Round-up “iPad” Edition: All the coverage you could want

God forbid you were another company trying to launch a product today. Apple completely dominated technology news today with the much anticipated launch of its table computer, the iPad. Here’s a round-up of the most interesting coverage we saw today (from our blog and others).

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What gaming executives think: Here’s Dean Takahashi’s extended take on the iPad with interviews of entrepreneurs including SGN’s Shervin Pishevar and Smule’s Ge Wang on the tablet’s potential for gaming. Electronic Arts’ Travis Boatman offers his take here on prepping games for the device.

McGraw-Hill gets axed for spilling the beans: One publisher was conspicuously missing from Apple’s demo today after its CEO spilled the beans about the tablet on CNBC yesterday.

Developers decry Apple’s advancing “closed” model for software distribution: With the iTunes app store instigating a great deal of angst among developers because of its cryptic approval process, it’s no surprise that several observers lashed out again. The Free Software Foundation called the iPad “bad for freedom.” Media artist Peter Kirn said Apple’s mobile product line-up “is doing immense harm to the computing legacy the company has forged.” Aaron Swartz, who helped create RSS and Reddit, said that the iPad spelled out the company’s vision of “total control by Apple. It’s a frightening future.”

Gizmodo covers the device’s many weaknesses: No camera and no multitasking.

Pogue and Mossberg each have a crack at the iPad: The Wall Street Journal’s Walt Mossberg thought Jobs’ presentation made the iPad seem “more like a hybrid” of a laptop and phone than a radically new type of device.

Fanboy Pogue cautions us to stay open-minded:

“Like the iPhone, the iPad is really a vessel, a tool, a 1.5-pound sack of potential. It may become many things. It may change an industry or two, or it may not. It may introduce a new category — something between phone and laptop — or it may not. And anyone who claims to know what will happen will wind up looking like a fool.”

Educational startup Inkling gears up to take advantage of the tablet: One San Francisco startup sees lots of opportunities for interactive educational modules on the device.

Shareholders applauded the price, not the device: Investors weren’t actually all that jazzed about the device itself, as the tablet was already priced into the market. Shares headed lower during Jobs’ keynote, until he said the starting price point was $499 — half of what analysts had anticipated. That’s what triggered a spike.

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The name gets panned, with iTampon trending high on Twitter: Yep, it draws an instantaneous mental connection to feminine hygiene.