Sept 2010

LOUNGE COMPUTING: THIS IS WHAT THE IPAD IS FOR

By Dan Parker

The iPad has spawned a new style of computing. And I’ve only just realised.
Allow me to explain: an iPad landed on my desk soon after its launch in the UK, but it’s taken until now for me to work out what to do with it – what it’s truly for. 
The question of what the point of the iPad is, is nothing new.
You pick it up, play around with it for a few minutes and it’s beautiful, right? You’re interacting with its big screen in a way you’ve never interacted with a machine before. It’s pretty much an immediate wow.
Then if you sit with it for a bit longer, you think, but if I had one what would I do with it?
That’s when the love goes away. I have a laptop, I have a dongle, and I have a media centre at home. I have an iPhone in my pocket. Can’t quite figure out where I’m going to use it.
After taking my iPad out of the work environment, things became a little clearer.

Lounge computing
I took it home. Stuck it on my living room table and decided to use it whenever I wanted to do something online.
Then came a massive change in my computing behaviour. The term lounge computing, or leisure computing springs to mind. It’s computing with your feet up on the sofa, which we’re not used to. For example, if you’re watching telly and you want to know the name of an actor, 30 seconds later your iPad will tell you.
You would never fire up your laptop, because by the time it’s ready to access the internet you don’t really care about the answer to your question.
The iPad quickly answers those trivial questions that crop up in life. You’ve got this incredibly approachable computer that doesn’t feel like work. That’s the key. It brings a whole new way of interacting with the internet that we’ve never experienced before. It’s a much more snackable, leisure orientated experience.
It’s also fantastic for ‘shared computing’, something that’s always felt a bit awkward in the past. Sitting on the sofa with my partner, feet up, glass of wine in hand - finding a holiday felt just as much of a shared experience as when we used to pore over brochures together.  Of course, booking was a lot easier…

So what does it offer brands?

Three things spring immediately to mind. First, the iPad is great for e-commerce. It’s easy to do lots of dragging and dropping. You could drag that into your shopping basket, drag this into ‘wish list’, drag something into ‘never show it to me again’...there’s a whole bunch of movement available because you’ve got this massive amount of screen to play around with. You have this wonderful sweeping sensation.

Second, it’ll add a whole new dimension to custom – and indeed customised – publishing. Imagine, for instance, how a Sainsbury’s TV ad could direct you to an iPad ‘magazine’ that’s jammed with recipes encouraging you to try something new.  Which takes you straight through to the online store. And which learns about your interests and likes over time.

Lastly, I think it’ll add even greater fuel to the social media fire. It’ll help make it even richer, more immersive, with more video and long-form opportunities – all the things that’ll help brands capitalise on this area.