um, you know, you seem so so so open-mined, i mean you think you are...
in the first paragraphe of your text, i saw the phrase (Can't we PLEASE stop making everything "i-something"???)... and i undrestood your logic.
you said that iPhone is not user-friend, it's hard to use it, but i'm not agree with you. EVERYTHING is at your disposition when ever you want in iPhone... i know, it seems diffrent at first with other moblie devices... as mac seems harder to use than PCs, but when you start using, you'll see that you were pent-up in the former system.
take a look at this site http://www.apple.com/iphone/phone/ and see how easy ou can acces to your contacts... you don't even need to think what to do... VERYTHING's there.

If you took any time to read the Apple website before you wrote this articlle you would see that there will indeed be 3rd party applications and though there hasn't been an SDK released it sounded like there will be one in the future. Additionaly if you feel the need to start devevloping now there was contact information for Apple implying that they would send you in the right direction to start.

Please read before you write.

The iphone will be released as a closed platform, but who is to say that open source communities like rockbox.org won't release a patch for the device to unlock it and run open source firmware. They have done this already with countless ipod releases.

I was kind of interested in reading this article, but the ads overlapping the text made it too hard.

Grow up, infoworld.

Apple shares are to pass $120 next week. Keep an eye on it and get in while you can.
Apple will create a demand not seen before for any one electronics product.
As cities begin to provide free wifi, Apple would benefit from those hoping to take advantage of free wifi.

You are so brilliant - maybe you should go into the mobile phone business.

One more reason why to give the iPhone a miss (and I think it is the coolest phone and UI I've seen): It falls way short on wireless data - Cingular's GPRS and EDGE, which it is equipped with, are way slow, and last gen. HSDPA, almost up there with EVDO for data speeds -- and really a must for any sort of browsing, which the iPhone is supposed to rock at -- should have been there for launch. Many phones have it now. 2.5G on the latest and greatest? I say let it mature first or get burned.

Eat your heart out infoworld. Hope much did Bill pay you? Every person in my work world and home is going to buy one, and we are techies.

No mem slot.
No replaceable battery.
Tiny memory.
No thanks.

I've never met a smartphone with a decent intuitive interface. They all stink. It looks like this may be the one that not only has all the features but lets you use them transparently. But none of us will know what the final proiduct will be, what the final feature set is, what it will be finally, legally, named, how open it is, or anything other than what we've seen at the keynote, until June. Why don't we all take a deep breath, admire the work that has gone into it so far and reserve judgement? I'm going to spend some time imagining how Apple will use multi-touch in other products and wondering whether any of the rip-off clone companies will be able to begin to duplicate it and who will be the first to add GPS functionality.

Dude, the iPhone runs OS X! And with OS X comes: built-in PDF and a TextEdit program that reads and writes Word docs.

As with iPod, the ecosystem will grow out of sheer demand, and without diluting the user experience or creating customer support nightmares.

But you probably thought the iPod was a stupid idea, too.

Um so smart my butt.
Tihis guy is a self glorifying hack if he cant see the direction this thing moves in.. the only failure by apple is its on cingular... i can see that move for international purposes only... quad band can be used in the rest of the world... the us is mostly CDMA.

Give me a break.. have you used a smart phone.. i have a treo and hate the thing... its special compared to the iphone.

Back to the carrier problem.. i wont leave my service and pay to break the contract just to have an apple phone..

How 'bout this...

Apple creates a certification program for 3rd-party apps so they can approve what is "not harmful." It would still limit custom and home-brew, unfortunately, but would provide access for scores of vendors.

Steve?

Well, techies of course will attack the technical specs (too slow, not enough this or that, not compatible with this or that)... then they'll go back to fiddling with their "smart" phones endlessly to try to get them to work.

Apple doesn't design products for techies. They design products for humans. And humans would rather have a product that does a few things very well and very easily, than an open-ended complicated device that can do anything badly and with difficulty.

"Third-party" software is rarely usable, useful, complete, and bug-free. To me, touting third-party support as a desirable feature is a cop-out. It's akin to saying "We can't be bothered to fulfill your needs, but hopefully someone out there will."

If the third-party functionality is truly useful and usable for most people, Apple will build it, and build it well. If it's confusing, complex, or not that useful, Apple will not waste your time with it. Considering the abysmal state of most software out there, I'd rather stick to the one company that can deliver technology that actually achieves my goals, seamlessly.

Apple has the right approach: Promise the user that nothing on the iPhone will ever be confusing, ugly, unintuitive, or buggy. It saves me a whole lot of time and frustration to simply trust them, and ignore the rest.

hey ignorant youngster, if you were around back in the 80s and had ANY clue about technology you would know that M$ owns the desktop because Gates signed the deal of the technology era that put his sad and stolen OS on every IBM blessed motherboard. PCs replaced terminals and corporate purchasers simply went with the vendors they had relationships with, got golf rounds, percs and spiffs from. It had nothing to do with open or closed systems. If corporate IT operated like new technology buyers such as educational institutions Apple may well have owned the desktop. Yes Apple didn't understand the corporate market well and made boatloads of mistakes but there was really no chance, M$ simply rode in on the hardware vendors coattails. this is a simplified take, it was actually Novell's market to own but they were strictly server minded and blew any chance, the IT industry has paid with under performing, overcomplicated pain ever since.

I *would* completely agree with you... if what you said was true. However, it's not.

You've got it wrong and slashdot's got it wrong. It's not that there isn't going to be any third party software, but that it has to be approved (tested, etc.) by Apple first. If you track back to the original article, the Jobs quote clearly indicates as much.

Please get your facts straight.

I've used my share of third party products, and I have to say that there is some comfort to be had in the knowledge that every product available for a platform has undergone thorough testing first. The cost, of course, is that you don't get as much software, but it also means that you don't have to sift through a lot of crappy software before you find something that works well.

An Apple-only product would be a mistake; but if Apple can add sufficient third party products that have been tested (big if), then that could work fine.

How much did you receive from those wireless device makers at CES 2007 to write this worthless piece of article filled with nonsense?

Stay underwhelmed by iPhone. I wouldn't want someone like you buy and use iPhone either. That would be a total turn-off to buy the phohe. The idea that I use the same phone as someone like you is so repulsively offensive and unimaginably deplorable.

EDGE might be enough for Web browsing. Steve isn't promising Flash or Java or streaming video, just Web browsing. Who remembers the Internet before DSL and cable modems? I do, and it was only T1 lines at work, dialup at home and ISDN if you were lucky. 128kbps ISDN was very usable for browsing Web pages, and EDGE is ISDN speeds.

I've seen a bubble before, Apple stock is going to tank, buy MSFT Microsoft it's Apple Stock before the I-Pod buzz. It's new operating system and X360 is going to shoot the stock from 30 to 100 in one year..........BUY BUY BUY!!!

Given the position that you outlined, I'm really surprised you didn't also object to the fact that the iPhone as announced is a carrier locked handset.

Now that's 1984.

The "i" is a brand name thing. It gives credibility, so I can't blame Apple for wanting it. I'd personally prefer an OpenMoko or a Nokia tablet. More open, less Draconian.

The iPhone is a just what the name means, it's a phone from apple that runs apps that people like to carry around, like their tunes and photos, contacts and to do list, etc. Its not a full feature computer. It really drives me crazy when people want the most out of their laptops and even phones. The idea is to adapt to the device, not the device adapt to everything you want, or, wish the device to do. I cannot tell how good it is cause I haven't tried it yet, I'll let you know. Concerning the word "open", it is synonym with the failure to finish a product that it not ready for consumer consumption, open source is just for geeky people that like to keep open source geeky.

"If the third-party functionality is truly useful and usable for most people, Apple will build it, and build it well. If it's confusing, complex, or not that useful, Apple will not waste your time with it. Considering the abysmal state of most software out there, I'd rather stick to the one company that can deliver technology that actually achieves my goals, seamlessly."

Personally, I've been waiting two years for Apple to come up with a spreadsheet to replace the one I use in AppleWorks. I've heard plenty of others say it would be useful. The rumor mill says it will be real soon now, but we're still waiting. Maybe this year...

You willing to wait a few years for Apple to get around to support ARD, for example, on their iPhone? Or would you rather have a solution in six months via VPC? I'd love to have MSN support for iChat. I get that with Adium. Think, when Apple ports iChat, you'll get MSN support? Nope.

I'd like to be able to use my iPhone to connect my laptop to the Internet. Maybe Apple will get around to it, eventually. But let someone else do it and I'll probably have a solution in a few months.

To me, it also begs the obvious question: Somehow, Symbian and Windows manage to support third party applications. But OS X appears to be too fragile--from what Steve Jobs says, one misbehaving application can remove major functionality. Doesn't sound all that secure to me...

Think about it, the Iphone ia a disruptive technology. It will change the way mobile media works! They have all the room to improve if needs be. This is just the beginning. Example: look at the Ipod it was a disruptive technology too. Are there other players out there that acheive the same goal as the Ipod? yes, are they worse? No! but, it's the user experience that apple gives you that makes thier products great! They weren't the first to create a mps player they have been out awhile before apple got in the game. But look at it now. The music industry, the film industry have all caught the vision of where they were going with this. Look around, who doesn't have aan Ipod? My friend put it best " Apple doesn't just make great products, they make everything beautiful, the interfaces are so organized and functional." That is why i think the iphone will be a huge success. It will change mobile media. I bet that Nokia, Samsung, Etc. are already working on similar products. Oh..about the "I" everything. i beleive that that was a mac thing before it got to be ubiquitous.

I'm bullish on Apple for 07. If there is one thing that I've learned about Apple is that while Microsoft is great at developing multi-purpose "do everything in one package" products, Apple's specialty is to do the complete opposite.

Just look at the innovative products that Apple has released over the past several years and you can't deny Apple's success with niche products.

1. iMac: Working as a part time sales person for Comp USA during the tech bubble, the release of the iMac was more like the release of Star Wars Episode I ala 1999. I sold iMacs to parents who bought the machines because their younger child wanted an iMac because of the perceived coolness factor at the time. While the traditional PC crowd turned their noses up and laughed, the iMac did something that HP, Dell, Microsoft, and Sony could not do. That is to create an entirely new customer for the personal computer to a market(the under 30 crowd) that previously saw computers as geeky and boring.

2. iTunes: After the mania that was Napster, Kaaza, and Morpheus; finally there was a company out there willing to do the unthinkable, "sell" music to the masses legally. I remember thinking at the time; "Why would anyone pay to download a song when they could get it for free" during this time. That was until I ended up killing my computer with a virus that came with a free download of a song from Kaaza. After 2001, the free Mp3 download companies started to come under fire from the music industry, Apple once again proved the Apple haters/doubters wrong.

3. "iPod": As the first company to release the first commercially successful portable mp3 player, the iPod is what the consumer wants to purchase when they go to a Target or Best Buy looking for an mp3 player. That's because the consumer doesn't just go looking for an mp3 player, they go to look to buy an iPod! We all know someone who has one of these. Everyone who wants an iPod doesn't have one, but give that same consumer a choice to buy a Zune or other non-Apple mp3 player and that same consumer will probably buy the iPod. and those who do have iPods love them.

My prediction for the iPhone is that this product ends up being this year's RAZAR. Remember what RAZAR did for Motorola? However the difference is that the RAZAR became a product that went beyond being trendy because everyone and their grandmother now has a RAZAR due to non-stop price cutting.

Now ask yourself,when have we known Apple to cut the price on anything? Apple keeps the demand for their products because it knows that its name brand carries weight with the consumer and this results in the consumer buying more Apple products.

Apple is good at creating and marketing products that are not only innovative, but avoid being trendy in order to create a long term perceived value on their products by consumers.

Remember, just because you don't care much for the new iPhone, then you probably will stick with a Treo, or Blackberry so you can check your work email 24 hours a day; 7 days a week. That's fine because that leaves more supply to the rest of us that prefer to actually enjoy our spare time out of the office instead of bringing the office with us wherever we go. In closing the iPhone is for the fun loving consumer, not the workaholic.

I have a friend with a perfectly open phone, a Nokia 6600 series. She lives in the Philippines, and when I visited her, her ultra-modern, better than we get in the US phone was not working properly.

"I think Celly is sick," she told me one memorable morning.

"Oh-oh," I said. I offered to take a look and see if I could cure Celly of her mysterious malady.

So we went down to the Internet cafe and I looked up the details of Celly's illness on the web. Turns out a virus had struck the phone and was sending hundreds of multimedia SMS messages an hour to her unwitting friends and acquaintances.

If having Steve in charge of appliations for the iPhone can prevent this sort of thing from happening, personally I'm all for it. This cellphone virus cost my friend $300 in phone charges, and all she makes is $1,000 a month (which is a solid upper middle class income in the Philippines where she lives).

So Steve is right that openness and third-party applications can be a real problem for a phone. While I was helping her with her problem, I was /very/ happy that my T-Mobile Sidekick was also a closed device.

All I need in a mobile phone is SSH and a great web browser. I'd say the iPhone is the best solution possible for me as long as someone brings SSH to the table.

D

It just seems like someone didn't complete and thorough analysis of the iphone before they wrote this article. Perhaps someone should read the apple website or even listen to keynote address by Mr. Jobs to completely become knowledgeable on what they are going to write an article on. I mean all the facts are basically laid out right there in front of you.

I hate the word "Open" All these vendors want you to use their products exclusively. Open is like beauty. It's in the eye of the beholder. For example, All company's are OPEN to new business even Apple. Apples unlike Micrsoft serves a niche(this is good in this case). The products work well together and the collection creates a closed experience for users. Once you experience this do you really want to go OPEN and experience something else. Apple is the Ritz of high tech!

Here's what I think that Apple's up to: they're managing the marketing message. The first announcement was just an introduction to the most critical point, that the iPhone is a convergence of iPod, phone and internet device, so they don't want to talk about it as a camera, or a software platform. In a few months, when it's actually for sale, they'll want to have something else big to talk about, so they held back on all other applications. Heck, they didn't show us the CAMERA in action, so you know that there's a lot more that they didn't talk about yet.

Also, the iPhone isn't completely closed, since it's got a fully functional web browser in it, and it's obviously fast enough to run complex AJAX applications well. It ran Google Maps faster than my desktop computer! So any internet-based application should run nicely on the iPhone. AJAX, Flash, Java - all can be used to do many interesting things!

@macaso - you are a perfect consumer. Tonight when you're playing scrabble, you can celebrate yourself with two high scoring words, LOYALIST IDIOT. Yes, someone will have to help you with the first one.

By the way, did you know that OS X has its foundations in FreeBSD and other open source efforts? There is a sun that feeds the grass you graze on. It shines because smart people turned it on. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad you're around to mow the lawn and pay your taxes.

You might be interested in the Open Source iPhone: http://www.linuxtogo.org/gowiki/OpenMoko/iPhone

You can install software on the Neo1973; not just the browser.

I remember when the Rokr came out, all anyone could talk about was syncing iTunes to the phone and playing music. Then it was complaints that you could only have 100 songs on it - duh, it's a phone not an iPod. No coverage at all about being able to sync contacts and calendar via iSync on it from your Mac. I happen to be a Rokr owner that likes my phone and had no plans to replace it - I usually dont sync songs on it, preferring to listen to podcasts - and then along came the iPhone and now there's no need for the old PDA/cell phone combination of gadgets from yesteryear. Everything is on the iPhone and knowing it comes from Apple - it will WORK!
I may just replace the Rokr with an iPhone, I'm sure it'll sync up fine with the new iMac that I'm planning on purchasing later in the year.

Simply put, your description of the release is moronic. I came here seeking information about the Google-Cingular connection. Google led me to this garbage. No, they will not stop name them i-product. What would you like, x-phone? Your comments, second only to your ill grammar, sickens me.

I have concerns about the BATTERY LIFE. The battery is apparently not removable or replaceable. And the iPhone runs a very short time on one battery charge. And the more you charge a battery, the faster its life will end. HOW WILL IT CHARGE? How long will it take to charge? Do you buy the phone from Apple and have option to purchase Applecare? Or do you buy the phone from Cingular and get some other kind of service on the actual phone itself? If you break the phone, what happens? Can you get one cheaper? Can you get a replacement? Will it cost you another $300 to $500? If you buy the phone on a two-year contract, what do you do with the phone after two years? Sell it on eBay? Lots of unanswered questions.

And oh yeah, I'd rename the phone to APPLE PHONE

@gcarroll - another whiner. What do you think Apple is? Sure they're in California, but so are rattlesnakes. Apple's shade of green is envy. Do you think snake oil Jobs can see any other color?

The reason Apple has only a couple % points in the market is because it's a Jonestown business plan. "Drink the apple juice." Sensible consumers who want functionality get fatigue after one or two eureka moments from realizing Apple is selling crippled products. That is, they sell cliffhangers and calculated obsolescence. The small percentage of die-hards are cultists. They want simple answers and don't care really about the cost in any terms.

I do own two 30" cinema displays. Why? They were the best value per pixel, ON MY PC!!! Cherry pick, don't Apple pick.

You hit it tangentially with "battery life," which is an old game with them. Someone above mentioned EDGE, which is exactly the point that Apple hobbles their products so they can keep you thirsty.

I understand why people that aren't Apple cultists complain about Apple: Apple and its zealots have no humility. Apple is, I suppose, justified. It has created a rapt base of style-hungry but identity-starved followers. Their concern, if any, for the questions you raise will be subsumed by their need for things Apple. Their price point puts the phone deep in early-adopter brand-freak territory.

@ Gringo. Yes, like most of us I'm the perfect consumer. The kind that makes companies money. But, I'm a smart consumer, I want things that add value to what is it exactly what I want to do with what I buy. I know what OS X is based on, but, it was taken from an open methodology to a closed one, with support. I don't want to deal with a device built only for geeky people. I have had my share of open stuff, but I just want solutions, like any other consumer. Now talking from the tech/finance point, I'm into return on the investment on technology, even though I like and have implemented the open methodology, all I can tell you is that customers (consumers) want results, you make money on results, not on what it could do once you press 15 buttons. Gringo, I'm the perfect consumer, you're just the perfect geek. A laptop running FreeBSD is not a big flip phone.

@macaso - you assume that my critique makes me its opposite. This is of course how people typically cast one another, but you are being too extreme. Similar to yourself, and everyone but mountain men, I am a consumer. In context, I have a Mac Mini! The difference between yourself and myself is not consumer vs. geek, but rather blind faith vs. consideration.

Let's look at two of your comments, which do allow one to cast YOU as rather extreme:
1) It really drives me crazy when people want the most out of their laptops and even phones
2) The idea is to adapt to the device

On #1 - So, you'd rather be a Gerber baby and be spoon fed gray peas and pink carrots. Surely that's wrong! Rather, although I admit this is just speculation, you must have a kitchen. And you shop at a store, so you CAN make the most of a world of ingredients, right? Or, do you really just have a shelf full of baby food?
On #2 - Wow. I mean, Wow. Do you also stuff your big feet into stiletto heels?

You state in a response to my post:
1) I'm a smart consumer, I want things that add value to what is it exactly what I want to do with what I buy

Maybe you could restate that – I'm not sure what you're getting at. I'm trying to decode the English. Are you saying you're smart enough to contort yourself into the limitations of a purchase?

Anyway, I certainly don't disagree with your assertion that the iPhone has apps people want to use. I agree! I will buy one myself when it gets legit with 3G! My point is that you are a numskull not for your assertions, but rather for your principles supporting those assertions. The ends don't justify the means, which I fully subscribe to.

And oh yes, being a “perfect consumer� is not something to brag about, or to imagine that an imagined relationship to “most of us� brings heft to your position. A perfect consumer is not an educated consumer. An educated consumer navigates the line between activism and, well, consumerism. You fall heavily on the monkey-do side of the boardwalk. If that's not clear, then don't mind me and please just keep on eating bananas.

PS: I don't like geeky devices :) They're too hard to use

Everybody has the right to voice their own opinion about any product, and in this case about the iPhone. Business analyst may forecast what could happen to the device if it doesn't meet expectations, well, their own personal expectations. is to early to say, but the iPhone sounds like it's going to be a popular device, or maybe the most popular device this summer. I have seen, and used devices that are just as powerful, but they lack the simplicity, GUI, to set them apart as a consumers dream come true. Open can mean so many things, but sadly, most people confuse open with free; yes, open can be free, and reliable, and all this good things why we use open on our network infrastructures, but something needs to be build on top of open to make it a marketable product, something the masses could use, not just technically inclined people. To take your point across fill in the gaps with facts, not unconstructive comments or name calling, it's childish at most.

Re: battery not replaceable. If that's the case forget it. My experience with iPod nano and mini which I happen to like (except for battery) is that battery life is not even close to advertised life, eventually won't hold any charge at all to speak of and is darn near impossible to replace without breaking the unit. Apple sells their crap like it's a toaster (if it breaks trash it) but they price it like it's an automobile. Be careful if Apple comes out with an automobile; battery not replaceable by user, send it to Apple for $10,000 battery replacement. Yeah right. Come on Apple, even my $1.00 Eveready flashlight has user-replaceable batteries!

Quite the contrary! Did I say people don't have a right to their opinions? My suggestion that you "just keep on eating bananas" means you can do/think as you please.

But really, choice isn't "everybody's" to have. And, as with your "most of us" comment, your generic largess is like a cat standing sideways to look big. Very few people have "the right to voice", and often, as you demonstrate, their definition of "everybody" is necessarily narrow.

In any case, I appreciate your softened stance. Being tenderized is always positively (de)constructive.

But I'm left with one curiosity. You say, "fill in the gaps with facts." ??? Before my first post I suspected you would miss, but now I'm sure you have missed, the entire point of my posts. My comments are based on your approach, not the phone.

Since you keep wanting to bring it back to a generic consumer, I'll humor you with a modification to my statement thus, "just keep on eating your ______ bananas"

1. Dole
2. Chiquita

We’ll have to wait and see when it comes out, and then point out the pros and cons of it. Yet, room is left for the usual speculators, no biggie. Speculation or not should be driven by a sense of responsibility. Once again everybody has the right to an opinion, even the ones without real world experience in product evaluation shouldn’t be left out, we just need to ignore the people making the absurd ones, listen to them, analize them, discard them, and keep the ones that really matters.

You're right, we should listen to people with real world experience.

In my last position I had a line manager that thought like you. Insulated, conventional, presumptuous. I kept him because he neither failed nor shone, but was intelligent enough, dependable enough, and containable enough to get the workaday technical matters organized without too much ego. I was, you see, responsible for getting our product out. *It* shone, because I kept it esthetically and functionally centered, and I had license to do so.

He was a total bore, but I appreciated his plodding and unwavering tack. So, cheers, and keep on truckin'!

PS: You obviously still don't get it. So as a last generosity, how about this: don't bite the hand that feeds you. Repeat that in the context of your first post. And for clarity, I'm not talking about the iPhone, I'm talking about your bad attitude toward "others" in general.

Has everyone here seen the iPhone Wars website? It's about 5 days old now. I've been watching it grow and expand everyday. (Some funny links to other iPhone sites they're developing.) Nice little site, a bit amateur but turning into a fun place to find the skinny on the iPhone. Check it out. www.iphonewars.com

The Cisco Kid

Dude,
Can U explain more about the "Eco Freindliness" of Microsoft??.

[ASAY: Sure. Microsoft, despite its many problems, understands that it's a platform company. It has worked hard to maximize the value of its platform, which means it needs an ecosystem. I would STRONGLY prefer that the platform not be closed, but Microsoft has found ways to open it up (a little) to make it a haven for ISVs and IHVs. And they've flocked. Apple could learn something from them on this. And yes, I am a radical Apple bigot that will never buy another Windows PC again in my life. But still, I appreciate some of the things Microsoft has done.]