Sunday, January 31, 2010

The Jesus Tablet


This entry will focus on the information provided in the linked news article below

http://www.economist.com/opinion/displayStory.cfm?story_id=15393377&source=hptextfeature
 
Apple has created a new product called the iPad. Apple is know to excel at taking an existing idea and making it better. Because of Apple's visionary boss Steve Jobs the company has been able to perfect three technologies: the laptop, the digital music player, and the smart phone. These perfected innovations have expanded multiple markets, areas of commercial activity where goods and services are bought and sold (definition from Google), including the telecoms and music industries. Telecoms are industries and companies providing data, phone service or entertainment to consumers and businesses (definition from Google). This new tablet is promising to transform the telecoms, computing and media industries. Computing is the branch of engineering science that studies-with the aid of computers-computable processes and structures (definition from Google). This new device is hoping to increase the number of digital readers of newspapers, books, and magazines. The question is whether this product will be able to save crashing media industries.

Why are newspapers and magazines struggling? This comes into play during the mid-1990s when the Internet began to expand in use and popularity. People no longer need to buy a newspaper or magazine to gain access to the information provided in the item. These people can instead go onto the Internet and find the same information. This internet revolution has caused for many newspaper companies to go out of printing business. Many owners of newspapers such as the LA Times have had to sell most of their share of the business. 

How can this new iPad help these businesses? Can it? These tablets are expensive and it may take a while for the product to spread and this could negatively affect the enthusiasm for a comeback of struggling media industries. These tablets may not appeal to all newspaper and magazine readers and could prohibit the magazine and newspaper companies from ceasing to use the printing presses. This could become expensive forcing more newspaper and magazine companies to go out of business. The possible positive effect of the iPad and the switch from paper to digital magazines and newspapers is a less demand for paper which would help save our natural resources. Because of this innovation, the iPad, some industries may die while others are born and grow.

1 comment:

  1. Don't forget to define your three terms for your readers (such as me!).
    People are totally going crazy over the i-pad! We will have to watch when they go on the market and see what the sales are like.
    I agree that reducing our demand for paper is good for the environment, but yes, some industries will suffer because of our transition to digital information. There is always a trade off!

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