[ctdonath]

The convergence of the PC and tablets is inevitable.

Far from it. I've been watching major companies try to converge them for 20 years, all to abject failure (tiny niches aside). The iPad succeeded precisely because it avoided "convergence".

[phaus]

It took over a decade to make a decent touch-screen device, because our technological capabilities hadn't yet caught up to our aspirations. Now that we can, m-commerce is the fastest growing segment of e-commerce, which is the fastest growing segment of commerce in general.

Basically, the iPad succeeded because the technology behind it had finally matured, and Apple paid close attention to all of the mistakes that were made over those 20 years.

I may be wrong, but only time will tell for sure. Right now we are still in the phase where companies creating hybrid devices are making a lot of mistakes. I'm betting that someone is eventually going to get it right.

[bryanlarsen]

I would argue that you're both right. The iPad succeeded because what it did, it did well. One major reason it could do things well because it didn't try to do everything.

But because it's successful, there's a big enough market to develop apps and accessories to make it do all the things it wasn't designed to do.