So when I got a press release today entitled “Five reasons not to buy an iPad” I reserved judgment on whether it was an April Fools prank full of obviously silly reasons, or just the usual pro-geek anti-Apple propaganda from yet another hard core geek who misses the days when every new “consumer technology” product was suitable only for the geekiest one percent of the population and no one else. Here’s the problem, though: after spending a fair amount of time reading and chewing over said press release, I have no earthly idea whether it’s supposed to be a joke or not. Sure, it lists the same old geek complaints about Apple’s mobile products that no one in the real world has any issue with, but the explanations for those five reasons delve into obviously comical territory that I’m left to wonder: am I being pranked or not?

No Multitasking – No searching the web as you chat on AIM, no listening to Pandora as you read an eBook.  Sure, the iPad is faster than your smartphone, but what good is added speed when you will have to be constantly going in and out of apps instead of being efficiently able to do them all at once?

Sure, except no one cares. Not only does no one in the real world care about multitasking, almost no one in the real world even knows what multitasking is (so much so that Palm effectively sealed the Pre’s fate as a mainstream flop when it starting running ads introducing the product as having “multitasking” first and foremost). The fact is that with the current hardware specs, Apple would be wantonly reckless to open up the iPad (or iPhone or iPod touch) to limitless third party multitasking, which would quickly bog the entire device down into underpowered mush and ruin the entire iPad experience for the typical user. In future years, when significantly more powerful computing hardware can be packed into the same size device, Apple will eventually open this up – but to do so now would be sinful.

No Flash – An understandable limitation in the world of cell phones, but this is unacceptable in a product trying to position itself in the world of notebooks.  Not only do many websites require flash to view certain content, some require it to access the website.

This is particularly comical on a day when major television networks lined up to pour sand on the grave of Flash by announcing that they were eliminating the use of Flash in their online properties for the benefit of iPad users. In other words, the rest of the publishing world has come around to the fact that Flash is twentieth century junk, designed for a bygone era, about as suitable for use in 2010 as the floppy drive. For someone to claim, on today of all days, that lack of Flash is supposed to be a drawback, on the day that Apple officially won the battle to kill Flash, makes me wonder whether the press release really was intended as a joke.

Limited Software – Like the iPhone, only runs apps from the Apple’s App Store.  Although there are tons of apps at Apple’s store, it still bans certain apps, such as Google Voice, your notebook does not.

Here’s where the fun begins. Take the feature that many if not most users consider to the be single most attractive aspect of the iPad/iPhone/touch platform, the overwhelmingly large number of free, cheap, and safe software titles available for the platform with literally one click, and try to spin it into a negative. Hard core geeks are the only people on the planet who think the App Store is “too closed” (or whatever anarchist propaganda phrase they’re using this week); everyone else sees it as a reason to buy, as evidenced by the tens of millions of App Store based devices on the market. These are the same geeks who claimed that iTunes was the biggest drawback of the iPod, at a time when the other ninety-nine percent of the population viewed its seamless integration with iTunes as perhaps the main reason to buy an iPod. So I’m left to wonder: was this nonsense written in all seriousness by an insulated geek who really doesn’t understand that there’s a world out there, or was this purposely written as nonsense in a too-subtle effort to be funny?

What will you use it for? – The iPad is not going to replace any of your existing technology.  Your smartphone may have a smaller screen, but it does just about everything the iPad does (not to mention makes phone calls), the iPad’s clumsy touch screen keyboard and limited capabilities make it incapable of replacing your laptop, and even a Kindle is a more practical alternative to the iPad as an eReader.

Let me get this straight: if a new device doesn’t replace one of your existing devices, you shouldn’t buy it. Cellphones didn’t replace anything (at least not until years later when they began replacing landlines). Was buying a cellphone a mistake? iPods didn’t replace anything, as most people were not carrying a portable music player of any kind when the iPod launched. Should we not have bought those either? What about computers? What did they replace? And until recent years, laptops weren’t powerful enough to replace your desktop; was everyone who bought a laptop as a secondary computer making a mistake? If a bicycle can’t replace a car, should you never buy a bicycle? You get my point.

And what of this “clumsy touchscreen keyboard” that the iPad supposedly sports? Is the author basing this assessment on actual hands-on time spent with the iPad (hint: no), or is the author basing it on the virtual keyboard of the iPhone and iPod touch, which is a fraction of the size and won’t even likely be typed on via the same combination of fingers? A keyboard on the iPhone and iPod touch which, by the way, is currently in use by tens of millions of users? And if the author really is that convinced that this iPad virtual keyboard he’s never used is going to sink the device, you’d think that perhaps he’d mention the fact that Apple is selling an optional iPad physical keyboard for home use.

But just when I’m starting to think that the author is simply an idiot rather than a prankster, I get to the claim that “even a Kindle is a more practical alternative to the iPad as an eReader,” a suggestion that even Amazon itself doesn’t appear to agree with (witness Amazon’s Kindle app for iPad). The Kindle, by virtue of only having one main feature and lamer hardware, is a significantly cheaper option than the iPad and may be a smart choice for those who wouldn’t use an iPad for anything but eBooks anyway, but to suggest that the Kindle is the superior product…. you’re starting to understand why I’m struggling to figure out whether this was written as satire, right?

It is sure to get better- If you still feel like you really need an iPad, at least wait until the next model comes out.  By then Apple will have heard all the above complaints and it will be greatly improved, and probably cheaper. Case in point: the iPhone.

Alright, you got me. That’s just the grand slam right there: criticize a device because it might get better in the future, claim to know that those “improvements” will identically mirror your own list of atypical gripes (and that Apple will do this just because you’re the one doing the griping), claim to know that the price will drop, and as proof of this, point to another product whose initial pricing was structured with a radically different philosophy. At its launch, the iPhone was a three inch computer which initially cost $499; the iPad is a ten inch computer which initially costs $499. A fifth grader could understand that despite the same price tags, one of those devices was significantly marked up at the beginning, and in contrast, the other is initially priced to move.

I give up. After all of the above evaluation, I still can’t definitively figure out whether out whether the press release was seriously intended as nonsense, or whether the nonsense was intended to be taken seriously. I’m not going to link to the original source just in case it was the latter (or worse, intentional ignorance for link-baiting purposes), but it’s easily findable through search engines if you care to. You guys are free to speculate about whether or not this was a joke in the comments, but I’ve already surrendered (for what it’s worth, at least one of my counterparts at another publication who received the same press release is betting on the press release being a prank). One last thought, though: could it be that this was indeed an April Fools joke that unfortunately wasn’t intended as one?

Justin Bieber on Leno tonight

Assuming that the TV Guide listings and the artist himself aren’t just collectively pulling an April Fools Day prank on us, teenage pop star Justin Bieber will be performing tonight on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. The performance comes just as Bieber’s new album My World 2.0 is set to top the Billboard album charts nine days after its release. Bieber will presumably be performing lead single Baby, which features a guest appearance by Ludacris; no word on whether the rapper will make a guest appearance on Leno as well.