Are Tablets Just Too Expensive?

An anonymous reader writes "Over at PCWorld they're asking a simple but valid question: Are tablets just too expensive? They point out that, weight-for-weight, pure silver is cheaper than most tablets, and that, like jewelery, tablets are highly thievable. The worst thing might be that the nascent tablet platform gets written-off as a high-priced niche for people with more money than sense."

Comments

They are too focused on cost and ignore value

[thepainguy]

I work with baseball players and it's extremely helpful to be able to put some clips and pictures on a tablet and take that out to the field to show them what I want to do. I used to do that with my iTouch, but an iPad is better because of the bigger screen. An iPad is also lighter and cheaper than a laptop.

Maybe a tablet is overkill for some applications, but it's not for the ones I use it.

This is the general problem with cost-based thinking rather than value-based thinking.

Re:But, but...

[Attila Dimedici]

I agree. I was beginning to doubt that until a particular friend of mine went out and bought one. When it first came out he was excited by it, but he said that he was going to wait for the "killer ap" to come out for it. Six months later he went out and bought one. I asked him what the "killer ap" was and he said, "Well, it does this and it does that." All things that fell into one of three classes. Either his laptop or his Iphone already did them in ways that totally suited his needs or it was a functionality that was purely for play. He bought one because his sense of "cool" could not stand being without one any longer.