Beta News’ Joe Wilcox is eating his words today, saying “I was wrong about Apple iPad”.

He was a vocal critic of the iPad when it was announced, like most tech analysts, arguing that the world doesn’t need the iPad or any other tablet.

After using it though, he’s come to a different conclusion:

The iPad is a remedy for distraction while letting users reap the Internet’s benefits. Apple marketing material makes audacious claims: “iPad is the best way to experience the Web” .

I initially dismissed these claims as marketing fluff, but on reconsideration actually see meaning to them. There is something immersive about consuming content on iPad that does change the Web experience — and that of other media.

Wilcox is brave to announce his change of opinion on the iPad. But, like a lot of people, Wilcox is still missing the bigger picture.

With the iPad, Apple is forking the Web. It’s not just creating a new “way to experience the Web”, but a platform that competes with the Web itself.

The iPad Forks The Web

The iPad’s raison d’etre is forking the Web.

The iPad offers a good Web browser with Safari. But even with Safari, Apple is insisting on forking the Web, making it Flash-free!

Why?

The iPad isn’t about Web-applications – it’s about Internet-enabled applications.

Instead of the one-size-fits-all approach of the computer Web browser, Apple is creating a platform of dedicated apps that do one thing really well.

This means:

• The BBC News app is a wonderful mashup of newspaper, Web and radio on the iPad;
• Google Maps on the iPad is tactile, interactive, more map-like and gorgeous;
• Reading USA Today on the iPad combines many of the best features of both print and the Web;
• Watching YouTube on the iPad is faster and more immersive, because the dedicated app adapts to the context of your actions; and
• iBooks combines the readability of books with the instant gratification of the Web.

Apple’s also addressing people’s most common worries about the Web:

• It’s making the iPad porn-free, unless you actually look for it;
• It’s offering an alternate Internet platform where you can forget about anti-virus software, malicious applications and crapware; and
• It’s presenting the Internet in a way that’s less scary and confusing than the Web.

Apple is even developing it’s own ad platform for its alternate Web.

Can Apple Fork The Web And Create An AlternaWeb?

Ten years ago, people said that you couldn’t compete with free music on the Web – that digital music stores would never work. Yet Apple created a store that competed with free through innovative design, attention to details and usability.

Now Apple’s competing with the Web itself.

Can Apple really create an alternative to the Web?

A million iPad buyers a month say that Apple’s already doing it.

Is this good or bad for the Internet? Leave a comment with your thoughts!

The iPhone is rapidly increasing Apple’s share of the browser market, according to the latest figures from StatCounter.

About 1 in 400 browsers on the Internet are now using Safari on the iPhone or iPod touch.

• Apple increased its share of the Internet browser market in the US by 64% between December and March, according to StatCounter,
• In March, iPhone and iPod touch increased their share of the total browser market in the US from 0.14% in December to 0.23%.
• Globally iPhone/iPod touch has more than doubled its share of the Internet browser market from 0.03% to 0.08%.

“The key message is that iPhone is more than living up to its claims of being a user friendly Internet browser, unlike many other cell phones,” commented Aodhan Cullen, founder and CEO of StatCounter.

We’ve said previously that Apple’s mobile Safari is likely to have a 1% browser share by the end of this year. This is going to:

• increase competition in the mobile market;
• accelerate the development of more demanding mobile apps, like social media and mobile content publishing;
• kill the use of Flash on sites targeting mobile users;
• make Safari the target platform for mobile development.

While other manufacturers are playing catch-up with the iPhone, there’s a strong possibility that Apple’s integrated hardware/software approach, along with its two-year lead on other companies, will let it turn the iPhone into a juggernaut like the iPod.

The StatCounter analysis was based on a sample of 372 million page views globally from December 07 to March 08, including 71 million US page views.

The iPhone Safari browser may soon directly support YouTube, according to at least one report: 

The latest version of the iPhone 2.0 firmware that was just seeded to developers has a YouTube plugin for MobileSafari.app! We’re not sure at this point if this is using the same method as the native YouTube app that just works in Safari or if this is some sort of “Flash” support, if you will. We’re going to dive a little deeper and try and figure this all out for you, so we’ll keep y’all updated! 

This isn’t official – but it suggests that Apple is taking another look at how it handles multimedia on the iPhone.

This could have broader implications for podcasters. As devices get faster and more capable, the streaming model implemented on Apple TV starts to become a valid alternative to podcast subscriptions.

Apple today slashed pricing on the iPhone, eliminating the entry-level 4GB model, and dropping the price of the 8GB model $200 to $399.

Pricing was the number one problem we identified in our list of 5 things Apple needs to do to fix the iPhone, so we’re not surprised to see the dramatic price cut. We’d still like to see Apple fix publishing from the iPhone, intro power-user phone features, offer a bluetooth iPhone keyboard and fix developing for the iPhone.

While Apple is on track to sell its one millionth iPhone before the end of September, sales have fallen short of expectations, and pricing was the major culprit.

“The surveys are in and iPhone customer satisfaction scores are higher than we’ve ever seen for any Apple product,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “We’ve clearly got a breakthrough product and we want to make it affordable for even more customers as we enter this holiday season.”

The 8GB iPhone is available immediately for $399 in the US through Apple’s retail and online stores and AT&T retail stores. Apple is blowing out the 4GB iPhones for $299, and also has refurb 8GB models for $349.

The price cuts, along with the introduction of the iPod touch, are likely to quickly turn Safari from a loser in the browser war to a contender with Firefox for the number two position, after Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Apple today announced that people have downloaded more than 1 million copies of Safari for Windows in the first 48 hours since the free public beta was made available on Monday. Safari has generated a tremendous amount of interest, in part because of people questioning Apple’s speed claims for the browser and because of publicity because of several significant bugs in the new browser.

Apple claims that Safari 3 is the fastest browser running on Windows*, rendering web pages up to twice as fast as IE 7 and up to 1.6 times faster than Firefox 2. Independent tests show Safari’s speed to be no better than Firefox and Internet Explorer.

Several significant bugs with Safari for Windows have been documented by security analysts. The first update for Safari for Windows was released last night and fixes some early reported bugs.Safari 3 for Windows requires Windows XP or Windows Vista, a minimum of 256 MB of memory and a system with at least a 500 MHz Intel Pentium processor.

*Performance will vary based on system configuration, network connection and other factors. Testing conducted on an iMac 2.16 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo system running Windows XP, with 1GB of RAM.

Completely out of left field, Apple today introduced Safari 3 for Windows PCs and Macs.

According to Apple, Safari is the fastest browser running on Windows, based on the industry standard iBench tests, rendering web pages up to twice as fast as IE 7 and up to 1.6 times faster than Firefox 2. Safari joins iTunes in delivering Apple’s user experience to both Windows and Mac users as well as full support of open Internet standards.

Safari 3 features easy-to-manage bookmarks, effortless browsing with easy-to-organize tabs and a built-in RSS reader to quickly scan the latest news and information. Safari 3 public beta is available today as a free download at www.apple.com/safari.

“We think Windows users are going to be really impressed when they see how fast and intuitive web browsing can be with Safari,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “Hundreds of millions of Windows users already use iTunes, and we look forward to turning them on to Safari’s superior browsing experience too.”

Other Safari features now available to Windows users include SnapBack, one-click access to an initial search query; resizable text fields; and private browsing to ensure that information about an individual’s browsing history isn’t stored.

Safari 3 supports all modern Internet standards so users can view websites as they were meant to be seen, including HTML, CSS, JavaScript, SVG and Java. Safari software updates are delivered seamlessly through Apple’s Software Update application, which automatically checks for updates.

Pricing & Availability

The free public beta of Safari 3 is available immediately as a download at www.apple.com/safari, and is preview software licensed for use on a trial basis for a limited time. The final version of Safari 3 will be available as a feature in the upcoming Mac OS® X version 10.5 Leopard, and will be available as a free download to Mac OS X Tiger and Windows users in October.

System Requirements

Safari 3 for Mac OS X requires Mac OS X Tiger 10.4.9 or later, a minimum of 256MB of memory and is designed to run on any Intel-based Mac or a Mac with a PowerPC G5, G4 or G3 processor and built-in FireWire. Safari 3 for Windows requires Windows XP or Windows Vista, a minimum of 256 MB of memory and a system with at least a 500 MHz Intel Pentium processor.