Like many others, I watched the announcement yesterday (via various live streams) and also kept up on the sites live blogging. I must say that after the iPad was introduced and described, I could not help but feel very let down. It's the one things that the rumors kept saying, and the one thing I did not want... a giant iPod Touch. In fact... a lesser iPod Touch since it lacks some of it's built in apps. While I could see this device as something I would use a lot around the house to surf the web and check email... I already have lots of ways to do that and spending at least $500 for a slightly better experience is going to be tough to swallow. I wanted a laptop replacement... not a bigger, crippled version of my phone.

My major gripes are:

• No camera.... you kidding me?? A webcam might have made me forget about all the other stuff... but really no ability to video conference? This is a deal breaker.
• No multi-tasking - While I can't accept it on my iPhone (and will be jail breaking if not added in 4.0), I really can not accept it in a tablet. It's 10" computer with a powerful processor, and we're stuck running one app at a time? Unacceptable.
• This one is a little unclear, but it looks like no GPS in the wifi version and perhaps cell tower triangulation in the 3G version... You put a compass in it, but could not afford a GPS chip?
• The screen ratio... a 4:3 old school TV size? Everything is wide screen these days. One of the great things about the tablet would be watching movies... but by the time it scales the fir the screen you've lost 1/2 the resolution! Makes no sense to me at all. Least the iPhone is close to 16:9..
• A extra $130 for the 3G option? No Kindle like free data plan? AT&T???? No tether option to use the iPhone data plan? I'm not paying AT&T twice for HORRIBLE service.

No hopefully some of these issues will be fixed in iPhone OS 4.0 (it's running 3.2 currently) and the hardware issues fixed in version 2. While I might be slightly tempted for the cheapest version for around the house web surfing... I think I'll save my money for the next iPhone.

Enough of the rant... time to score my predictions.

1. No iTunes announcements... Grade: F
2. No iPhone announcements... Grade: F
3. No iPhone 4.0 announcement... Grade: F
4. I nailed the name (event he fact they brought back iBook), got the 10" size, and the external controls. Came close on networking, the dock ports. Missed on camera, tethering, OS version, and landscape docking. Grade: B-

All in all I'd say I failed this announcement. But, I will say a lot of what I predicted still may happen in the next 6 months, just was not on yesterdays agenda.