When I first saw the iPhone, like all Apple products, in my mind, I told myself, I had to have it! Just like I got myself the iPod and other Apple stuff that they're producing. Somehow, when you look at Apple products, they have class, a great sense of style and it suits the consumer's needs, it's also user-friendly and blends in many facets of your daily life into a little machine (that might become surgically grafted to my palm).After the initial wave of excitement subsided. The next few thoughts crossed my mind, and believe me, this is the part where I start poking holes in my own perfect little bubble of thoughts. Firstly, if they're going to produce a phone like this and make it a camera, a web browser, a music player (a built-in iPod), a photo viewer and other stuff, why not make it a PDA too? For the price of this iPhone, I could get myself a PDA phone like O2's or Dopod's or Dell's or Hewlett Packard's. Why would I spend so much money on the iPhone when it can't seem to function like a PDA? Where does the SIM card fit into? How long is the battery life going to be? Apple isn't exactly know for it's endurance when it comes to battery life, think about their iPods. And it runs on Apple OS, so that means you get to sync it with everything you have on your Apple computer, in other words, you have to be an exclusive Apple fanatic to use it, relatively speaking.
Next, all I ever wanted in a phone was a revolutionary way to chat with my friends, be it locally or internationally, think businessman. The excellent text messaging SMS QWERTY keypad and touchscreen everything on this iPhone allows me to do just that. OK, I'll admit, a little music won't kill me, so the integrated iPod is a bonus. And oh yeah, the camera (2 Megapixel only?) too, just in case friends or movie star comes along and sits next to you and you need prove that he/she was there. But, to add in an integrated web browser? Why? As it is, existing mobile phones have some form of web browsers and believe me when I tell you it's tough just trying to get it to work, let alone type. The thought of slow download of information rates is already headache enough, let alone trying to find a hotspot to surf the web from. Granted, sooner or later, every other bookshop or coffee shop or bus stop or train station will have or become a Internet surfspot with Wifi and other Bluetoothie availability for everyone to be connected internationally, but is this really necessary now?
The disadvantages of being the first company to introduce technology into the world or market, is that someone out there, think competition like Microsoft, Creative Technologies, Sony, Samsung etc etc etc. will definitely find a way to miniaturise, customise, re-revoluntionarise your product. In other words, copy it wholesale and call it their own, which includes slapping new patents on it and calling it theirs. Then you'll have to reinvent everything all over again and we're back to square one aren't we?
However, this does give competition to the iPhone. The late release dates for the iPhone in Europe (by the 4th quarter of 2007) and in Asia (by 2008) will likely mean that, given the time frame, Sony might come out with something smaller, or Microsoft with go into a joint-venture with Creative Technologies (not that they already aren't) for a phone and MP3 player together. Although products are patented, it doesn't stop anyone from buying the iPhone, tearing it apart into it's component parts and reverse-engineering the stuff and call it their technology. The frustrating thing about this is that you'll be tied up in lawsuits over who owns what technology, that by the time the product comes and goes, the lawsuit will no longer have any meaning anymore.
Having said all that, I do think that Apple is one step ahead of everyone (consumers) and they think like and know what their consumers want and know how to give them what they want. I give them absolute credit for trying and putting technology out on the market to compete and revolutionarise everything.
I was getting sick of the competition between Nokia, Sony, Samsung etc with all their new models of mobile phones. Technology can only progress so far, another competitor needs to find something that breaks through all this stagnation and I think that, ladies and gentlemen, Apple has done just that today! Bravo!
Below is the article press release and specifications of the iPhone lifted directly from www.gizmodo.com
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“iPhone is a revolutionary and magical product that is literally five years ahead of any other mobile phone,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “We are all born with the ultimate pointing device—our fingers—and iPhone uses them to create the most revolutionary user interface since the mouse.”
iPhone is a Revolutionary Mobile Phone
iPhone is a revolutionary new mobile phone that allows users to make calls by simply pointing at a name or number. iPhone syncs all of your contacts from your PC, Mac® or Internet service such as Yahoo!, so that you always have your full list of up-to-date contacts with you. In addition, you can easily construct a favorites list for your most frequently made calls, and easily merge calls together to create conference calls.
iPhone’s pioneering Visual Voicemail, an industry first, lets users look at a listing of their voicemails, decide which messages to listen to, then go directly to those messages without listening to the prior messages. Just like email, iPhone’s Visual Voicemail enables users to immediately randomly access those messages that interest them most.
iPhone includes an SMS application with a full QWERTY soft keyboard to easily send and receive SMS messages in multiple sessions. When users need to type, iPhone presents them with an elegant touch keyboard which is predictive to prevent and correct mistakes, making it much easier and more efficient to use than the small plastic keyboards on many smartphones. iPhone also includes a calendar application that allows calendars to be automatically synced with your PC or Mac.
iPhone features a 2 megapixel camera and a photo management application that is far beyond anything on a phone today. Users can browse their photo library, which can be easily synced from their PC or Mac, with just a flick of a finger and easily choose a photo for their wallpaper or to include in an email.
iPhone is a quad-band GSM phone which also features EDGE and Wi-Fi wireless technologies for data networking. Apple has chosen Cingular, the best and most popular carrier in the US with over 58 million subscribers, to be Apple’s exclusive carrier partner for iPhone in the US.
iPhone is a Widescreen iPod
iPhone is a widescreen iPod with touch controls that lets music lovers “touch” their music by easily scrolling through entire lists of songs, artists, albums and playlists with just a flick of a finger. Album artwork is stunningly presented on iPhone’s large and vibrant display.
iPhone also features Cover Flow, Apple’s amazing way to browse your music library by album cover artwork, for the first time on an iPod. When navigating your music library on iPhone, you are automatically switched into Cover Flow by simply rotating iPhone into its landscape position.
iPhone’s stunning 3.5-inch widescreen display offers the ultimate way to watch TV shows and movies on a pocketable device, with touch controls for play-pause, chapter forward-backward and volume. iPhone plays the same videos purchased from the online iTunes® Store that users enjoy watching on their computers and iPods, and will soon enjoy watching on their widescreen televisions using the new Apple TV™. The iTunes Store now offers over 350 television shows, over 250 feature films and over 5,000 music videos.
iPhone lets users enjoy all their iPod content, including music, audiobooks, audio podcasts, video podcasts, music videos, television shows and movies. iPhone syncs content from a user’s iTunes library on their PC or Mac, and can play any music or video content they have purchased from the online iTunes store.
iPhone is a Breakthrough Internet Communications Device
iPhone features a rich HTML email client which fetches your email in the background from most POP3 or IMAP mail services and displays photos and graphics right along with the text. iPhone is fully multi-tasking, so you can be reading a web page while downloading your email in the background.
Yahoo! Mail, the world’s largest email service with over 250 million users, is offering a new free “push” IMAP email service to all iPhone users that automatically pushes new email to a user’s iPhone, and can be set up by simply entering your Yahoo! name and password. iPhone will also work with most industry standard IMAP and POP based email services, such as Microsoft Exchange, Apple .Mac Mail, AOL Mail, Google Gmail and most ISP mail services.
iPhone also features the most advanced and fun-to-use web browser on a portable device with a version of its award-winning Safari™ web browser for iPhone. Users can see any web page the way it was designed to be seen, and then easily zoom in to expand any section by simply tapping on iPhone’s multi-touch display with their finger. Users can surf the web from just about anywhere over Wi-Fi or EDGE, and can automatically sync their bookmarks from their PC or Mac. iPhone’s Safari web browser also includes built-in Google Search and Yahoo! Search so users can instantly search for information on their iPhone just like they do on their computer.
iPhone also includes Google Maps, featuring Google’s groundbreaking maps service and iPhone’s amazing maps application, offering the best maps experience by far on any pocket device. Users can view maps, satellite images, traffic information and get directions, all from iPhone’s remarkable and easy-to-use touch interface.
iPhone’s Advanced Sensors
iPhone employs advanced built-in sensors—an accelerometer, a proximity sensor and an ambient light sensor—that automatically enhance the user experience and extend battery life. iPhone’s built-in accelerometer detects when the user has rotated the device from portrait to landscape, then automatically changes the contents of the display accordingly, with users immediately seeing the entire width of a web page, or a photo in its proper landscape aspect ratio.
iPhone’s built-in proximity sensor detects when you lift iPhone to your ear and immediately turns off the display to save power and prevent inadvertent touches until iPhone is moved away. iPhone’s built-in ambient light sensor automatically adjusts the display’s brightness to the appropriate level for the current ambient light, thereby enhancing the user experience and saving power at the same time.
Pricing & Availability
iPhone will be available in the US in June 2007, Europe in late 2007, and Asia in 2008, in a 4GB model for $499 (US) and an 8GB model for $599 (US), and will work with either a PC or Mac. iPhone will be sold in the US through Apple’s retail and online stores, and through Cingular’s retail and online stores. Several iPhone accessories will also be available in June, including Apple’s new remarkably compact Bluetooth headset.
Screen size: 3.5 inches Screen resolution: 320 by 480 at 160 ppi Input method: Multi-touch Operating system: OS X Storage: 4GB or 8GB GSM: Quad-band (MHz: 850, 900, 1800, 1900) Wireless data: Wi-Fi (802.11b/g) + EDGE + Bluetooth 2.0 Camera: 2.0 megapixels Battery: Up to 5 hours Talk / Video / Browsing, Up to 16 hours Audio playback Dimensions: 4.5 x 2.4 x 0.46 inches Weight: 4.8 ounces / 135 grams.
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