Marco.org: Microsoft didn't lead the way to the iPad

As usual a well written article by Marco Arment, but I don’t completely agree with his conclusions.

Microsoft didn’t lead the way to the smartphone-to-tablet approach, and they didn’t lead the way to the iPad: they led the way down their own path that got them somewhere completely different, irrelevant, and unsuccessful.

In my opinion it’s hard to argue that Microsoft’s and other’s efforts, at creating a tablet directed at consumers (by downsizing PC hardware), have nothing to do with Apple’s approach or didn’t influence it.

There were a few good tablet computers which used Windows and pushed the technological boundaries of their time — remember the Compaq TC1100? What hindered these devices from being considered by consumers, was generally bad marketing and high prices.

I’d say that the constant failures to create a vital tablet market, have more to do with a generally narrow-minded approach to the concept of a tablet, than with the finer points of the technological execution.

Microsoft’s (and other PC maker’s) error was never having thought about creating a device that isn’t fully self sufficient, with a form factor bigger than a PocketPC.
At the same time, Apple gained experience in this area by creating the client-host-based ecosystem of the iPod, when nearly all competitors created portable recording studios, for consumers that simply wanted to listen to music.

Apple did —back then and lately— what it does best; take a step back and examine not only a device by itself, but evaluate how a device could be used and the environments in which it might be used.