9 things wrong with iPhone Source Arstechnica
So, after watching the iPhone announcement—the gadget we've all been jonesing for—what's the first thing we all do? That's right, figure out all the things that are wrong with it and why it's not going to be the "killer app" for Apple. It happened to the iPod, why not the iPhone. Here's my take on the caveats... and before you all howl, Clint specifically asked me to render an opinion. Editor's note: ;)
* Cost: The price point hurts! It's $499 for for 4G and $599 for 8G. So as not to be stupid about it, that's $500 and $600 for a phone. And apparently, that's with a 2 year carrier agreement! The Tyler household isn't going to be springing for one of these any time soon at that price. Will businesses? Quite possibly, because as extensible phones go, that's not a huge price. Also, we should keep in mind the application of Moore's Law. The iPhone costs a bundle now. In a year, it won't. The price will go down through technology improvements, economies of scale, so forth and et cetera.
And, let's all remember that when the RAZR came out, it was $500. I just got mine for $30 with a 2-year contract right before Christmas. As they say at Wal*Mart, "Watch out for falling prices." Also note, that this is a high-end phone plus the best music player on the planet. A 4G iPod Nano costs $200 already. Another $300 for an extensible phone suddenly might not seem too outrageous, especially if you already carry too many gadgets. I still want one.
* Cingular: There's no cell phone plan information yet from Cingular. Cingular trumpets the fact that it doesn't drop calls... but everyone I seem to hear from hates them (I have T-Mobile, so no personal experience here). Plus, add the fact that Cingular bought AT&T Wireless because AT&T had such awful customer service that business was crappy. When Cingular actually did well, AT&T bought Cingular back. Brings up the question, "Is AT&T going to suck less as a cellular carrier the second time around?" Remains to be seen. All in all, the fact that the iPhone is not carrier independent is making lots of people unhappy (including me).
* No 3G: This is a hardware issue, so for first-generation adopters it may be a biggie. Business users or tech enthusiasts with a thirst for the latest and greatest are going to care, big time. A case can be made that the price point of the iPhone puts it solidly in the business and enthusiast market. On the other hand, those of us, like me who are woefully behind the technology curve when it comes to cell phones, are not going to care much. Presently, Cingular doesn't even support 3G in all its markets (and in those, coverage isn't extensive), so it's hardly worth paying for the circuitry when it can't be used. In a year, the iPhone may indeed support 3G.
* No WiFi sync to iTunes: it strikes me that this is a software-only "problem." At present, no iPod syncs over WiFi (no iPod has WiFi). Once the software supports it (and there's no reason I can see that it can't) it'll happen.
* No over-the-air downloads from iTunes store: This is a direct result of slow data speeds. See 3G above.
* No removable memory: I saw this in a blog somewhere... can I laugh hysterically now? I mean, when I went to put a ringtone on my RAZR (God, I hate that phone), I couldn't copy a whole MP3 onto it (and you should have seen the uncommunicative error it threw). There wasn't enough memory for a 3MB file. Are 4 gigs somehow not enough that we need an extra 1GB removable memory? Color me as not getting this complaint at all.
* Battery life issues: Here's a potential problem. You get 5 hours of talk or video and 16 hours of audio (no mention of how much standby time you get). If you're surfing and watching and listening when you're not talking, this could be a potentially huge issue, especially since you can't just keep an extra charged battery and swap them out.
* No MS Exchange or Office support: This is a potential biggie to business users. Consumers aren't going to give a flying fart. But since the iPhone is extensible and runs actual Mac OS X, there is simply no reason that Exchange support can't be added. There is no reason that it can't support Office documents. None. Big deal at first? Maybe. Big deal forever? Doubt it.
* Not extensible by third parties: This is probably the biggest long-range caveat. If Apple locks down the iPhone permanently to all third-party developers, it's going to weaken the platform in the long run. Third party developers are the lifeblood of almost any platform. For business reasons, they can do things that a large company like Apple cannot do. However, it will be interesting to see if Apple uses the certification of third party products as a revenue stream (something like SalesForce's App Exchange). I strongly suspect that somehow, somewhen, third party apps will make it to the iPhone, especially if companies like EA Games, which is pushing hard into iPod games market starts leaning on Apple for a portal into the iPhone.
Would you really spend money downloading music over the air anyway, not to mention draining your battery to do it? Don't know about your costs but that sort of traffic would certainly be many times more than the 99 cents for the song down-under!
Posted: Thursday, 11 January 2007 at 4:45PM (AEDT)
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So its $15 per month and $1.99 per song from Verison to get over the air music downloads
Its video is tiny and are just clips like music videos.
iphone has a large screen and full length movies and tv shows. its simply not possible to do them over the air.
Music yes rest no. but then people will bitch why can't i download movies when i can download music. blah blah
better to not give that option from the start, cause i can bet giginger will start complaining
@MySchizoBuddy: When have I ever said I hate Apple? In this very thread I've said I'd get the phone if it wasn't for some omissions that I'd get it. I just don't understand why that makes me an Apple hater. Is it because I don't fall down and praise everything they do?
In fact, I believe earlier in the thread I also said the AppleTV was very interesting to me.
Before you start making accusations read my posts.
As for the 3G. I'm well within my rights to expect a phone to have that. Just because the US is, surprisingly, backwards with phone technology doesn't mean Apple shouldn't cater for the rest of the world. I did note that Jobs mentioned 3G in his Keynote as something to come later. Doesn't mean I'll change my thoughts that it's a stupid thing to leave out.
I'm so sorry that I expect better things of Apple. Maybe that's Wanderers fault for building them up so much?
Apple will cater when the time comes. why is so hard for you to digest.
why add 3G increase the cost even more, drop the battery life even more. when no one is going to use it.
makes no sense what so ever
putting a feature that no one is going to use is plain ass stupid. It doesn't matter if it from the future and totally awesome. 3G will come when its needed. not sooner not later.
Cingular doesn't even have complete coverage with 3G. only certain areas have it. Why will Apple add 3G. makes squat of a sense to add 3G
If it's not going to be used then it can be turned off by default. It's a moot point though because they haven't added 3G. I'm just hoping the second generation is as revolutionary as they say this one is. When it was announced i spent a good bit of time talking about it with my friend and we were both saying that it looked a pretty good phone and we wouldn't mind getting one. It hr a pretty good phone but it's not fantastic. It's not revolutionary. I'd love to see some more detailed specs on this thing though. What's the screen made of? How easy is it to scratch? Fingerprints? What sort of ccd sensor is in the camera? I'd like to know more about the syncing options. There's a lot more that i'd like to know about the phone. Right now though all we're getting hr bare minimum tech specs and some cool videos. I can't make a proper judgement until then. Right now though it looks like a good attempt but not quite good enough. That touch screen really does sound great though. I can't wait to have a play on it.
No removeable memory..*tsk* Bad Apple! Why in the hell not? Maybe there's an iPod adapter that will do this?
Schiz, the whole 3G thing is a valid reason. Here in the UK I have been using 3G for the past 3 years, and I don't live in London or even a major city. Sure it's not available everywhere, but what good is a fully featured safari if you are browsing in the 19th century speed-wise? I've tried "surfing" (more like drowning) the net using standard GSM networks and it's seriously painful. That combined with the lack of exchange capability basically rules this phone out for the majority of business users. Hey, I hate Exchange as much as the next man, but it's a de facto business standard.
The two battery thing is bizarre. I can sort of see why they have two separate batteries, but frankly, I'd rather just have one big one and have the ability to talk for longer As for it not being remveable... well that's just Apple through and through. While it may make it look prettier, where a phone/PDA is concerned, this really is a case of form OVER function.
Looking forward to version two with all these things fixed as I really like the rest of this "phone"
Am I to understand that you're agreeing with me [-Stash-]?
I'm not use to this happening on this forum so I thought I'd check.
Incidentally, don't try using 3G if your house is surrounded by trees. It'll make you cry.
Take some perspective. This is the first multi-touch user interface consumer product in the electronics industry. It's groundbreaking no matter how you look at it. It's the equivalent to when Apple first introduced the consumer version of the mouse.
If you haven't seen it yet, you should take a look at Jeff Han's real-world demo of multi-touch user interfaces. (If you've seen "Minority Report" you've already seen the concept.)
http://youtube.com/watch?v=QKh1Rv0PlOQ
It gives you an idea of where Apple is going to take user interfaces in the next few years.
dan39, yes it is ground breaking, but it is not perfect and has some serious shortcomings to everyday use. That's all we want people to realise. It's been called the "Jesus phone" and quite frankly it's not, not yet, maybe version 2 It's done some new stuff very well, but fallen down on some of the older stuff. That's all. I'm not saying it's crap, it quite obviously isn't.
Yay!
As for the multi touch. It's great and it appears to have been put to good use, although I'd rather have seen it on a Tablet PC style device.
However, for the phone it does appear to work and that's the best thing about it. Second best is the OS/UI it has. The SMS arrangement looks darn sweet. I just wish the rest of the phone was up to scratch.
I've had touchscreen phones before (Sony Ericsson P900 & P910i) and I've repeatedly found myself wishing I could do more than one touch at a time. The handwriting recognition on those phones was pretty ace though. Actually worked, even with my illegible scrawl.
OK... Make that the first multi-touch user interface consumer product in the electronics industry that anyone has actually ever heard of.
That Touchstream thing is more of a peripheral. I'm talking about mainstream devices that have direct multi-touch interfaces as their entire UI to the software.
Yeah, it's still super neat. And it's definitely the first touchscreen with multi-touch (that I have heard of . The touchstream keyboard is really cool as well, unfortunately they're not made anymore, and used ones go for about $600 on ebay these days.
Continuing this debate is probably pointless, but jeez wanderer, it's either black or white for you, isn't it? And I'm sorry, but when the only company ('s products) you ever praise (and can spend several topic pages doing it) is apple, and you scorn anything competitors release (at least I have yet to see you say anything good about any product besides an apple one), that's not exactly an unbiased view. In fact, here's a funny but true comment on digg a few weeks ago concerning a recent event; it seems to reflect your attitude pretty well (or at least how you come off):
Other company to bloggers: Here's some PCs for review. Return them when you're done with them. Digg: [doesn't notice]
Microsoft to bloggers: Here's some PCs for review. Return them when you're done with them. Digg: [first[ EVIL MICRO$OFT BRIBING BLOGGERS WITH FREE LAPTOPS!!! [later] EVIL MICROSOFT SNATCHES LAPTOPS BACK OFF POOR BLOGGERS!!!!11!!
And, no doubt, if it Apple did it, Apple to bloggers: Here's some PCs for review. Return them when you're done with them. Digg: [first] Bounteous Gods at Apple generously acknowledge grateful and loyal bloggers! [later] Apple reaffirms its utter integrity after slanderous FUD campaign casts doubt on generous gifts!
Come on, people, get a sense of perspective...
I'm actually quite surprised you managed to find it in you to make a single criticism of an apple product.
Comments
Don't know about your costs but that sort of traffic would certainly be many times more than the 99 cents for the song down-under!
Posted: Thursday, 11 January 2007 at 4:45PM (AEDT)
V CAST VPak - 1st Month Free, $15/month after promotion
Now you can get music with amazing sound quality downloaded directly to your phone, for just $1.99 and up per song. With over a million songs in our library to choose from.
Three great ways to take your music with you
1. Direct to phone
Download any song from our music catalog to your V CAST Music-enabled phone for as little as $1.99 each, plus airtime.
2. Download to computer
Download songs to your computer for as little as $.99 each.
3. Sync your music library
Get the Music Essentials Kit and sync your own music library to your phone in moments.
Get VPak for unlimited V CAST access
Get the most out of your V CAST phone with VPak. Hundreds of video clips daily, including sports highlights and news updates. Email and shop online with Mobile Web 2.0. And play amazing 3D and multi-player games.
Plus with VPak you’ll get unlimited airtime for V CAST Music, V CAST Video, Mobile Web 2.0 and Get It Now. All for just $15 a month.
http://weblogs.jupiterresearch.com/analysts/gartenberg/archives/2007/01/whats_missing_f.html
Schiz, the whole 3G thing is a valid reason. Here in the UK I have been using 3G for the past 3 years, and I don't live in London or even a major city. Sure it's not available everywhere, but what good is a fully featured safari if you are browsing in the 19th century speed-wise? I've tried "surfing" (more like drowning) the net using standard GSM networks and it's seriously painful. That combined with the lack of exchange capability basically rules this phone out for the majority of business users. Hey, I hate Exchange as much as the next man, but it's a de facto business standard.
The two battery thing is bizarre. I can sort of see why they have two separate batteries, but frankly, I'd rather just have one big one and have the ability to talk for longer
Looking forward to version two with all these things fixed as I really like the rest of this "phone"
dan39, yes it is ground breaking, but it is not perfect and has some serious shortcomings to everyday use. That's all we want people to realise. It's been called the "Jesus phone" and quite frankly it's not, not yet, maybe version 2
That Touchstream thing is more of a peripheral. I'm talking about mainstream devices that have direct multi-touch interfaces as their entire UI to the software.
UPDATE:
It turns out that Apple purchased FingerWorks, the company that made Touchstream, and its patents.
Furthermore, I don't really see how this is a 'first-of-a-kind phone' when lg already came out with something like this by at least december last year: http://www.slashphone.com/89/6073.html (original article in hungarian, it seems: http://www.mobilport.hu/?r=8266 )