What can the iPad do?

"The iPad is nothing more than a big iTouch." "It does nothing that a netbook can't do".

These are some of the more common statements that I have heard since the iPad debuted. While it's true that out of the box, the iPad varies little from the iTouch, that view is short-sighted.

Look at the iPhone or iTouch, out of the box they both play songs, surf the web and check email. But start adding apps and the whole equation shifts to what can't these devices do.

The iPad is the same way. Out of the box it seems limited, but I feel it has greater business applications in that it's screen size opens it up to a host of applications that are ill-suited to it's smaller brethren. When you consider the apps that can be delivered via the iPad, the view of the iPad is transformed from neat toy to virtually anything you want it to be.