Addicted to the iPad?

I've written about this same phenomenon here.

The Apple iPad is good.  Really good.  But is it too good?

Here's another blog post on the downside of the most successful gadget launch in history.  In short, the author is afraid his own kids have become addicted to it.

They'll use it for anything. And while one's actually using it, the other will sit there and watch the first one using it. Until, again, they start fighting over it. (And you know what that means. It means I might as well already debit my checking account for a second iPad.)

It's worse than TV ever was--because there's only one TV and because they can't subtly get up and turn on the TV and be using it for 15 minutes before you notice what they're up to. And also because, unlike TV, there's this aura of respectability around the iPad, because it is actually possible to use it for something other than mindless entertainment (not that my kids use it for that).

And it's not only the kids: My wife and my daughter have squabbled over who gets to go to bed reading a book on the iPad and who gets shafted with the limited selection on the paper-based stuff. (So let's go ahead a debit my account for a THIRD iPad.)

Again, a month after we bought it, the iPad has become so central to our household that we have to hide it. And in relatively short order, to preserve my family harmony, I'm probably going to have to buy two more of the damn things.

Read the entire piece here.