Well it’s all happening today.
Express thanks must go to o2 who have sent me over an iPhone 3G to review. I have it in my hand and it is more solid, more desirable, … just better than the 2G iPhone.
Here then is a quick and dirty picture of it (taken, with a bit of personal ceremony, with a 2G iPhone camera):
Expect a fuller perspective shortly.
Suffice to say that when you take a look at the Apple iTunes Application Store, it’s all… slowly, ever so slowly, happening, this mobile thing.
I spotted the Truphone app, the ShoZu app, the Wine Lover application, the Horroscope app…
There’s a degree of fake smilery to be had when it comes to o2 (and Carphone Warehouse) beset with technical problems on today, iPhone day. It’s not good. But, it is unprecedented. It’ll maybe even make the evening news here in the UK. If it does then I think it’s all-news-is-good-news. The iPhone and Apple cachet cancels out disappointment pretty quickly. Whatever the launch day spluttering, there’s clearly a lot of demand:
What’s very exciting is the feedback that I’m getting from people, not traditionally iPhone users. The experience that an iPhone can offer your average normob (and not your highly attuned SMS Text News reading mobile geek) is so powerful, so compelling, that I reckoned the market would be overflowing with iPhone demand after the 2G launch last year. But the pricing was all wrong. It’s much better now… so I just can’t wait to see if, very quickly, the market in the UK will segment, between the haves and the have-nots.
That is, those who have a decent, exciting, easy, seamless mobile (and internet) experience and the have nots — the Sony Ericsson-wielding Great Unwashed who can phone and text and occasionally use the shitty shitty mobile internet.
So I’ll have my experience of the new iPhone up shortly. If you’ve just got yourself one, mail me over your thoughts and we’ll publish.
Someone please help me out here, 'cause I'm on the verge of giving up. I've tried – really – to understand the iPhone hype. I've become used to it in the mainstream media, because the mainstream media are gullible, and thus easy prey for Apple's unstoppable spin machine. But here, on a site which specialises in mobile tech, I really thought I might hear some sense amongst the hysteria. But no.
OK, anyone? All I want to know is the answer to one question. What, precisely, is so damn great about the iPhone? I really can't see it. I hear it's “revolutionary” – but it contains hardly any features not seen already on other devices, many of which have been around for quite some time.
It has 3G? Great, there must be at least 50+ devices doing that now. They're pushing a 2Mpx camera with no videocapture when “normobs” are offering 5Mpx or more WITH videocapture. The lack of videocapture means it's actually irrelevant that it lacks a front-facing secondary camera for videocalling. It still can't handle MMS, and Apple's only (weak) response to that has been “but it has full email capability, you don't need MMS” (oh really? And how are you meant to exchange picture messages with the 95% of the market who don't have email capable phones, or is the truth that iPhone users are trying to form an elitist clique where they'll only converse with the similarly equipped while looking down disdainfully on the “normob wielders”?). Can you copy and paste yet in messages? Errrr… OK, what's Uncle Steve's explanation for that one, is copy & paste obsolete now too?
My personal current favourite is the ludicrous congratulations being heaped on Apple for the new App Store. Yeah! Great! Apparently, iPhone users now have the incredible ability to… wait for it… actually install new applications on the devices they paid for! Congratulating Apple for that is a bit like saying Nelson Mandela should thank the people who imprisoned him for eventually releasing him (i.e. he shouldn't actually have been imprisoned in the first place, so why the hell should he thank them?) Just curious, does the app store also include the facility to install your own ringtones instead of being limited to just the ringtones you've had to pay Uncle Steve yet more money for? Mmmm… let's see… oops, let's not go there. The App Store? Every major mobile OS has an “App Store” out there on the web, offering umpteen times the amount of software Apple's does, and when Android-based devices eventually arrive, they'll have an “App Store” everyone will struggle to match. For God's sake – if Steve Jobs physically kicked these people in the nuts, they'd probably thank him for it.
We'll also just gloss over the fact that if I want an app. for a Blackberry, Palm or Symbian-based device, I just need to Google it, and if I can't find what I want… well, I could always write it myself and slap it on there! I could do the same for the iPhone, couldn't I? Well, no. Because the only way of getting an app onto an iPhone is via the iTunes App Store, which means that Uncle Steve STILL gets the last word on what you can put on YOUR device (remember, the one you paid for) and what you can't. Speaking of money, although I can't blame Apple for this directly, the tariffs offered by O2? Still in excess of what you pay for any other device. Same with AT&T in the US, and there's been a virtual revolution in Canada over Rogers's initial data plan offerings.
Bottom line, the iPhone has one (or two, if you're picky) thing(s) going for it – Mobile Safari is the best browser out there, and combined with the multi-touch screen, it offers the best browsing experience currently available on mobile (you trade that off for messaging though, tests have proved the iPhone touchscreen is no faster to type on and suffers from the same error rates as predictive text keypads, both being roughly 3 times as slow as a physical QWERTY a la Blackberry). But for how long? Speaking of RIM, rumours are beginning to circulate that they've seen the iPhone as a shot across their bows, and are going to respond full-force with the upcoming Thunder (or Storm, no-one's quite sure of the name). Electrokinetic touchscreen? The same engine in their new browser as M-Safari? Ouch. If they get multi-touch on that too, the iPhone's only true market-leading features just bit the dust and quite probably got aced. Hard to believe the browser bit considering the existing 'berry browser is so bad, but this is what Apple have brought on themselves in a way – they set new standards in this area, now everyone else is going to copy them.
Still, keep believing the hype. Of course, I forgot the iPhone's other big advantage – ooo… doesn't it look cool sitting there next to the skinny latte and the organic carrot cake? I'm waiting for one of the iPhone poseurs to start claiming that Steve Jobs actually INVENTED 3G. Eh? No, He DID! He really, really, really did. And the internet. Or was that Al Gore?
That deserves it's own post. If you don't mind Colin, I'm going to re-post
with it's own page.
Review on its way…
Fire away, would be interested to hear counterpoints. Not trying to start a fight or anything, actually just want to see if anyone has the answers that have so far eluded me and those I've spoken with. Problem so far is that when I HAVE raised such point to iPhone owners, they seem to struggle to counter with very much – and I wasn't being sarcastic about the “skinny latte” either, because at least two were eventually reduced to “yeah, but look how COOL it is!”. Mmm.
BTW – I must apologise to Steve Jobs about the Copy & Paste accusation. Steve's since informed me that he didn't forget it at all – you can get it from the App Store, $12.99 (with a minimum 18 month contract). 😉
I suppose the other interesting thing that is worth a bit of thought is what impact will the 'second hand iPhone effect' have on the market?
My wife tonight is the proud owner of a (slightly heavily used) second hand iPhone – and I'm guessing a similar handover exercise will be happening in households up and down the country over the next few weeks. Up until now she's quite liked my iPhone but never would have considered shelling out for one herself. Like most normobs she hasn't until this point browsed the web, sent email, used maps or listened to music on her mobile – this is just not what normal people do! But tonight as we were grabbing a bite to eat she asked me how she could get web browsing added onto the pay as you go SIM pack I'd just picked up for her. I nearly choked on a mouthful of burger! She has never been interested in using her mobile like this before. NEVER. But I bet you she won't be the only one who gets a bit curious about what an inherited iPhone can do…
Colin, I do get your frustration and bewilderment, I really do. I've been an Apple fan boy for years, and even I questioned my sanity as I got up early this morning to que for a couple of hours before work. But if ownership of a second hand iPhone can get someone as normal as my wife interested in using a mobile for more than just calls and texts, then they Apple are certainly onto something…
Jon, spot on.
My wife is 1000% can't be arsed with mobile geekery, but she has of late been pestering me about handing on the i2G once the new one arrives in the house. Possibly just for Solitaire & Archers podcasts, but there you go.
I agree up to a point. That point is that the marketting is actually part of the iPhone. The technology and the publication campaign are an inspererable bundle. How many people who buy Nokia have heard of Ovi and will get any benefit from it?
Cadbury's chocolate is second rate technically and actually quite expensive, but it is all most people want because they really understand it. The ads make it clear, if it is wrapped in violet then it is yummy – easy!
My wish is not that technical people get frustrated with Apple's success but that Nokia et al wake up to the fact that they are engineering companies that sell to people, not engineering companies that sell to engineers.
PS: Nelson Mandella did actually blow things up and shoot people. The problem wasn't that he was sent to jail (he even pleaded guilty to most of the charges of violence against him) but that they didn't let him out when his sentence was complete.
I agree up to a point. That point is that the marketting is actually part of the iPhone. The technology and the publication campaign are an inspererable bundle. How many people who buy Nokia have heard of Ovi and will get any benefit from it?
Cadbury's chocolate is second rate technically and actually quite expensive, but it is all most people want because they really understand it. The ads make it clear, if it is wrapped in violet then it is yummy – easy!
My wish is not that technical people get frustrated with Apple's success but that Nokia et al wake up to the fact that they are engineering companies that sell to people, not engineering companies that sell to engineers.
PS: Nelson Mandella did actually blow things up and shoot people. The problem wasn't that he was sent to jail (he even pleaded guilty to most of the charges of violence against him) but that they didn't let him out when his sentence was complete.
I agree up to a point. That point is that the marketting is actually part of the iPhone. The technology and the publication campaign are an inspererable bundle. How many people who buy Nokia have heard of Ovi and will get any benefit from it?
Cadbury's chocolate is second rate technically and actually quite expensive, but it is all most people want because they really understand it. The ads make it clear, if it is wrapped in violet then it is yummy – easy!
My wish is not that technical people get frustrated with Apple's success but that Nokia et al wake up to the fact that they are engineering companies that sell to people, not engineering companies that sell to engineers.
PS: Nelson Mandella did actually blow things up and shoot people. The problem wasn't that he was sent to jail (he even pleaded guilty to most of the charges of violence against him) but that they didn't let him out when his sentence was complete.