The Perfect Phone Storm? 567
peter deacon writes "Is the iPhone the next Segway, the next Zune, or the next iPod? The Perfect Storm offers some iPhone details that aren't secrets, but tend to be lost upon the analysts and journalists cranking out hit pieces on the iPhone. Why is everyone from Gartner to Gizmodo calling for a boycott of the iPhone? An interesting take on how Apple's new mobile phone will push to open up the web as a mobile platform for every mobile device on the market with a standards-based browser, and how Apple 'hacked the hackers' by releasing Safari for Windows in advance of its new phone."
Re:slashdotted alrady? (Score:0, Interesting)
Here's a deconstruction of a few myths that have failed to take these unhidden secrets into consideration, along with the final aspect of why Apple released Safari for Windows, as I promised to reveal in the last article. It has something to do with the iPhone, of course.
Segway Segue, or AirPort Runway?
The levels of both enthusiastic hype and detractors' hate over the iPhone appear to have handily eclipsed one of the last ultra-hyped new devices of the tech world: Dean Kamen's Segway personal transporter.
Back in 2001, the Segway was presented sight unseen as the mysterious, revolutionary invention Ginger. It was privately shown to a handful of luminaries--including Steve Jobs--who all seemed excited about its potential. When actually revealed to the public, it was met with a mix of interest and ridicule, in part due to its steep price tag. After all, if you can't afford it, it must be silly and impractical.
Kamen's claim that the Segway would change society and that cities would be reconfigured to account for a world mobilized by two wheeled robot transporters didn't work out as planned.
San Francisco--one of the few cities to have enough flush nerds to warrant opening up a Segway dealership--actually banned the device on its sidewalks in a frantic, spastic panic about public safety concerns.
On the other hand, there have also been runaway hits that initially received little hype, criticism, or attention. Apple's AirPort introduced a mainstream audience to WiFi wireless networking. Apple wasn't the first implementation on Earth, but it did offer a pioneering set of products that delivered ease of use on a level that is still unmatched.
The iPod was also greeted with passive yawns and dismissed as too simple, too expensive, and uninteresting by critics, only to build into a phenomenon that changed the music industry, made Apple's simple music players a household name, and established the company as a top consumer brand.
The Devil in the Details.
Unlike the Segway, the iPhone isn't a hyped tease. Apple introduced the device six months ago with a full demonstration of how it actually worked, assigned it a firm price tag, published its technical specifics down to the millimeter and gram, and provided a comprehensive look at its features and underlying technologies.
In comparison, Microsoft's Zune--which had been in the news just a few months earlier--was presented from the start as having an unclear feature set. Fans made broad assumptions about its capabilities, resulting in great disappointment. Analysts overreached to claim that Microsoft would eat up Apple's iPod market share by offering a highly subsidized unit, or even offer it for free with a subscription plan, neither of which actually happened.
As the "iPod Killer" got closer to release, its price was still a secret and its key features were revealed to be more limited that anyone imagined. Its highly touted WiFi became nothing more than a way to squirt advertisements to friends, exploiting "the Social" in an attempt to sell music in Microsoft's new PlaysForSure-incompatible version of its impossible to crack Janus DRM.
Only its violent failure could silence the giddy critics that gushed about its supposed game changing, iPod killing impact that never happened. The Zune made the Segway look like a runaway hit.
[10 Ways Microsoft Can Salvage their iPod Killer]
[Zune vs. iPhone: Five Phases of Media Coverage]
[The Two Faced Monster Inside Zune]
[The Microsoft iPod-Killer Myth]
The Desperate Panic of the Apple Haters.
It is therefore interesting to compare the news sources that gushed over the Zune--with little information from Microsoft--and encouraged their
Re:wow... (Score:1, Interesting)
biased (Score:5, Interesting)
Is it like walmart, in which every mom and pop shop is going to have close, adn the big guys, like target, are going to have find innovative ways to compete?
Is it like SUVs, in which individuals are unfairly taking advantages that were meant to for farmers and laborers, thus forcing those that choose not to take advantage of the tax code to subsidize their lifestyle?
Is it like the american automaker, refusing to put put profits into R&D, seeing it's stock turn to junk.
Or is it as simple as the wackos on street corners who scream at people as the walk or drive past, imploring them not to visit a particular place because they will be putting their immortal souls in jeopardy.
I may not get an iPhone, but given the amount of money that has been spent begging people not to buy it, I look forward to how it will transform the US mobil phone market as well as the Blackberry/MS fight over the enterprise mobile market. Given the level of fear, I expect that transformation to be significant. I see IT personal having to go to training, kickbacks disappearing, and perhaps, in a perfect world, more webpages that can be read by browsers other than IE.
Re:Is this a joke? (Score:5, Interesting)
The biggest problem with smartphones and the iPhone is size. If you aren't carrying a bag or wearing cargo pants, they just don't fit. Going out dancing or bar hopping with a Treo clipped to your hip just looks stupid. If they really want to revolutionize phones, every iPhone needs to come with an iPhone-nano that rings at the same phone number.
Web (2.0) Hype (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Is this a joke? (Score:4, Interesting)
Apple aims at the home market, and a small section of the professional market, namely those who do what Apple kit is good at (Design, artistic, video, audio production etc). That said, I've also seen Mac Pros and Xserve together with Xserve RAID and Xsan to do high-level research work.
Apple hasn't yet (afaik) aimed at a business which needs 2500 new terminals just to do spreadsheets and word processing. They may in the future, but for now Apple kit just isn't right for enterprise level business. It is good, however, for large production type businesses. Wander around a newspaper editing room and see what people use.
Re:Is this a joke? (Score:5, Interesting)
Really? I watched the original demo back in January, and after that I knew how to use it. I'd never held one in my hand, but if you gave me an iPhone I bet I could get all the stuff to work in a couple of minutes without using a manual.
Contrast that with my Samsung WinMobile smartphone. The manual for that is about half an inch thick (I still can't remember how to do some of the things on it). The software that is bundled has inconsistent interfaces. Nothing seems to work in a predictable way on it and the touchscreen is tiny, requires a crap stylus, has buttons all over it, and looks like ass. And, although it was a free gift from my employer, it costs more than the iPhone.
The iPhone is the original Macintosh of smartphones. The only difference is that you don't have to keep swapping disks out of it, but most people would think that a good thing.
The iPhone is going to be a massive success because a lot of people would like the functionality of a smartphone, but have been put off by the poor usability of previous efforts.
Re:As a mac user who doesn't want the damn thing (Score:5, Interesting)
I would be more concerned if there wasn't a notebook update. Desktops are "dying" so to speak for consumers which is where Apple targets. http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/07/06/22/app
This push for the iPhone will in fact help Mac users and possibly standards users. If the iPhone is very successful, Safari / web standards compatibility will be a requirement. I don't have to keep wondering when the top hit list will ever change over (http://webkit.org/projects/compat/hitlist.html). More services will open up for the Mac; for instance, push IMAP instead of proprietary Blackberry protocols may become standard which would allow desktop apps to take advantage of. Better synchronization support for OS X. H.264 may become a "de facto" standard which would stop the Windows Media only sites I keep encountering. There are many reasons for you to care about the iPhone as a Mac users that aren't directly related to the phone.
People who just tend to focus on Mac OS X are missing the bigger picture. I may not get an iPhone but I understand and do care about its success. And its coattails may not be limited to just Apple. Everyone benefits from a more open and standards based web. It might just take an iPhone like phenomenon (or hype machine) to nudge webmasters and other parties in the right direction.
Re:Is this a joke? (Score:4, Interesting)
Apple went straight for the enterprise with OS X servers. Remember all that triumphalism a few years back about a new supercomputer being built from Xserves? How OS X was going to be the new standard for supercomputing, how all the enterprises were going to switch switch switch? Yeah, nothing came of it, so of course the fanboys rewrite history so Apple only ever aimed for the home market.
What are you reading? I don't recall any of that guff and nor should anyone else. Lets dig back in history and see what was really said: Here's a journalist's transcript of the Xserve preview event in 2002 [macworld.com] and here's a followup a few hours later with more details [macworld.com], neither of which bear out any of those assertions. The stated market was Education, Creative, Biotech and Video and they sold a lot into those areas, not to mention Government (find out how many Xserves are on U.S. Navy submarines running Linux).
As far as "triumphalism", the first anyone heard of the Mac supercomputer was when it made the top 10 Supercomputer list - and those were DESKTOPS! That generated its own hooplah when, once again, the extablishment was pulling another stick out of its eye for underperforming and overbilling.
Re:Instead of creating (Score:3, Interesting)
Why would you assume it would not? If the iPhone artificially does not allow local web pages, that would be both odd and stupid of Apple, and would rightfully generate complaint. Since there has been no reason to assume such a bone-head move, maybe we should wait to see if Apple makes the mistake before complaining.
After all, the postulated complaints that its battery would be too short, its screen would scratch too easy, it couldn't use the iPhone name, it wouldn't be able to open any Word or Excel docs, and that IT shops would have no way to design custom apps for it all turned out to be non-problems.
More is required (Score:5, Interesting)
I would assume it would not support this because a) GOOGLE has yet to get it working and b) If it was possible, Steve would have been talking it up at WWDC.
I assume this is Daniel Eran from RD posting, if so, good to talk to you again -- I've posted a couple comments on your blog that you've responded to and emails that you've also responded to. Let me make one thing absolutely clear -- I am not a knee-jerk Apple hater; quite the contrary -- I own a Macbook Pro which I ADORE and an eMac I rescued from my university's trash heap.
The thing that keeps galling me about the iPhone is the "could-have-beens." People have been speculating about and hoping for some kind of "pocket Mac" or "new Newton" for years, on the assertion that a machine like this running OSX would have all kinds of possibilities. Now, here we have just such a machine, and Apple is telling us that instead of being a powerful tool, it's going to be a shiny toy, and we'll like it that way. Despite the fact that there is nothing but software in the way of the iPhone's potential. It is enormously frustrating. As someone who considers himself at least on the level of "power user," it frustrated me when I heard there would be no SDK, but it really felt like a slap in the face when Steve Jobs had the balls to get up on the stage at WWDC and pretend that AJAX was something new and uniquely Apple.
I'm sure the iPhone will be a stunning success, but I have a feeling we'll still be sitting here waiting for Apple to rescue us from Windows Mobile for a long, long time.
Re:Biased, iPhone not ready for enterprise use (Score:5, Interesting)
Bias is not a problem if you recognize it. You can learn about the viewpoints of even unreasonable extremists by reading what they write, and knowing that they are extreme in their opinions, you can evaluate how much of what they say you can agree with. Bias is only a problem with unreasonable people present biased information as if it is neutral and conveying no hidden agenda. Such as when CNN says the war in Iraq is going well. They should be providing an unbiased report of the facts, not presenting PR as news. When you watch a show that presents a clear and obvious political agenda, you are hearing opinions, not news. One can not have an unbiased opinion. Bias is expressing an opinion.
Still, nowhere does the article insist that people should buy an iPhone, although it certainly does provide reasons why IT users should question what you refer to as "analysts wishes." Really, it asks, why do these analysts wish this stuff? Why are they expressing their wishes that the iPhone be banned? Is there bias involved?
I should also assure you that the author of the article has experience in administrating Exchange 2003 and in using it with Windows Mobile phones, and that the comments made were made in relation to actual support issues.
The points you outline as important to IT are certainly worth mentioning. Some of them Apple addresses, and some of them are outside of the currently demonstrated feature set. For example, it appears that the iPhone won't edit Excel docs, although it can view them. Will Google Sheets serve this need? How many people will this really affect? Is this something that will expand in the future?
Certainly, the iPhone isn't going to satisfy 100% of the market. Apple generally targets 80% of the needs of the market. The iPod has no built in radio for example. If you really want a radio, you can buy an add on. If you really want a music player with a built in radio, you have to buy one from somebody else. That has not resulted in too many lost sales.
The iPhone will also not work for everyone. I was speaking at Lawrence Livermore Labs, where phones brought on site can't have cameras. They also can't emit radio in the form of bluetooth, WiFi or even cellular. Obviously, Apple would be stymied to develop a version of the iPhone that would work there, because it would be impossible. So LLL falls outside of places where Apple can sell iPhones. That's a pretty small portion of the market however.
I know so much about the article and its author because I wrote it.
Re:More is required (Score:5, Interesting)
I can think of features I'd like to see too, and can imagineeer video conferencing and free VoIP over WiFi. And what about voice recognition and voice synthesis and voice mail trees and an iTunes store client... The thing is that many of these things are either engineering problems or have to wait because Apple has finite resources.
I'd rather get an iPhone now and watch it improve as Apple releases software updates for it that wait for it to be released until it could serve any need anyone could imagine. A general purpose computer would quickly turn into the Newton, which was ~$900. It lacked a clear obvious use, and only offered the potential to do a lot of things that its relatively small user base could not actually support.
The iPhone is already so much better than my Treo or the WM phones I've looked at, even the high end Nokia phones -- for what I want to do with a mobile. If it gets a market base similar to the iPod's, it will result in a vibrant platform that will have to deliver demanded features. It will create a vacuum for development. That won't detract from people who want something else. There will always be a market for N95s or WinCE phones tied into Microsoft's server and VB environment, and Treos... well not Treos, I think this will kill Palm.
That's what I see: no reason for threat. The only thing Apple can do to rivals is raise the bar, forcing them to compete and push the envelope themselves. That's why I don't understand all the hate and try to deflate it with some reality.
It's a lot like the Mac: the only thing Apple has done to the PC is to help push standards like USB, push tight integration, and push innovative features. PC users benefit from Apple being around, even if they never choose to buy anything from it. I think choice is good, and that innovation needs to be welcomed, not scorned. The mobile business is tragically boring, and the iPhone will help shake things up. I think the engineering decisions Apple is making are all pretty smart, and I like to describe why. If that makes me a "fanboy," well then yipee, I don't mind. As you've probably noticed, I have my own detractors, and I've learned to deal with it. I just like to write.
Re:Apparently (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes. Yes it is. As for the iPhone, would be glad to drop the phone part of it and have a web surfing video iPod and no contract lock in. Ok, I really want a Newton 3000.
I hope you're right (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm not sure "what you want to do with a mobile." But right now my Cingular 8525 smartphone is better than or equal to the iPhone for what *I* want to do -- email, IM, phone/text/voice, music and movie playback, games, writing (yes, I actually do some writing in Pocket Word) and remote administration (with ssh and VNC) -- costs less and doesn't demand that I pay for a data plan just to run it on the network.
I really look forward to the day that this isn't the case, but that day is not today,
Re:slashdotted alrady? (Score:3, Interesting)
That was quick.
There are a lot of Apple haters, mostly with their fortunes tied to its failure. That's not going so well. TFA is just a response to the avalanche of bought-and-paid Microsoft FUD reporters who can't seem to get the term "unbiased" right. Call for an iPhone boycott? You can always hope - suckers. This article is biased toward outing those buffoons with nothing else to do except panic. I cringe at some the venom this guy has published, but as uppity and fanboyish as Dan is, he's mostly right.
Horrible media scene of Mac which apple.slashdot.org can't find unbiased articles to post is another factor.
Fanboys claiming they don't need Flash on a $600 devices browser adds more to your madness. As you can guess why Flash was not included, you go more mad. Just because they don't want iTunes competitors working inside Mini Safari of iPhone... IMHO of course.
I am not calling for boycott, I am just preventing my friends and family from falling into Apple's trick and buy iPhone instead of some real smart device which you can INSTALL SOFTWARE and CHANGE THE BATTERY. I am doing this as owner of 3 Macs at home alone and get Xserve (sometimes expensive) based services whenever I can.
Re:Then what is the killer app (Score:3, Interesting)
Name them. If third party apps are really so important, name the ones that a majority of the smartphone market finds indespensible.
http://corp.handango.com/Handango.jsp?siteId=1&ji
Millions of unique monthly visitors
650,000+ newsletter subscribers
190,000+ content titles
16,000+ content partners
Hundreds of licensees
Hundreds of countries
Dozens of currencies
Dozens of languages
9 operating systems
7+ years commercial usage
Lets see Opera Mini which is a J2ME (Java) Application which uses the platform Mr. Jobs claimed "nobody asked for it"
""This is a celebration for our users," said Jon von Tetzchner, CEO, Opera Software. "Thanks to the more than 10 million people who have downloaded and used Opera Mini, we've changed the way users and mobile operators think about the mobile Web. Because of the tremendous grassroots support, Opera Mini is now a movement."
http://www.opera.com/pressreleases/en/2007/01/26/ [opera.com]
These are CONSUMER/END USER products. VPN/Blackberry/Exchange/Notes etc. solutions which are purchased in bulk numbers in customised manner doesn't count. E.g. no company goes to Handango and add 10.000 VPN client licenses to "shopping cart" of course.
Opera's numbers excludes the massive numbers distributed by cell networks sometimes embedded in phone pre-installed too.
Re:Biased, iPhone not ready for enterprise use (Score:5, Interesting)
I think the reason the iPhone elicits such varied opinions is because it *is* so divisive. There are those who look at the cellphone market today, and the devices that are available and really think the iPhone will save them from the doldrums of the currently available solutions. To a certain extent, this is really true. However, there are many people for whom the iPhone will not be an option. Generally these are the people who use the phone as a tool rather than as a phone / Internet device. There is also a subset of this second group who see the iPhone as a really missed opportunity. They are generally Apple users currently (or plan to be in the future), and see the iPhone for what it's really capable of on a technical level. They love everything about the iPhone but just see all the things they want to do with the hardware/OS and are frustrated with the limitations being imposed upon them. I have to admit that I'm sort of in this last group.
My personal feeling is that yes, the iPhone is incredibly better than any other phone out there. Note, I said phone. When it comes to devices like the SLVR, RAZR, the Verizon and Sprint phones... the iPhone will beat the crap out of any of those. I know, I've used a lot of them and I think that the iPhone will be a perfect opportunity to really change the game in that market. The price point *looks* high, but given the rumors of the $175 early contract termination standard with the iPhone, this is the price without being subsidized (as Steve Jobs alluded to many times). This makes it a perfectly reasonable price in my opinion because that's what these things cost. To buy a phone unsubsidized will START at $300 for the crappiest phone on the market. They can top the iPhone price in a hurry. I am more accustomed to this because I've bought my phones retail for years. I like my phones unlocked so I can slip in a "pay as you go" SIM card while I'm out of the country.
However, in the smartphone market the iPhone will have a tougher time. Generally those who use smartphones are either geeks (who like to develop and/or install third party apps to their devices), or executives who have a particular need (push email from Exchange for example). For these people, the iPhone will not work. Unless Yahoo! / Apple opens up their push IMAP spec and people get on the job of developing conduits for Exchange and Sendmail (or other UNIX email) systems then they're not going to look at the iPhone. Now, granted that's not who the iPhone is targeted at, either. At least, not yet.
For me, the iPhone is becoming a wait and see game. I'm glad to see it; I think it's going to shake things up in the low end and "standard phone" market quite a bit, and it's going to change people's opinions about what a phone can be. For Smartphones, though I think that's going to take more time, several software (and maybe hardware) updates before it becomes a contender... but become a contender it will. I personally will wait. I have a WinMo device today that suits my needs perfectly. Most of the apps I run on it are third party, and I don't know if I could survive on an EDGE network any more after having a taste of 3G (which is how I'm posting this, by the way). Also, the lack of real, physical tactile keys are a problem to me since I've become accustomed also to typing lengthy emails and postings to Slashdot on an HTC TyTN. It's not perfect... and there are things the iPhone does that I look at and think I'd really like. However, the limits imposed upon me with an iPhone would be untenable to me and I don't think I'm alone.
Note I also don't believe that the limits imposed on this first-gen iPhone will last forever, either. Apple has always been an extremely developer-friendly company and I don't see why that will change. Sooner or later I do believe they'll open up the iPhone to devs, and they'll open up the "networks" to be more flexible (though that may come down to contracts with AT&T). Until they do, the iPhone's not for me... but I do see how it can be for others. Perhaps my wife will like one...