Apple iPad: More than 1 million served

I have to give a lot of credit to Steve Jobs and his team at Apple as it took only 28 days for the company to sell 1 million iPads, according to a report today on The Wall Street Journal website: (http://bit.ly/d2M20M).

I'm still holding out for a new-and-improved version, which I suspect will come before year’s end. I base my supposition only on the history of Apple gadgets. I've learned the early adopters get to wallow in the coolness factor for a while, but then feel stung when the next generation of any particular Apple gizmo hits the shelves because the new version always does more, costs less, or both. Usually both.

I witnessed the "gotta-have-it" magic of the iPad firsthand on Friday at an Apple reseller store in La Quinta, Calif., I was spending the last part of the week in the Palm Springs area and ventured out early to find a just-released 3G version of the iPad. I was curious to see whether people would line up for the iPad that comes with a pay-as-you-go wireless plan from AT&T. What I didn't know is the store wasn't an official Apple Store, but an authorized reseller.

The clerk at the Mac Gallery told me his store didn't have any 3G iPads in stock and wouldn't get any for a few weeks. I hung around anyway and heard the same story repeated to about six customers in the next 30 minutes. One woman decided to check out the Wi-Fi-only iPads on display. I was surfing the Web on the 16-gigabyte model, and she was asking the clerk about the devices. The conversation went something like this:

Customer: So, tell me why I need an iPad?
Clerk: Well, it's something of a cross between your phone and your laptop.
Customer: It looks like a big iPhone, except it doesn't have a phone. Is that right?
Clerk: Yes, that's right. But you can do your e-mail and go online with it.
Customer: Why are there three different models?
Clerk: The only difference is the size of the hard drive. They come in 16, 32 and 64 gig-models.
Customer: Well, I don't want to pay $700, and I think I need more than 16 gigs, so I think I'll take the 32-gig model.
Clerk: Good choice. I recommend the 32-gig one, because my iPod has about 8,000 songs on it, and it's not even 32-gigs. We don't have any in stock, but you can order one now and we'll have it for you in less than two weeks.
Customer: Great. Thanks.

And she bought it! Just five minutes earlier she hadn't ever seen an iPad and had no idea why she "needed" one. The clerk did a fine sales job, but as he explained the iPad’s features, the customer was trying them. The device pretty much sold itself. I'm guessing it was number 998,932, give-or-take a few hundred.

I figure mine will be somewhere in the third or fourth million sold. I'll let you know when it happens.

... A side note to the story:

I used the iPhone App "Siri" to find the Mac Gallery store. Its mapping function helped guide me to the store it as I drove up California Highway 111 from Palm Springs to La Quinta. The first time I asked Siri driving directions, the application indicated I was about 17 miles away. I rechecked several times as I neared the store, getting updates at the 8- and 4-mile markers.

Driving alone, and not wanting to take my eyes from the road, I sensed I was getting very close to the store, so I pulled into a shopping center parking lot and asked Siri again for my proximity to the store. The application came back with this: "Location: 341 feet. Time of arrival: four seconds."

Now THAT'S a location-based service if ever there was one. I looked around and spotted the store across the lot. It took about 10 seconds to get there, as the lot was one of those with those pesky parking lot curbs.

I've touted Siri before as one of the best free apps I use. If you haven't already downloaded it, do so today. You'll be glad you did, even if the store you're looking for doesn't have exactly what you want. I imagine there's an app for that, too.