The iPad is actually useful as a media player because VLC was allowed in the Apple Store. Sadly it seems the VLC Media Player is going to be removed due to the incompatibility between Apple’s de factor Digital “Rights” Management (DRM) and the GNU Public License (GPL) which VLC is released under.
One of the problems with the iOS App Store is the mandatory use of DRM. This violates several open source licenses which assures many projects will not be made available for iOS devices. Thankfully Android doesn’t have this problem and thus open source applications can be released DRM-free.
Additionally with the removal of VLC the iOS platform will lose the ability to play 99% (possible exaggeration) of video files out there. Thus the iPad’s advantage as a media play will be flushed right down the toilet.
The repeatedly and consistently stupid moves made by Apple never cease to amaze me… but people keep buying their stuff, so they keep on doing it. Go figure.
It depends on what angles you’re looking at it I guess. From Apple’s point of view having an App store you completely control makes nothing but sense. It’s a very smart business move.
Of course it completely fucks over the user base but most of them are Apple zombies anyways so it matters not what Steve does.