The problem of porting ‘smaller apps’ to the iPad →

Ole Teucher:

The huge addition of screen real-estate comes in handy for more complex apps, apps that display huge amounts of text, or other media that benefits from the large screen. But many of the little tools that are available on the iPhone don’t really need such a large screen, and if you don’t really have enough to show, chances are that your app is going to look pretty awful. The problem is, that most developers will probably port their apps anyway, because Apple doesn’t offer a decent way to deliver apps with a relatively small functionality.

Strong points are being made. My crooked reasoning says the iPad isn’t meant to run smaller apps, or consume smaller content. Just as it is better for reading at length, consuming larger media, being productive on a larger scale, it’s equally crippled in terms of ‘smaller functionality’. It’ll run them just as fine as the iPhone does ‘bigger apps’, but a dividing line in real world functionality will emerge. Remember, Apple isn’t trying to sell you the iPad instead of your iPhone. It’s selling it to you in addition to the iPhone.

And even if you don’t buy into that theory, I’d remind you that we haven’t even started yet. I’m sure Apple and its developer community will think of something amazing. They haven’t disappointed us so far.