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Abstract
This study examines the underlying practices of consuming traditional mass mediaspecifically TV and movie content, news, and their accompanying advertisingthrough the iPad computer tablet. The research questions and hypotheses cover areas such as post-adoption behaviors, including rate and variety of tablet use, and classifying the iPad as a continuous, dynamically continuous, or discontinuous innovation. Further, advertising avoidance, irritation, and skepticism, as well as attention to and absorption of content on the iPad are studied, particularly in comparison to the traditional mass media delivery systemsthe television and the printed newspaper. Phase one of the study incorporated four in-depth focus groups of adult iPad owners, and was used to inform the second phasea national online survey of adult iPad owners. Key findings include: Two disparate types of iPad users emergedthose who use theirs often, and for many tasks, and those who use theirs infrequently, and for few tasks; TV ads on the iPad are more irritating than TV ads on the television; although attention to the television is greater than attention to TV on the iPad, attention to TV on the iPad yields greater levels of absorption to content than does attention to the television; and while portability was cited as the most frequent reason the iPad changes the TV viewing experience, compared to the television, it is control of news content through the iPad that changes the news consumption experience most, compared to the printed newspaper.