for this. Our new app is called iBooks.”

Book shelf.

Five big partners.

10:56AM: Book Store is similar to iTunes.

10:58AM “Now, something very exciting… iWork. A little over a year ago I asked the head of our team about creating iWork for the iPad. The reaction was… ‘ahhh they require a lot of horsepower'”

10:59AM “Could the tablet handle that? You betcha. But they required a new UI — here’s Phil Schiller to tell you about it.”

11:00AM Phil Schiller SVP Product Marketing is on stage. “Good morning everyone. iWork is a suite of apps that millions of customers love.”

iWork for iPad.

Totally redesigned interface for iPad.

It appears iPad has different keyboards for different needs. Spreadsheet keyboard is different than, text entry keyboard.

11:11AM: “So what are we going to charge for applications like this? We’re gong to charge just $9.99 each.” $10 for Keynote, $10 for Pages, etc

11:12AM “Isn’t it great?” Some slight hesitation. “A few other things. I’d like to talk for a minute about iTunes. The iPad syncs over USB just like an iPhone or iPod.”

11:13AM “Now I’d like to talk about wireless networking. Every iPad has WiFi… but we’re also going to have models with 3G.”

11:14AM “Now what does it cost for the data plans? Well in the US carriers charge about $60 a month. We have a real breakthrough. Two awesome plans for iPad owners. The first one gives you 250MB of data a month for $14.99.”

11:14AM “We have an unlimited plan for just $29.99 a month.”

11:14AM “We have a breakthrough deal with AT&T.” Wow. Some serious sharp intakes of breath here.

11:15AM “So how do you turn this on and manage it? You can activate this right on the iPad. And there’s no contract — it’s prepaid.”

11:16AM “So we have a breakthrough deal in the US. We hope to have our international deals in the June / July timeframe. However, all of the iPad 3G models are unlocked, and they use the new GSM microSIMs.”

11:17AM “WiFI plus 3G if you want it. So iPad. It’s phenomenal. Email is fantastic, best device for photos, great for music, great for video. It runs almost all of the 140k apps on the app store, as well as a whole new generation of apps.”

11:17AM “And the new iBooks application. You can carry literally thousands of books around. And the iWork suite of apps with the best UI we’ve ever seen for something like this.”

11:17AM “What should we price it at?”

11:18AM “And just like we were able to meet or exceed our tech goals, we have met our cost goals… iPad pricing starts at $499.”

11:18AM “If you listen to the pundits, we’re going to price it under $1000, which is code for $999. When we set out to develop this, we had ambitious tech goals, but we had aggressive price goals.”

11:18AM “And just like we were able to meet or exceed our tech goals, we have met our cost goals… iPad pricing starts at $499.”

11:20AM “So $499 for 16GB of iPad. That’s our base model. 32GB is $599, 64GB is $799. 3G models cost an extra $130. $629, 729, and 829 with 3G.”

11:20AM “We will be shipping these in 60 days. 3G models will ship in 90 days.”

11:21AM “We’ve got some really great accessories. First one is a dock. You know the slideshow I showed you? When it’s in the dock you have a great picture frame. We have another dock that’s interesting… the keyboard dock.”

Now playing a demo video. No multitaksing, no phone calls (as far as I can tell).

11:30AM “Do we have what it takes to establish a third category of products?”

11:31AM “We think we’ve got the goods. We think we’ve done it. Another thing we’re excited about is that there’s already 75m people who know how to use this because of how many iPhones and iPod touches we’ve shipped.”