There’s plenty you can’t do professionally with an iPad – as detractors have been pointing out since its launch. But that’s maybe missing the point of its creation.

Steve Jobs made no apologies for declaring Apple as the company at the “intersection between technology and the liberal arts”. He’s right – no other company has done as much and with the best intentions in the generalised intellectual field.

That’s why the list emphasises “professional”. Of course, Apple does provide elegant solutions for all those expert tasks and it’s exactly why the iPad does not. It is not competing in the professional desktop or laptop markets. It’s competing in a newer space. It did not invent the pad/slate/tablet market. But it sure as hell has taken that market out of Death Niche Valley.

Other companies, like Hewlett Packard, will be launching their versions this year – I’d bet that none will be as desirable as the iPad. Why? Because Apple not only understands the power of good design, it also understands “market” for liberal arts/education better than anyone else.

The debate on whether the launch of the iPad was handled successfully goes on and Clark Turner, editor of UTalkMarketing has been helping to focus that (disclosure – there’s a contribution from me!) What is beyond serious debate is that Steve Jobs and his team have created a product that will sell in multiples of millions into a new group of customers, as well as Apple die-hards and iPhone/iPod converts.

The iPad is about three things: connectivity, distribution, exchange. It wi-fi is lightning fast (3G is a wait-and-see) so users are up, online and networking without so much as a single slow handclap.

This easy connectivity is a boon for publishers of newspapers, magazines, books, film and music. The digital distribution network just got very large indeed.

Online, iPad users can exchange, share and learn. Education, in its generalised, liberal sense, has also expanded its horizons and my colleague Lorraine Warren nails the reasons elegantly on her blog.

The iPad will appeal to a wide demographic - I can’t wait for the ads (toddlers, grannies, teens, mums and dads, mums and mums, dads and dads, singles, in-betweenies, grumpy old men…)

I know it’s an old Apple term but the iPad is “insanely great”, as much for what it does not do, as for what it does.