What Does The Apple iPad Mean To The Comic World?

The Internet has been buzzing these last few days after the announcement of the iPad. This is the first tablet/slate of many coming out from different companies, Apple as usual cornering the market. Steve Jobs unveiled the iPad to us not long ago, and it opened up a world of new opportunities. While not quite sold on the name (I recently mentioned the iPad to a friend of mine, and he asked me if it was for my iPeriod.), I feel one of the greatest benefits of the iPad is going to prove to be in print media. This includes newspapers, magazines, books, comics, all of which have seen a decline in sales in the last decade, mainly due to the Internet.

So good thing, right?  A device to conveniently bring all types of the media to your fingertips, in a new fashion. Of course, you can do that with any laptop or smartphone, but here’s where the iPad comes in.  It’s the in-betweener, basically a big iPhone but smaller and less awkward than any laptop. Cool, but at a price tag of $500, why should we buy it? We, being the nerdians dedicated to the safekeeping of our comic collection, fighting for the validity of our various independent views on the comment boards (you know who I’m talking about), and general comic book connoisseur’s. Well, here’s the deal.

The comic industry has made a definite move toward online comics and downloaded comics ported to different smartphones and laptops, which is a good move. But there is only so far you can go… the Iphone has a few great comic reading apps, but your reading a comic at a fraction of the size or in a panel screening process that just gets annoying. On the flip side, laptops can be bulky and corded out, and I don’t sit down and read one comic, so I might be there for a while. The iPad is almost the size of an actual comic page, lightweight, wi-fi, and has a lot of programs specifically dedicated to e-books and e-reader documents, with more to come. Even the comic companies are just waiting to see how the comics are presented in these readers before they factor in a change to the distribution of their comics to be more readily available to online/downloadable apps.

Now I’m not going to start talking about the ethics or laws surrounding downloading comics, because I already did that here. This is how I look at it, and the way I look at most dilemma’s in life. How does it store comics? The iPad is an easy, slim, light, semi-futuristic comic book that holds all my comic books. Ones that I can actually read! As a collector I just cant bring myself to crack the seal anymore so a chance to read my favorite issues, storylines, or entire series at the slide of my finger sounds pretty good to me. Not to mention the additional e-books, newspaper apps, movie player with more questionable downloads, social networks like Facebook and Twitter… the list is endless. You can take a look and check all the features here. No phone or camera, basically everything else.

The opportunities provided to the comic companies are amazing… if the companies pursue them. It could be a chance to get comics out to a new market and to the fans in a way that benefits everybody. It could be a step in the right direction to the future of comics and print media, which the Internet has placed in question over the last few decades. They just have to take that next step. This isn’t saying I personally will stop buying print comics and books, but another way to enjoy the medium never hurts. And another way to collect the comics I love is OK in my book.

Now it all comes down to the price, as most things do. $500 for something the size of a comic just doesn’t seem right, does it? Yes, lots of possibilities and its definitely sleek and cool, but $500 makes my wallet convulse a little. And then I thought about it a little, and started adding up the money I have spent on various comics and related items over the years… Maybe you think about it for a minute too… Yea, that’s what I thought.

So while the iPad gets the SupaScoot Stamp of Awesome, that doesn’t mean you have to be first in line to buy it. Even if you’re an Apple junkie with a Steve Jobs obsession, give it some time to prove itself and get some of the really impressive apps. But once it does prove itself, and to me that means a beyond amazing comic reader, I will be picking it up for sheer comfort and accessibility.

What do YOU think of the iPad? Useless? Life-changing? Let us know!