Apple iPhone: stab in the cellular dark or invasion iPod next-gen? |
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After an entire months-long game of hopscotch, peek-a-boo, and "What Will Jobs Do Next", Apple finally reveals the... iPhone. Steve, you can be quite the stubborn cookie - we shall now have to differentiate between the Apple iPhone and the Linksys iPhone. Anyway, what's probably interesting about the iPhone is not what it has out of the box, but what it DOESN'T have, for a phone that costs as much as a PS3 - 20GB and 60GB.Let's keep it short: no 3G. As a cellphone, that could potentially be crippling to the iPhone (especially when Steve wants 10 million on the streets by next year). And if he tries to sell the phone to Japan - that country is true-blue (or blood-red) 3G country - it's going to be murder, so we're thinking that Apple might want to keep this as a North American release for now.
Still, the global (let alone NA) cellular industry isn't Apple turf - the iPhone is not going up against late entrants and also-rans (e.g., Zune), but against the monoliths of the cellphone industry: Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Motorola. Steve Jobs says that the iPhone is five years ahead of any other mobile phone. Well, not in the 3G department, most definitely.
But we're not going to simply surrender to the belief that Steve Jobs' fair-haired boys didn't think of all this when they drew up the iPhone's specs. They could always market it as a luxury product (at that price, it better well be). But for a company that has made its mark as a mass market trend-setter (even given the price of the 5G iPod), that could be a bit odd.
The other, and more viable, option is to play to their strengths. Try thinking of the iPhone less as a phone whose cellular features don't stack up to the cutting edge in the industry, but as a "next-gen" iPod which happens to have cellular capabilities. After all, with all the word flying around of a full-screen, touch-screen iPod, this might as well be it. And then the US$ 600 tag might be more justifiable, although it will most likely drop in the latter half of the year to reach to a wider audience. And as an iPod, it's pretty cool, especially with OS X and web browsing capabilities. Oh, and it makes phone calls, too.The lack of expanded 3G cellular capabilities won't cripple the potential sales of the iPhone (at least not in North America) if it doesn't become a critical issue, and if the iPod features take hold of the public imagination. The most likely scenario is that early adopters will trade in their iPods (especially earlier models) for the iPhone, precisely for its iPod features, but they won't mind having a new cellphone at the price as well (they will have to switch providers, though, unless they're with Cingular).
The rest of the market will move in after a price drop, and if they can afford to part ways with their current cellular provider (except if they're Cingular already), OR if Apple decides to open up the iPhone to other providers as well. Opening up would be a very smart move for Apple after the early adoption phase, to reach out to the market with what will still undoubtedly be quite the expensive cellular phone/iPod, although we don't know what the details of their contract with Cingular is.
Do we think that Jobs will shake the streets with 10 million iPhones by 2008? As an iPhone, no, but as an iPod, probably. And with Apple Computer, Inc. changing its name to simply Apple, Inc., to reflect a greater emphasis on consumer electronics and not just the Mac lineup, expect the iPhone marketing to reflect a similar philosophy of having your cake (iPod) and eating it, too (with a built-in phone). Apple may be moving to convergence, but it should be moving with its best foot forward.Heck, if they find a way to make iTunes on a wireless work, they could even undercut Microsoft's networking strategy with the Zune and make music on the iPhone wirelessly tradeable with other iPhones. That will really do wonders for iPhone sales. Steve Jobs is not as insane as some doomsayers think he is, moving into uncharted territory for Apple.
Next bet: with that motion sensor inside, they might want to make the iPhone workable with the Sony PS3 or Nintendo Wii. Now that's insane.
A big thanks to our resident Apple worm Chris S. for helping develop the ideas in this article!
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Comments [refresh]
1st! w00t!!!!!
when is the release because i am thinking of importing it from america (i live in the UK)
You have to use cingular for it don't you? Or can you buy it and use another service? I almost feel the iphone was a mistake. They are marketing it as the next ipod...but it's really expensive and... I don't know, remember the battery life? Now, not only are you watching video's and listening to music, you are surfing the web, and talking on the phone. I can barely get 3 hours out of my video ipod watching videos. Compound that with the phone, WIFI, and browser usage.
I would say batteries will be an issue, or maybe just an incovenience....and Ipod's have a high tendency to crash. If this happens with people's phone's, they will lose all their video, music, contacts, bookmarks, probably documents stored inside as well.
Apple also has to realize this won't be as big as Ipod's...not even close... people already have cheap cellphones and wireless providers. An Iphone will be more of a luxury item like a sidekick. I'm only talking in terms of cell phones though, I'd imagine it will be pretty popular with the pocketpc crowd.
Just my .2
competition are not popular so this product may be a big hit just like the ipod. this is apples take on (windows ce)pocketpc which is on the 5th revision going further.
June 2007
@Snowspot.net : if it's like most smart phones you can use it on any GSM market, HOWEVER. if it requires a data plan from cingular to use the internet. you can use it for the phone and multimedia parts. but the internet will never work.
And if you guys didn't already hear. Cingular is not allowed t give any discounts on the iPhone EVER as part of their deal for the phone.
Battery life will be a concern however the 5G iPod w/ Video uses a spinning hard disk while the nanos, shuffles, and this 8 GB phone use flash which saves a lot of the battery power.
grow up, everyone can see who posts first you dont need to tell us. Just grow up
(1) I hate the design of all cellphones. Steve's right; they're dreadful. This thing is super-slick. I could tell immediately how to do things on it that are akward, confusing and require more button presses than a moon launch on more conventional products.
(2) I love being able to browse the web usably anytime, anywhere. Reallly, this is more of a killer app than the phone. Email, too, and a gorgeous SMS implementation that makes conversations delightfully easy to follow.
I do wish it had 3G. But what's speed if browsing the web is still ugly and clumsy? And really, the 128k-320k EDGE speeds should be good enough for any single individual if you're not pulling down video.
(3) I expect this to be a very good SSH terminal thanks to the big screen. Since Palm, Blackberry and even Sidekick have SSH, I'm sure there will be some way to get it on the iPhone. Heck, it's part of MacOS X at a pretty low level.
(4) Developing widgets for it looks like it would be a lot of fun and I'd be very surprised if there isn't good support for at least third party widget-style applications.
(5) I'll enjoy the music features but because I don't like earphones they won't be my focus. But it will be nice to be able to attach the iPhone to an iPod dock/speaker system - that way it charges and also provides me with a music system.
So there you are, some solid reasons to buy it. My only worry is how well the software-based keyboard will work. I loved the Sidekick keyboard but even that's harder to type than a full-size unit. Bluetooth keyboard support would be a great idea for this product.
I used my Sidekick once to meet a tight deadline when the Internet connection in my house went out and the sidekick's network connection still worked. Great. But far better with a bigger display that's crisper and easier to read. I say this to give you an example of how integrating this with a real keyboard would really make it useful. Maybe a display, too.
MacOS X should be able to handle it, no? (I know there's confusion as to how much MacOS X there is in the device, but I would think most low-level stuff like Bluetooth and networking would be the same).
D