Harry McCracken at Time has been using an iPad as his primary computer for a couple of years now, and he still gets guff about it. But that’s nothing compared to the general consensus that taking photos with an iPad is worthy of ridicule. When Apple added cameras to the iPad 2, it was pretty amusing to see people taking photos with the tablet. Don’t they realize they look like dorks? was a common refrain. (I thought so, too. Although my bigger complaint was with the image quality of those first cameras.)
But since then, I’ve changed my mind because in the real world, people are using iPads as cameras all the time. I linked to Shawn Blanc’s post last week about how the iPad has given his legally-blind grandfather a way to capture photos. And that’s just one example.
Now McCracken is putting a flag in the ground: “Resolved: There’s Nothing Stupid about Using the iPad as a Camera.
With all due respect to such people, they seem to have some form of cognitive disorder that leaves them believing that what’s right for them is right for everybody. But if somebody is doing something with a computer and is happy doing so, it’s usually a good sign that the person in question has found something that works. Not for you, not for me — for that person.
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But the thing is, none of this matters. If a meaningful number of people choose to use an iPad as a camera, those people have found something that works for them. Why any of them should care about what anybody else thinks, I don’t know.
Jeff Carlson | Never Enough Coffee Creations 