No they are not. Will there be Adobe/Office style aps written to do actual work? Probably. When the dust settles will most of the users 'work' on and iPad? Nope.
Ummmm..., you're showing yourself to be as ignorant as some of those "pundits" quoted in the article above ... LOL ...
That's why some of these idiots either posting about the non-usefulness of the iPad and those other so-called "pundits" are idiots -- when they say such things ... and are just "nattering nabobs of negativity" -- completely and totally uninformed... :-)
It does a lot of work, like spreadsheets, designing webpages, writing letters/documents, creating slide-show presentations, desktop publishing for brochures, advertisements or something to produce for your own use and/or distribution.
And that's in addition to all the apps that you can get with the iPad for organizing whatever other kind of work you like to do (like, for instance), I have several of the Bible apps which make it great for doing Bible study on the run and having excellent "tools" at my disposal.
Then you can use it for reading your books or listening to your music or keeping up on recent television programs (that you may want to catch up on, while getting around in your travels (either day travels or on a trip), organizing and creating picture/slide shows with your own pictures and/or videos that you shoot... and... so much more that it "boggles the mind" that someone can be so ingorant as to say that it's not productive... "amazing" ... LOL ...
Way to go....
Look, I understand you got a permanent erection for Steve Jobs.
What I am is as big an Apple fan as you will ever find. PERIOD. I have a house full of them including the first one I bought over 20 years ago. I buy them for family members. And I am the Mac Guru every one I know comes to on the rare occasion there is a problem with their machines.
Again. iPads will not be used for much, if any, work. They will be used to consume. Why on earth is that a bad thing?
Next time you might try to not shoot your own troops.