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The buzz about an Apple tablet has been con­stant for some time. The pre-emptive strike recently by Microsoft — announc­ing its upcom­ing tablet called Courier has only cre­ated more buzz. Who will have he killer device?

Well Apple of course.

I don’t say that just because I use Apple prod­ucts. I say it because Apple cre­ates prod­ucts that change the way we do things. Apple’s suc­cess with the ipod was giv­ing peo­ple a device that had not only inno­v­a­tive hard­ware design but an engine inside and on your lap­top that changed the way almost every­one buys, man­ages, plays, and shares music. They trans­formed buy­ing and dis­tri­b­u­tion of music as data.

Then the iPhone. Another device that has changed the way peo­ple think about how they inter­act with the inter­net and 3rd party devices. They cre­ated more than a phone; in fact the iPhone is a mini com­puter that just hap­pens to let you make phone calls. Just ask ATT, they can’t keep up with the data streams as iPhone users are con­tantly con­nected using the device to instant mes­sage, surf the net, buy tick­ets, find out what restau­rants are nearby, and play rich inter­ac­tive games.

So now every­one is wait­ing for the tablet.

Microsoft has tried to own the buzz by releas­ing videos of its upcom­ing tablet. Actu­ally two tablets that fold.

It’s a hand­held com­puter. Ok.
It does mult-touch, cool.
It uses a sty­lus too. Nice.
It uses drag and drop. So Apple.
It’s nice. They’ll sell a bunch I’m sure.

But what does it bring that changes every­thing? Nothing.

Then we start to hear a bit more about the Apple tablet, expected to make it’s debut in early 2010.

A new device that is set on chang­ing or maybe sav­ing another dinosaur indus­try. Pub­lish­ing. What do you think that Ama­zon has done that with the Kindle?

News­pa­pers and pub­lish­ers are in the tar pit. They don’t have the slight­est idea how to change the way they deliver their con­tent. Fee­ble efforts by news­pa­pers have failed. Ama­zon brought us the Kin­dle as a vehi­cle to increase prod­uct sales but it’s a one trick pony and the price is too high.

So, I’m look­ing to one of the most inno­v­a­tive com­pa­nies we have right now.

Apple.

I don’t think they will disappoint.