I see this as a huge problem. The bottom line is that most students cannot get away from pen input and are still more likely to use a stylus to highlight text than a mouse. While students are typing notes more and more often, so much is still done with a pencil. But, because Apple is a big name, they are going to secure deals with e-textbooks and people will continue to use e-textbooks in a computer-y way and think that that's how they should be used. I tutored high school and university students for almost 20 years, and even towards the end, a very, very small fraction of them used the computer to make/type notes (either in class or at home) or answer homework questions. Looseleaf paper and spiral bound notebooks still rule the average school, though from the number of IM messages I receive from them now in while they're in class, I'm going to guess that post-secondary laptop use in class is stronger.

I could be wrong but I don't see this so much as a problem of focus as one of breaking into the big markets. I think the use case for the average student, something that allows handwritten math equations and marked up pages, is pretty clear. The iPad is nowhere near replacing the need for pens and notebooks, which I think are still alive and kicking in education today. I wrote a bit about my findings of the iAnnotate app on the Mobile Read forums, and it doesn't (yet) look suited to that at all.

I can understand why not every university student has run out and purchased a $2000-$3000 tablet PC (although those that have swear by them), but if this $500 machine continues to improve the user experience, there's no reason why this shouldn't be a reasonable student substitute.