Think of the iPad as the Macintosh 128k. It provides a glimpse of how we will interact with computers in the future, yet at the moment is undeveloped and lacks the features and software of mainstream computers. The Mac 128k lacked a hard drive, multitasking, enough RAM to be usable, and the huge range of productivity software available on MS-DOS machines. Over time, the Mac (and Windows) matured and the feature set exceeded that of command line driven OSs.
I think one of the first points made in this article was that the author was not criticizing the iPad's lack of current features, but rather the philosophy behind it and the implications that arise from its widespread adoption.
