First night with the iPhone and what happens? My car won’t start. So I use my iPhone to call the auto club, and wait for a jump start. While we’re waiting, I use Google Maps to look up where we are and what our nearest cross streets are.
I guess it was a trial by fire, but the iPhone came though with flying colors. And my car finally got me home. After a teensy delay.
New feature request for iPhone 2.0: jumper cables.
Maiking calls and accessing Google Maps won't convince me to shell out for an iPhone (not that I can anyway, Cingular's coverage isn't that great over in the UK) I can do that on a Nokia 6233, let alone an N-series or a Windows Mobile device from HTC. The iPhone is an overpriced LG Prada with added WiFi (not that the Prada isn't overpriced) ever so pretty but doesn't actually do much and I see more of those on eBay and in the second hand shops than I do in people's hands.
I think the iPhone's USP is that you can actually connect the damned thing to a Mac, hopefully the release of the iPhone will have Nokia's PC Suite, Motorola's Mobile Phone Tools and even - shock horror - Microsoft's ActiveSync on OSs other than Windows!
GN:
Such discussions tend to become religious debates..or at least at a level akin to the "tastes great / less filling" beer commercials over here. Since neither of us currently have used an iPhone yet, we're both speaking out of orifices not normally used for speech.
However, if I may make one point, referring to an iPod as simply a more expensive XXXX, is totally missing the point of what Apple intends to be the value proposition (whether it achieves it or not is a different issue.) Sort of like saying that a Rolls-Royce is simply a more expensive Acura. After all, their both basically cars with a similar assortment of functions and accessories.
The iPhone intends to make the experience of using all the functions we currently (or aspirationally) use on a mobile phone / music player much easier to use and more seamlessly integrated.
THAT is the value prop on which the success of the product relies.
Drove to store, bought two, came home, and activated both (different computers) - elapsed time: less the 90 minutes for everything. SWEEEET!
Maybe if the others had worked on their Karma a bit...
I am not an Apple fan, but two things strike me about the iPhone: its interface is not what you find on any phone out there, and I think that's the core aspect of the entire device, as the previous poster mentioned.
The second thing is the inexplicable vitriol and self-righteousness that comes with declarations about what the iPhone is perceived to be: overpriced, a toy, not serious, not real, etc. No one is name-calling other phones in relation to existing devices, why the iPhone? Doesn't that alone tell you something there is something different going on here? After all, I don't see Nokia phone owners snickering how overpriced a Treo is.
I am not an Apple fan, but two things strike me about the iPhone: its interface is not what you find on any phone out there, and I think that's the core aspect of the entire device, as the previous poster mentioned.
The second thing is the inexplicable vitriol and self-righteousness that comes with declarations about what the iPhone is perceived to be: overpriced, a toy, not serious, not real, etc. No one is name-calling other phones in relation to existing devices, why the iPhone? Doesn't that alone tell you something there is something different going on here? After all, I don't see Nokia phone owners snickering how overpriced a Treo is.
GeoNeil clearly has never actually used a Mac. I sync my Motorola and Ericsson phones with my Powerbook over Bluetooth; it works reliably and simply, I didn't need any external software (unlike the PC) and it was ludicrously easy to set up.
I also sync faultlessly with a Windows Mobile PDA using Missing Sync.
I also doubt he's seen the Keynote presentations where it's very clear that the user interface on the iPhone is vastly different than any preceding mobile device.
GN, if you're going to make comments on the Internet, try maybe to stick to areas which you actually know something about?