When the iPad was first announced, it was panned. People called it an iPod Touch on steroids, made fun of the name in its similarities to feminine hygiene products, bemoaned all the things they expected but the device lacked, and dismissed it because it brought nothing new to the game of mobile computing.

I disagreed. And, as it turns out, I was pretty much spot-on. I noted that the paucity of features would be made up for over time, with software and hardware upgrades–and so it happened. I noted that the low capacity was OK because it’s a networking device–I was right, and even more so, we now have the iCloud. I noted that the device’s simplicity was an asset, that the user experience would be superior, and that the UI was a key to its success. That its success would lie not in bells & whistles, but in the potential of the software that could be written for it.

Then, a week later, I made another prediction: that textbooks would be the killer app for the iPad. Well, the iPad took off without textbooks, but now it may take off even faster with them.

Nice to see that I was not only right about the iPad when so many others were writing its obituary, but I was also right about why. In short, it was not just fanboyism, but recognizing what would and would not work.