1. Be Webpad

I am pretty sure that Apple carefully looked at the history of webpads and reasons why this class of devices failed so miserably in the early 2000s in the wake of the dotcom crash. If there was one device that had chances to succeed, it was Be’s webpad. It had all the right ingredients (of yesterday’s technology) to set a trend and become a benchmark for the industry. It had a sleek design, a dedicated operating system with an easy-to-use interface that was targeted at web browsing and multimedia applications. Be had some issues with the product strategy as it imagined the device to be used for online shopping while you are in the bathroom.

The problem of the Be-pad? Be made the bet that Internet Appliances would be the future and dropped its wonderful BeOS operating system in favor of an Internet-Appliance-focused BeIA version – which found only one significant customer – Sony’s eVilla Internet Appliance (which also failed). The Be webpad was the best-designed webpad of its time, integrated even WiFi connectivity, and remains a symbol of the dotcom crash. If there is a direct predecessor of the iPad, it is most likely the Be webpad, even if it had a weak rechargeable battery.

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