hm, i've been discussing this with fellow ipadsexual tvc15, and we kinda agree that the ipad, like the wii, is NOT something for hardware geeks. however, UNLIKE the wii, it isn't made on the cheap and doesn't revolve around stupid gimmickry. it's a device for a specific lifestyle.
for me, it really works because it is a great, unobtrusive, slick form factor that works GREAT for casual web browsing, movie streaming, book/comic/manga reading, wiki plundering, and magazine/newspaper browsing. i already spend a great deal of time just reading and consuming information on the internet, and this is like the perfect convergence form factor and experience for INFORMATION CONSUMPTION -- in fact, it really feels like the ideal lifestyle device for me. it's my morning newspaper; it's my lunchtime teevee stream; it's my before-bed book or web crawl; it's my bored-at-the-parents manga session; it's my "let's play air hockey" or read winnie-the-pooh on the road moments with my daughter; it's my sunday afternoon couch-bound slog through the news of the week experience. i don't hafta be propped up in front of a keyboard; i can easily use it to show friends shiz; you can put it on its back and play little games with the kid or wife; it streams and plays movies like a champ; you can have it open next to you for convenient gamefaqqery or im chats with online pals. i find it so trememndously useful for the absurdly technophilic "always connected" way i conduct my life that i can't imagine why i was so down on it to begin with. it's made my netbook feel cumbersome and useless, by comparison.
my recommended apps:
ibooks
newsreaders for: nyt; usa today; bbc news; npr
wikipanion plus
civilization revolution
netflix
pages (for jotting down notes)
the built-in email client
im+
a bunch of simple games for the fam, like crosswords and word searches and air hockey
safari (really fast, surprisingly)