iPhone Thoughts

It seemed like eternity to me that the rumors about a phone by Apple were floating around, especially since I was at the last two MacWorld conventions in San Francisco, with eyes wide open. It is an amazing feat, even for Apple, to enter the highly competitive cell phone battle. Well, unless you were lost on a deserted island recently, Apple iPhone was finally announced on Tuesday, January 10. Apple stock soar above 92, white RIMM and Palm stock plummeted, changing the playing field in an instant. But wait a second, with Linksys jumping on the name iPhone trademark, first, for their own VoIP phone, is Apple going to go through more legal woes again? Cisco, the parent company of Linksys, says no. They told Marketwatch that they are signing agreements.

For the iPhone service, Apple has teamed up with Cingular Wireless. That is out of character for Apple to join forces with another company. For example, Steve Jobs had the ambition to build Apple’s own online music service, iTunes, using their own massive servers, bandwidth and hard drives. But team up with Google too? That’s because Google perfected the satellite mapping technology. Why reinvent something that works so well already?

If I do get one, luckily for me, I had chosen to move to Cingular. I wanted an unlocked phone - the kind of phone that countries like Japan and China enjoy the benefits of. I like the rollover minutes too. (I must say for the record, though, that Cingular claims to have the least dropped calls, but I've experienced the same amount, if not, more so.) What about the millions of others who are bound by 2-year-contracts, or those who don't want Cingular as a service? That will leave many isolated Apple fans in the dark.

The release date is set for June in the US. For Asia, it will be released sometime next year. Finally, we get a cutting edge cell phone before Asia does.

Many people, including me, were looking forward to a video ipod with a larger display. And now that it's here, Steve Jobs seemed to downplay that feature. That's the feature that interests me the most, actually. I have a cell phone and iPod, already. Although the flash memory saves on battery juice, the 4 and 8 gigabyte options are a paltry size if you're used to a 30 gigabyte iPod for your movies and music. The addition of Paramount to the iTunes movie library is a welcome addition given that we geeks can now download and watch Star Trek movies.

Will it play games? With the versatility of the multi-touch screen, that's a definite yes. With the power of OSX and the customizable interface, the possibilities are endless. It makes the Sony PSP look like a toy. Well, actually it is, since it's specificly made for gaming and movies.

I have a feeling one of the many accessories for the iPhone will be a screen protector. If the iPhone's screen is anything like the current iPod's screen, plenty of glass cleaning fluid and a rag will be necessary. Without anyone getting their hands on an iPhone at MacWorld, it's difficult to say how the fingerprints will affect it.