For me, LRm is exactly the tool I wanted when I first saw the iPad. That's not to say I think it's perfect but, rather, it already fills the need I have. That need is to deal with the ~90% of my photos that I don't want to keep.
My beef isn't with what the produce can do, it's how it does it and the time it takes!
I'm out of town shooting and I come back to my hotel with a mere 100 raws from a 5DMII. I want to edit the images as you describe:
1. I save the 100 raws from card to laptop.
2. I import them into Lightroom.
At this point I can start working on the images. With LrM I have to additionally:
3. Build Smart Previews, a task I'd not
have to do above. That takes time.
4-5. I have to sync them to the iPad, something I'd not do above. That takes time. Then sync them back to the laptop. That takes time.
6. I have to work on a slow device that's got a smaller display. And I have to avoid using anything in Quick Develop because the device isn't color managed.
At this point between workflow A and workflow B, I've finished what I needed to do in A
well before I got the images into the iPad for B. Then I have to sync back.
Further I have to use another cloud service (Adobe's) I don't want to use in both directions.
Editing a shoot still takes time but now some of that time can be in situations where I couldn't edit before
Why couldn't you do the editing on the machine that you sent the initial raws to in the first place? (ideally in this kind of on-the go scenario, a laptop).
Maybe at Adobe or wherever you work with LrM, you have a super fast T1 line. Ever try all this syncing using the WiFi at a La Quinta hotel? Not my idea of a fun workflow.
Lastly, I know that everyone in the Lightroom team definitely considers LRm a 1.0 product and that there are workflows that can be improved.
Can you speed up WiFi for the syncing?
Can you allow me to use DropBox which is the cloud service I already use?
Lastly, I'm someone that started with Photoshop 1.0.7 and LR 1 (actually pre-release). Both products where vastly more useful and well thought out in their 1.0 incarnations than LrM 1.0 by a long shot.