The Over Hyped iPhone

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"...one of the strongest motives that lead men to art and science is escape from everyday life with its painful crudity and hopeless dreariness, from the fetters of one's own ever-shifting desires. A finely tempered nature longs to escape from the personal life into the world of objective perception and thought." - Albert Einstein

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Tuesday, October 21, 2008

The Over Hyped iPhone

There I said it. I don't mean to be inflammatory but I have to stop the insanity. I know those of you who bought iPhones might be upset at this point, but you will probably be sleeping. People who buy iPhones have a weak mind so this gif will surely prevent you from reading this lab note. Steve Jobs is a brilliant marketer. He has mesmerized most of the world. I cannot believe how Business Week and other mag's were duped to put this guy on their cover!

Let me first say that I have found only 1 area where the iPhone deserves the accolades the lemmings bestow. Suppose you are at a soccer game and want a bit of info. An iPhone will get it quicker than most any other devices. That's it. I will not give the iPhone points for industrial design because there are other devices that are just as pretty/functional. I might have to back off, but only a bit, if you press me on it's UI. I can make a good argument there as well that it's mostly just flash. Symbian, Motorola, or Windows Mobile are only a key press or two behind. The iPhone has the Apple store, Windows Mobile has hundreds of retailers.

Let me tell you about how my Motorola Q9H running Windows Mobile 6.1 beats the pants off the iPhone by demonstrating two use cases. First is how I am currently using it. I got rid of my data plan. My phone only costs $39(+all the taxes) per month. Can you do that with an iPhone? I listen to my podcasts in high fidelity WIRELESS-LY on my cars stereo streaming from my phone during my commute to/from work. Can the iPhone do that? I want to get turn by turn gps direction on my phone so I purchased TomTom Navigator 6. Can you get turn by turn voice prompts on the iPhone?? Will you be forced to use an 'approved' Apple app? Can you download it freely or do you have to go through the 'approved' Apple store and give them their mark-up? I can read/write email, download podcasts and do any other data intensive task as long as I have the phone docked (remember this use case is 'without data plan').

I use the Bluetooth voice dialing in my car and with my Plantronics 655 ear piece. I say 'CALL HOME' and the voice dialing in my phone responds precisely every time! Can the iPhone do that? Finally I wanted to put more music on my phone so I doubled my memory from 4GB to 8GB by inserting a $40 micro SDHC card. Can you upgrade the iPhone? Can you change it's battery? Can you write software for it (without making any promises to Steve Jobs)? Which phone has better call quality?

Running without the data plan will be significant to many people as this recession takes hold.

My second use case is with a data plan. I had a data plan up until last month. I have been using Beyond Pod as my pod catcher. It downloads the podcasts directly over the air to my phone. It has a built in, very sophisticated, scheduler to download. Beyond Pod is open source. Will the iPhone support the open source community? Can it download over the air? I can tether to my Q9H. Tethering means I can extend its high speed wireless internet to my net-top or laptop when I am on the road... For free (although this is frowned upon by AT&T so please tell them so you can pay their exorbitant tethering fee even though they can't possibly tell you are doing it). Another non-approved by Steve Jobs iPhone app. I CAN SPEND $999 ON AN I AM RICH APP IF I WANT ON WINDOWS MOBILE OR ANY OTHER NEW TECHNOLOGY WITHOUT DISCLOSING MY TECHNOLOGY TO STEVE JOBS. CAN THE IPHONE USER DO THAT????

Yep. Steve Jobs has you iPhone people mesmerized.

damon at 5:32 PM | (2) Comments | Add a comment | Permalink

Commments

Lou said...

Yes, it's true what your're saying about the many advantages of your Q9H as compared to iphones but remember, NOT all people are as technology literate as you are who can figure out ways to save money. I think Steve Jobs created this for peoples' convenience. If the product was so bad....why do you think people still love them....for cool convenience 'cause not all people are a wizard like you...who wants to spend so much time playing with the phone to the neglect of their wife and kids...I guess for people who have wives and kids, they would not tolerate playing all day with the phone figuring out how to jag things around. It is simply a matter of personal taste and decision and that's what you have to respect others for. I am sure your children might want to see their daddy spending time with them too rather than being on the phone for unlimited amount of time.

Wednesday, November 05, 2008 2:29 AM

James said...

I do agree with Lou...people have the right to choose which phones best suit their needs regardless of the quality and usage. This is democracy and I think we have no right to criticize anybody at this point. In times of hyperchange, who knows what will come out next. So

Wednesday, November 05, 2008 2:35 AM