We deserve a big smack on the head for expecting Apple to give us everything they’ve got. Quite simply, if the iPad had a camera (front-facing) able to video chat, the world would end because it would be perfect. But see, that product with a front-facing camera is the dream product. The big iPhone 3G rumor was a front-facing camera, and it came again with the 3GS, and again with today’s iPad.

Apple never gives us everything we want. And they are probably the only company that can do that. When the iPhone came out without copy-and-paste, without 3G, without video recording, without a lot of the features that were starting to become the norm, people were upset. But see, people bought it. And to think that Apple didn’t have the iPhone 3G nearly-ready within a few months after the original phone’s launch would be dumb. Right now, sitting probably in Steve Job’s office, are the next generation iPhone running 4.0 software and an iPad with a camera capable of video chatting.

Apple’s got products they could release ready right now, but they can’t give us everything we want. Because when they come out in 8-12 months launching a new one, they have to have something killer. But the same cycle will continue, we all want something but they won’t give it to us. And the next one they’ll give us that, but not something else. And so on, and so on.

That’s Apple for ya. The iPad is a slick device and when Steve showed it off today, he proved that.

Whether or not the same Apple “don’t give them everything they want” strategy will work with the tablet, I’m not sure yet. The iPhone is pretty much a must-have device. The first one revolutionized phones and the other two were substantially better improvements.

But the iPad, we’ll have to wait and see if it’s revolutionary. As more and more apps are built for it, I think it may be… the possibilities of what this can do are endless. In the medical market, this could easily replace those crappy tablets currently in use once a medical application is built and accessories for things like blood pressure, blood sugar, heart pressure, etc, this could be big in the medical community. In the school market, this could finally be the digital medium for textbooks where students can use textbook apps interactively: reading, taking quizzes, marking key sections, e-highlighting, etc. In the magazine market, it’ll be even more incredible: as Time and Conde Naste have both made mockup apps which were designed to be placed on the iPad originally, the magazine space could reinvent itself. Picture this Mag+ idea as an app on the iPad:

Mag+ from Bonnier on Vimeo.

That would be revolutionary.

And the most revolutionary aspect of them all is that this one device can do hundreds of thousands of things, it can revolutionize all of these markets at the same time.

That fact is what’s being underestimated here, and that’s why the iPad is the way of the future.

Now if only it would let me video chat… second generation iPad anyone?