Jeremy Leslie of Magculture has written one of the more interesting reviews of the ipad and existing apps on his blog. His thoughts touch on some of the key issues for app designers and newspaper and magazine publishers. It is good to see that we are in agreement on this, particularly when I am in the midst of grappling with just these issues on my first bit of ipad design:
…simple is best. I admit simple is my natural default, but this brief play on the machine makes me wonder how compelling the busier Apps like Popular Machanics or Wired Apps will be.
…a key point [is]– making good use of the technology to provide a subtle improvement to the original content rather than reinvent the wheel.
One thing he mentions is that it is smaller than it looks in videos and demos. One can easliy get the impression that the screen is bigger than it is, and this affects how people design for it. A lot of the designs have treated the iPad as if it is a purely passive experience like TV – or else assumed that differentiation requires gimmickry and novelty. I think that elegance in an ipad app design lies in readability, ease of use, and as Jeremy says – enhancement (and I’ll add simplification) of existing experience rather than reinvention of the wheel.