Real reaction to the iPhone

January 10, 2007 · Comments

Forget the Mac-fan sites, you already know what they’re going to say…the new Mac|Life magazine for example:

The iPhone: We Had Hoped It Would be Great, and We Weren’t Disappointed

Really, now? I never would have guessed.

If you want an idea of how the iPhone will really play out on the streets in June, take a look at the comments in David Pogue’s “hands on” entry on his blog. I don’t mean the post itself, which fairly talks about some of the phone’s shortcomings…I mean the comments. Scroll through the 179 comments so-far-and-counting on the New York Times site, which means it’s not necessarily Mac zealots…more like everyday folk…and you’ll see things like:

Should we also assume that the phone will eventually allow the possibility to open attachments such as word docs, excel, powerpoint and thier Mac equivilents? They could not have overseen that neccessity, right?

Can the phone be used with Apple’s iChat tool for video and audio communication?

I wonder if the phone will be available without a data plan. It’s hard enough for some of us to justify the price tag they’ve slapped on there — if we have to shell out an extra $20-30/month for a mandatory data plan on top of voice minutes, it would further edge out potential customers.

ha…try $40/month, mister.

So does this push corporate email?

Does anyone know if this has a removable/replaceable battery?

I would like to know if there is a way to connect this phone to a laptop to use it to transmit files.

where is 3g on this phone?

And so on and so on and so on…

Apple is going to have to convince these people that they either A. want something else or B. will have to wait to get what they want, but it’s coming. This isn’t like the iPod. A phone is different. When the iPod launched for most folks it wasn’t replacing an essential day-to-day item. Sure, some folks are really serious about their music. But compared to the cell phone? Not even close.

Don’t read this like I’m slamming the iPhone. I’m not. Far from it. I’m really enthusiastic about the disruption this represents in the cell phone industry. Years from now when we’re all scrolling through a list of our voice mail messages and we’re picking what we want to hear in whatever order we want, we’re going to remember the bad old days when you had to call and listen to those messages in a sequential recording. And we’re going to thank Apple for opening that door, just as we are thanking them now for truly mobile music and all-in-one computers, computers without floppy drives and computers with USB ports.

It’s not about this phone. It’s about the beginning of something really new in an area of technology that desperately needs it. In all likelihood, I won’t be shelling out my $599 for an iPhone this summer. My mobile device is too important to me for me to take a step back in features in exchange for increased usability in other areas. But I’ll be cheering Apple on with gusto from the sidelines. I want this to be a huge hit…with other people’s money. I waited until the 5th generation to get my first iPod (4th if you count the fact that I started with a Shuffle). I’ll jump in when the water’s right for me, personally. It’s not “if,” it’s “when.”

I think Steve Jobs knows perfectly well what’s wrong with the iPhone. I also think he doesn’t care. He’s skating to where the puck will go, remember?

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