Our Love Affair With the Tablet Is Over

I think there is some truth to the article, but not that much.

Yeah, 5" devices are a nice size and make people somewhat less likely to reach for their tablet when reading. But is a 5" screen going to replace a textbook? or a magazine? or a kiosk? are people going to want to watch a movie on their phone?

It's all of the above - phones, tablets, laptops. Depends on what you are doing.

But fact is, many are now using tablets instead of laptops. Tablets are simply a more pleasant experience for causal use. And a lot of computer use is casual - reading, surfing the web, games, email, facebook.

So IMO tablets trend up in the long term, laptops trend down. But neither die.

Two weeks ago, I went to a birthday party for a kid we know. His dad works for google and there are a lot of tablets in the house. I was outside eating barbeque, then went inside, and not hearing any noise, went into the kids playroom thinking they were all asleep. All five were sitting on the sofa playing the same game of minecraft. There was a nexus 7 on the floor that had evidently been drained of battery. My son had plugged his in (I carry a micro-usb cord and converter in my pocket for events like this). Their ages: 5 to 9.

They played for an hour solid, only speaking to each other to discuss in-game stuff, like: how do you make arrows, or who has strings...

Not once did they ask parents for help.

This is silly. Expectations for phones and tablets are crazy, specifically when talking about apple.

I read things daily that say apple is done for talking about both phones and tablets. The market share numbers aren't THAT important when we are talking about numbers as big as we are. In the mid 90's, when Microsoft "Won" and Apple lost the global PC market was ~50 million. Apple alone sold more tablets than that last year, and they sold more phones than that last quarter.

They don't have to sell 200 million tablets and phones per quarter. Apple is going to die or get crushed because Android has more market share, and tablets aren't going away either.

The only reason tablet sales haven't gone to the moon like some people predicted, is that they misunderstood the replacement cycle. It's not something that needs to be replaced every year or two like a phone. My iPad 2 is still just fine. I would love to have an iPad air because it is nicer, but the functionality is pretty much the same. In another year or two it might get to the point where i want/need to upgrade. But that is 4-5 year replacement cycle, not 1-2.

I suspect you're being down voted because article is discussing the merits between 3 devices, PC's, tablets, and phones, with the conclusion that phablets are the win in the end (with some fairly feeble 'evidence'). The fact that all three affect some peoples circadian rhythm isn't overly valuable to the conversation. Form factor is the discussion, and you're talking about light sensitivity in insomniacs. Water is a solid at -30c at sea level is also true, regardless of whether people down vote me. And neither are relevant to the article or the discussion being had.

Battery life is probably as important as size for merging the tablet and phone markets. My tablet is effectively an extended battery for my phone. I could probably use my phone for everything I do on my tablet, but if I did, I'd be charging my phone 2-3 times a day.

As soon as the size gets more usable and battery life improves sufficiently tablets will probably turn into a fringe device.