The iPad is a remarkable device. My three year-old little girl learnt how to use it within minutes, I learnt how to use it within an hour or so, and it beautifully highlights almost all of the problems of working with PCs.
Buying software couldn’t be simpler. There are no minimum system requirements, no drivers, no runtimes or codecs needed, in fact no installation files. You simply pay for it (without having to reach for your credit card), click on the icon and it’s installed. That’s it.
By way of an example, we recently bought a handful of Squeezeboxes for our home and office, so that we could listen to music all round the house and while we worked. My single criticism of the Squeezebox is their remote controls are extremely basic. The base units themselves  make good use of a touch screen, but that means having to go to the units every time we want to browse or change music, adjust the volume and so on.
Logitech do sell reasonable remotes, but they cost hundreds of pounds here in the UK. A quick search on the App Store, and three minutes later I have SqueezePad installed on my iPad, for a mere £5.99.
SqueezePad is a beautiful application. It lets me control every single aspect of any of my Squeezeboxes from anywhere in the house or office. I can synch all systems to play the same music throughout the house, search for music in my Napster account, adjust the settings, volume, switch on and off and much more.
For $5.99 I have a remote that is better than the Logitech model for a fraction of the price.
On top of that I encountered a couple of very minor issues with the software. I emailed the author, who then not only replied with detailed instructions as to how to resolve the issues, but also assured me that the next release would resolve them fully.
Try getting that level of support when you find a bug in one of Microsoft’s applications.
So why do I wonder whether the iPad may be killing the software industry?
Pricing. Take a look at the screenshot of the What’s Hot section of the Business category in iTunes:
The iPad is changing expectations, and redefining what we consider a reasonable price for software.
I gushed with enthusiasm for the SqueezePad application and level of support, but how can companies like that hope to make a good income when their products are so cheap?
As someone who works within the software industry, I am a highly atypical user. Yet I would have paid many times more than £5.99 for this application. In fact if I want the product to be developed further, and I want it to still be around in a few years, I need to pay more than this.
If you are a software developer, chances are high that you’ve at least considered going down the iTunes Store route. You’re probably put off by technical issues, by Apple’s hoops and I suspect by the low amount you can charge for your software.
Feedback appreciated through the comments below – is the iPad killing the software industry?
