From volcanoes to Third World Schoolchildren: Why I chose the iPad 2

From volcanoes to Third World Schoolchildren: Why I chose the iPad 2 -

Last week, I posted two stories about my iPad 2's big trip to Guatemala for I4U and TechEye. The articles -- mainly the pictures, if I'm honest -- provoked a larger reader response than I'm used to dealing with. Most of the comments and emails came from female fans, excited by my rugged handsomeness. But many came from doubters -- people with a reflexive negative reaction towards any Apple product.

First off, I'll provide a dram of personal background: the iPad 2 is the first Apple product I've ever purchased. I'm not a fanboy and I've written some very nasty things about Apple that have been read by a few million folks. So I didn't come into this experiment with an eye on providing Apple with some free PR.

Not everyone simply accused me of being an Apple fanboy. Reader "Tom" on TechEye brought up an interesting point. And made a butt joke.

"Another article by someone who thinks an expensive toy that can do the sort of things we've been able to do on computers for a long long long long time is somehow newsworthy may just result in an article on 'First iPad found by proctologist'."

(Via The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW).)