The iPad is out, and women everywhere are jumping for joy because now they finally have a computer that can double as a sanitary napkin.

The iPad was released yesterday, and octogenarians are trying to jump for joy because there is finally a computer they can use without hounding their grandchildren.

The iPad is here, and now Jesus can rest in peace.

Yes, this weekend, and likely the rest of April, will be dominated with talk of the iPad, its apps, its games, its strengths, weaknesses, pundits and detractors. There is a whole cottage industry based around Apple releases, and according to the numbers, this was no small release. Upwards of 700,000 purchased in the first day, lines around the block, people smashing each other’s faces in to be the first to smash someone’s face in with an iPad.

I don’t believe people will replace their laptops with iPads. Rather, I think that the iPad will become the newspaper you take into the bathroom with you. It will be, with your cell phone, the first thing you touch after getting out of bed, and likely the last thing before going to sleep. It will be a permanent fixture in most living rooms, and even some kitchens, and it will operate to change the way people surf the web.

Which got me wondering: how do you surf the web? Ever since I got my Nexus One, browsing the internet on a Smartphone is actually possible (this coming from the stunted methods used in the Blackberry OS). Pages render smoothly and, for the most part, intelligently, adjusting to the smaller screen size. Text is clear and readable, and scrolling with your finger is easy and natural.

The web was never meant to be navigated with a finger. Links are generally text-based, and therefore hard to touch sometimes without zooming in; the finger isn’t as adept at manipulating text as a mouse. In spite of this, touch-based web has exploded since the iPhone. There is not a major website without a mobile version or one modified for touch.

Similarly, the iPad has already dictated, through its lack of Flash, how many media-based websites must exist in the Apple ecosystem. The company has forced major news and media companies to monitor what device one is using to browse its site, and to format it accordingly. Many companies have iPhone-, and now iPad-ready experiences. They have jettisoned their flash-based media with HTML5. This undermines the concept of an open web. Though the content is the same, one does not know that, on a non-Apple device, if he or she is getting the whole experience. Development for the iPhone and iPad are going to take a lot of time away from other mediums, other worthwhile projects. It’s sad to see, since the open web exists outside the Apple ecosystem.

The fact that Android devices will, in the near future, receive relatively complete Flash support, with Flash 10.1, and will be able to interact with non-Applefied sites, will hopefully bring developers back to reality a bit, and to halt their rapid eschewing of the Flash platform, which, for the most part, is an aide to the web. Yes, there are security concerns but as long as one is careful where he goes, and does not use the web for, ahem, nefarious purposes, Flash is harmless. What isn’t harmless is the ability for the Great Steve Jobs to essentially dictate, but not supporting a certain platform or plugin, what tools web designers can and can’t use to enhance their site. While Flash is the first, it may not be the last time that Apple decides they do not like a product or platform enough to support it.

But this is getting long-winded. I want to know: how do you surf?

Since getting my Nexus One, I spend a lot less time surfing the web on my laptop, in spite of it having much more screen space, and all the plugins that are supposed to enhance the surfing experience. I believe I default to the Nexus One because, at its core, my surfing desires are simple: to find good content and consume. I don’t need fifteen tabs open at the same time; I don’t need Flash. Mostly, I just need a couple bookmarks, a decent rendering engine, and a couch, and I am off to a good start. Browsing the web with your fingers feels natural. There isn’t the halting stop/start of a mouse (or thankfully, the track pad, which on my Dell laptop, SUCKS). There is just me and the screen.

So I may buy an iPad. I will probably use it haltingly, the same way I use my iPod Touch. To surf the web on the couch or in the bathroom. But without true multitasking support it’s going to be either a newspaper, or a book, or a browser, or a game system. But it will likely never be all these things to me. The great thing about having a laptop is that, when you need to, you can do more than one thing at a time. I think as consumers of media we are impatient, and this impatience will likely prevent the iPad from being adopted absolutely as a laptop replacement.

Comments? Suggestions? Let me know in the comments.