:talkingfuture.com Come and learn about the future…

Martin: One of the most significant things about the iPad is the also the most obvious: its bigger than the iPhone.

The app store is a brilliant thing. Developers get to focus on making great software for a controlled set of hardware while Apple look after virtually all the administration. The apps are available allover the world in local currencies from a reputable source with uniform simplicity. Imagine if all these developers had to host their applications on their own servers and sort out all the financial stuff that goes with selling an international product. Not a pretty sight is it?

As a consumer the only flaw in the app store was that the apps only worked on that little iPhone screen. A larger screen means that games can be more detailed, more controls and functions can be on screen without obscuring the app itself. Suddenly the platform is open to apps like the iWork demo at the iPad keynote. Imagine the possibilities for iPhone optimized versions of the current Sketchbook and Photoshop apps not to mention all the other possibilities.

There was a lot of talk before the iPad event about Apple getting together with publishers to reinvent newspapers and magazines. The app store and a 10 inch screen now makes this possible. Imagine a magazine such as Wired creates an iPad app. Within the app you can purchase the latest issue of the magazine. The pages appear in the app pretty much as though you are using an ereader to read a .pdf copy of the magazine. But that is just the beginning, the articles can have interactive diagrams, photos can become movies when you tap them: the possibilities are endless.

Now another scenario: The BBC could make an iPlayer app. Download it and you have the whole of the BBC’s output including live TV and Radio quite literally at your fingertips. Now imagine that Sky and NBC and Discovery make apps too. Interactive on demand content going straight to the consumer on a global scale, Apple do the admin, the producers make the content and everyone is happy.

Thats why we will eventually see this on a 15 inch screen, a 24 inch screen and maybe one day a 40 inch screen. The computer as we know it won’t be around for long.