How many iPads will Apple sell by December?

[Evan]

We'll tack on a poll for this one, because I'm interested in seeing what everyone thinks.

Some analysts are saying five to six million iPads will fly off store shelves. Others are saying only one or two million.

What do you think? And yes, this does include the WiFi and 3G models together, not separate.

[*Susan*]

I am going for 3-4 million, all models combined. Apple has a huge fan base, and a lot of people are eagerly anticipating this. I also think it is going to be very, very popular among kids and will be a big Christmas wish list item this year.

[caps]

i went with 3-4 aswell, and personally i can see college students being the biggest force when it first comes out

[*Susan*]

Caps, I think you are right on there!

[Evan]

Agreed. College students are going to eat this up.

However, I wonder if it's going to solely depend on textbook availability.

[caps]

i dont think so. personally i believe im buying it for the right reasons (ease of use, save money on textbooks, etc.) however i can also see half of my school having mommy and daddy buy them one for christmas just because its the new "hot" device (yes i got to one of those schools)

[alobar72]

well, lets say 40 million iphones out there.
I could believe, that every 1 in 20 iphone useres will buy an iPad for Mom / Dad / Granny.
would make 2 mio sold. These are people, that are not apple fanboys or computer-minded.
add to this the 3-4 Mio iPads that where mentioned above - mostly apple fans, I believe
we have about 5 or 6 Mio.

On top of this come the students, and commercial users ( health care, sales force, work force, insurance, etc )
I believe the adoption rate in those fields will be much higher than with the iphone - which already showed some promising proof-of-concepts.

So yes - I believe they could sell quite a lot.

But then again: who knows :-)

[Evan]

That healthcare field idea is great, but I think a lot of those movements halted when people (like doctors and surgeons, and the like) found out that the iPad wouldn't have a camera. a lot of the uses for a doctor, would be to use that camera to take a picture of someone's body, for example, and then show the family, like a child's mom, where the fracture is in their leg.

Of course, there are other ways that the iPad could be used in this field, but I think many doctors out there, at least the ones who had even considered the iPad, were looking for a camera to fit most of their usage plans.

[alobar72]

You are surely right. Lack of camera is a point. On the other
hand I think it still would be an remarcable improvement
to what is reality now.
The medical field
though is for sure special.
Any physicians here to say a word about that ?

[niuniu]

I agree with some of the comments regarding the reason for doing this. It is fully dependent on what type of site you run and should it be a news site or a site that brings up to date information frequently then it`s fair to say that this technique would be useful. However, in general I don`t see why anyone would bother when Google Indexes within a matter of a minute after publishing and therefore it makes the process of using Tweeting to bring traffic a bit redundant. But for news sites it is definitely a positive step to take.