Apple Once Again Makes Something Useful And Worth Having
My cell phone is crippled and unusable in so many ways it's hard to count them. Even the camera, one of the main features of the phone, is nigh unusable. The camera interface is easy enough, but it's such a pain in the ass to get the pictures off the phone that it's not even worth it to bother. You can send the pictures to a Verizon website, then after finding the website (the URL changed a couple times in the time I've had my phone, plus it's not easy to find even if you're on Verizon Wireless' page) you have to enter a username and password, different from your regular verizon account, and then eventually you can right click and save the thing to your computer. Only recently did I discover that I could use SMS to e-mail the pictures to myself, which is an undocumented method. And still a bit of a pain.
This is what it's like for a lot of the technology in my life. Commercial-level technology that is effectively broken due to poor design or the selfish dependency on undersupported proprietary technology.
I bought my Apple laptop so that I could do editing and sound work from home. Now it's my primary computer for everything, doing everything I ask quickly and flawlessly.
The short and simple reason I love my Mac so much more than I love my PC is this: I spend more time doing stuff and less time constructing hacks and workarounds.
As of last week, my PC spits out error after error when I perform tasks as simple as *opening folders on my desktop.* I'm not some computer n00b, haplessly banging away on a keyboard, either. I'm a lifelong veteran of these electronic disasters, and my first tour of duty was on DOS 3.0.
But now. Now! Here comes the iPhone.
Check out features after the jump...
The iPhone is the video ipod with a wide touchscreen that everyone has been speculating about. Is also a phone. With WiFi and Bluetooth, wireless syncing, and a real web browser - safari. If I'm lost in the city or looking for something specific, I don't have to try and figure out how to get what I want out of GoogleSMS. (Which, actually, is pretty great if you haven't used it. It's just not the internet.) I can simply mosey on over to a wireless internet hotspot - or better yet just steal it from any number of homes and businesses in NYC that send out unencrypted WiFi signals - and really actually open up Safari and find what I need on Google. And this isn't some broken, half-assed SafariMobile application with half of the web application and extension functionality ripped out of it - this is REAL Safari.
Because the iPhone runs OSX.
Now, I'm sure that we've still got some crippleware issues that will reveal themselves in the months before the phone ships in June, and even more after that.
After all, as much as I love my iPod, it is badly crippled. I can't play songs purchased at the iTunes store at a friends house if I USB connect to their computer-driven entertainment center. Nor can I burn a CD for a friend with my iPod - because I'd have to "authorize" my song on their computer. And if I have a hard drive failure on one of my machines, I have to jump through hoops to use my iPod to restore my music collection - Apple broke the iPod's ability to move songs off of it *on purpose*.
If I had to bet on one bit of broken functionality on the new iPhone, it would be the ability to wirelessly share songs with friends. You can send photos - they demonstrated that during the keynote - but despite having the technology in place - bluetooth and wifi - I think it's safe to assume that Apple has killed that natural feature.
My only other beef with the iPhone - so far - is that even the most expensive model only has 8 gigs of storage on it. I've got a 30 gig iPod that is completely full, and I'm constantly having to swap music off to make room for my new tunes. And I don't even have any video on the little guy. When it comes to storage capacity, the new iPhone is a huge step backwards.
Oh! One other beef. They have an exclusive deal with Cingular. It's undoubtedly so that Apple could have a service provider partner that could guarantee infrastructure for all the features that they wanted. But still. Even if I'm really excited for this phone - and I am - I'm not paying the price to break contract with Verizon. I'm not even sure when my contract is up...
For a full run-down, go check out the Macworld 2007 Keynote at Engadget.
Photo via Engadget
stephen, what's yr fone?
I have some verizon-branded LG piece of shit.
I thought of another way a lot of the consumer phones are broken - address books. When people lose or break their phones, they lose all their phone numbers. How many times have you seen myspace posts that say things like "lost my phone" or "phone died" with "please message me your number!"
The chips a lot of phones have now with the numbers are great - unless you lose your phone or are switching to another without support for the SIM card, then you're fucked.
But with wireless syncing with your mac address book? *gurgle*
my hiptop mirrors my address book, email, uh everything, online. good and bad, that's how that lady hilton got f'd
As neat as this thing clearly is, i'll wait and see how hackable it might be...Linux VOIP would be awesome.