iPad Roundup - UK 10th May PreOrder

We're thinking ... 8 hour working day vs. Blackberry = 15 hours of extra work a week

With sales of the iPad in the region of 731,409 the iPad is proving a very interesting device.

Interestingly the number of units sold come from Chitika who are (and this is where it get interesting) calculating the sales. The sales are calculated by monitoring internet traffic. The stats are worked out by counting how many iPads they see across their Ad Network. They then multiply that by how much of the Internet they at that point in time (more on the methodology). This gives the number we can see, a 'rough estimate'.

I first looked at the estimate on the on the 6th of April, it reported 382,979 iPad users online. In 12 days they have shipped at least 348,430 units ... at the basic retail price that would equate to $499 x 382,979 = $191,106,521 sales in 12 days.

iPads in the UK

The dissapointing news for us in the UK is that the sale of the iPad has been delayed. This is due to domestic demand. The single shining light being that the apple website is now stating that pre-orders will be avaliable on the 10th May.

When launched in the UK we will have the G3 version. So far o2, Vodafone and Orange have confirmed they will be offer the iPad at it's UK launch at the end of May. They will be providing mocro-SIM cards for mobile internet access to their networks.

We will only have to hope that Icelandic Volcano Eyjafjallajoekull isn't still causing problems.

What do we know about how they are being used?

With regards to how people are using their iPads we've got the pre launch report from Sybase. The software  company Sybase, looked into looked how consumers are using tablet devices. Reporting their findings they said: the "#1 reason U.S. consumers would use a tablet device such as the Apple iPad is for working on the go."

Interesting on the Gizmondo website (via distimo) they are talking about the number and type of  APPS avalaible.. It turns out that  iPad apps store is dominated by GAMES, 33% dominated that is! Coupled with this other sites are reporting "Compared with the iPhone, news, books, productivity and education are more poppular on the iPad".

The future

For several years Mary Meeker at Morgan Stanley and Co. have made technology predictions. The latest "Internet Trends" report (released 12th April) has one major relevant fact, the Mobile Web taking over the Desktop by 2015. This is attributed to the upsurge in smartphone usage ... and now iPads.

One other fact that's being talked about recenlty, came from · Social media company Vitrue. They have proposed that the a Facebook fan is worth $3.60 (measured in ad impressions and mentions), though some companies' fans value witll be different to others. The calculation they perform is worth checking out.

>>> Talking all of these bits together, I feel a picture is starting to form.