Regardless of the indicators you may choose to look at, it’s clear that 2011
can be dubbed the Year Of The Tablet. The indicator that got my attention
today and inspired this blog post was this week’s Staples flyer, the front
page of which is dominated by tablets. Five of them in fact, from Asus,
Acer, Motorola, and, of course, Blackberry.

I know I’ve asked this before, but where is the competition for the iPad?
The prices in this ad range from $399 to $599, a reasonable bracket, but why
aren’t any of them taking the world by storm? All of the reviews of various
tablets I’ve read have ranged from ambivalent to disappointed, to, in the
case of reviews of the Blackberry Playbook downright hostile, and that’s an
entirely separate issue from the cavalcade of failure that seems to hang
over the Playbook like a cloud. RIM really does seem to have hit all the
wrong notes, from the email client issue to choosing the wrong retail
partners. Every time I hear a radio spot for Sears that proclaims “Sears:
Your Blackberry Playbook Destination” I wonder if the octogenarians who
still actually shop at Sears even know what that means.

Not that Blackberry is the sole recipient of vitriol: One acquaintance of
mine who is pondering their options for a tablet as an addition to their
network said bluntly, “The HP tablet is clearly not an option.” That’s got
to sting.

Competition is great for both innovation and consumers, so my question
stands: where is it? Is there anything even on the horizon that can threaten
the iPad?
I just needed to get that off my chest. I promise that my next blog won’t
have anything to do with either Apple or the iPad.