The first iAd for the Apple iPad was released today in the United States. This special “preview iAd” is for the upcoming Disney movie “Tron: Legacy“ - in theaters this Friday, December 17. The iAd is designed to show off the iAd for iPad platform and make maximum use of the iPad’s resources although as this is only a preview of the platform the tablet won’t see another iAd until early 2011.

The Tron: Legacy iAd will be very much like those iAds previously seen on the iPhone and iPod, it will run full-screen (see pictures below) and feature amazing graphics and video native to the app running the iAd, in this case an example given is the TV Guide app. According to AdAge the TRON iAd will have around 10 minutes of video as well as pictures from the movie, it will allow people to listen to a preview of the movie’s soundtrack with the option to purchase it on iTunes without leaving the ad, as well as a theater locator complete with showtimes for the movie.

This iAd also marks a first for all iAds as it is allows users to send an email straight from within the ad. The article doesn’t specify what the email would be but I assume it is something to do with sending details about the movie. Also no word on whether or not this functionality is coming to iAds on the iPhone or iPod.

This release of the first iAd on the iPad is a tad bit delayed as it was originally announced that it would be coming in November but either way it’s here now. This launch is also in keeping with Apple’s launch of the first iAd in April for iPhones and iPods which was an ad for “Toy Story 3″ another Disney movie. Likely this is because Steve Jobs is the largest single shareholder of Disney stock and he has been sitting on the company’s Board of Directors since May 2006.

As mentioned above, this iPad iAd will only be available in the USA and the same will be true when there are further iPad iAds next year. iAds on iPhones are still only available in the USA, UK, and France although they are going to be rolling out in Germany and Japan some time in the new year.

What I personally do not understand about this move is why do it now? Seeing as this iAd is not the beginning of a flood of iAds on the iPad platform and we’ll have to wait to see more of them until 2011 why not wait until the iPad 2 comes out next year? If they had managed to keep this iAd release on schedule and do it in November then by all means they should have released it in November. But as they delayed its launch anyway why not put it out in sync with at least the announcement of the iPad 2? I am assuming, of course, that the iPad 2 will have better specifications than the current iPad and therefore be capable of even cooler iAds.

For More Info:

Advertising Age Article [LINK]