February 2008 Archives
- Using the iTunes store as the distributions channel (expected)
- Apple will be the approving authority and gatekeeper for all applications
- There will be no connectivity allowed to third-party add ons
I believed that Apple was already midway to completion of iPhone 2.0 when the iPhone was released. Now that the 3G chip is ready, the roll out should begin sometime in the summer.
Read all about it here.
Yesterday Apple Inc. COO Tim Cook had a presentation at Goldman Sachs Technology Investment Symposium and brought with him the first good news of the year.
Rather than rehash it all here, you can read a full report on what was said here.
Basically, Cook stated that he doesn't think that there is iPod saturation and that the goal is to extend the iPod into a the first mainsteam mobile Wi-Fi platform. He also stated that Apple has high hopes for the iphone SDK to bring apps limited only by the developers imagination. He went on to talk about iPhone sales, unlocked iPhones, the MacBook Air's target market and Apple TV.
The statement that caught my eye was about the Mac. When asked if there was any limit to the Mac's market share, Cook stated that he sees no limit, no ceiling for Mac potential. Just wow.
I believe Apple realized the shareholders were hurting due to the large margin of losses in the first two months that the stock took since the market had it's doubts about whether or not the suspected downturn in the economy would weaken Apple's sales. Sending Tim Cook in to talk to analysts got the word out quickly that Apple is in good shape and is bullish on meeting their own goals in the present future.
APPL is currently trading +5.27 (128).
"Please join us to learn about the iPhone software roadmap, including the iPhone SDK and some exciting new enterprise features," was what the email invite stated.
Judging by the picture below, the event will cover the iPhone/iPod in enterprise, SDK and probably feature a few software demos.
This may also explain the unexpected iPhone update 1.1.4 that was made available yesterday. Preparations for the SDK? Immediate availability of some software titles would be sweet!
The SDK will open up the iPhone to a wealth of software developers AND it will make iPhone a true mobile computing device. I can't wait to see what developers come up with.
Users can sync their iPhone with iTunes and click the check for updates button to get and install the update. According to the Important Information section, it says this version of the software includes bug fixes and supersedes all previous versions.
The download weighs in at 162 MB. I'm downloading it as I type this!
I am not an iPhone basher, nor am I an Apple basher. I've used Apple products since the early 1980s, when my dad got my sister and myself an Apple II Plus. To this day, my computers and MP3 players and operating systems are Apple.
But not my phone.
No, I am not in love with Windows Mobile, or the Palm OS, or Blackberry, or Symbian, or whatever strange operating system runs on my Samsung phone. I'm far from enamoured with Verizon or Sprint, although I did like TMobile a lot when I used them--but if today's iPhone was on TMobile, I still wouldn't have one.
Do I hate the iPhone? Far from it. I've used mobile phones for years and every one I've used has had an interface that was either years behind what the iPhone provides--or decades behind it. I think that visual voicemail is a great development and unlike every other phone (or PDA) I've had, the syncing just works. Mobile Safari is to the second best mobile browser out there, Opera Mini, as the Nikon D3 is to a camera using the Kodak Disc.
But when it came right down to it, I got an iPod touch rather than an iPhone.
Why?
Two terms: 3G and tethering.
I might have added to that list at various points in the iPhone's short history the lack of (Apple authorized) third party applications, but I hope that will be eliminated as a concern in the next week or so. I have a few third party applications installed on my Samsung. They are of varying quality; Google Maps is its usual remarkable self; GMail is useful even with the limited input possibilities of the keypad and five button pointer common on phones; Opera Mini is far better than the inbuilt browser; Twitlet (a Twitter client) is usable if bare bones and with the occasional issues related to the limited resolution of the display; and the IRC client is more like a dancing bear than anything else. Still, I am quite hopeful--particularly as one who dabbles in code--that useful iPhone applications will indeed exist from third parties.
I realize that 3G is not without its faults, including battery life decimation, but the speed that I get through my Sprint phone--and for perspective, I think Sprint is a horrible company to deal with and my Samsung A920 is one of the most bizarre examples of user interface in the history of many--is fast, fast, fast. Not as fast as my cable modem, but considerably faster than the low end DSL I encounter at my part time job's office. But for the handheld itself, I would really not have issues with EDGE, because if all that was available was EDGE, I think all I would be doing is checking email, which doesn't require a ton of bandwidth.
The bigger issue for me is tethering. Tethering, as used in this context, is to hook the phone up to a computer (typically the iBook I'm typing on right now) to use for data. I use this very often--several times a week. I'm not talking about just checking email; I'm talking about Web browsing, torrenting, accessing my VNC
server at home, downloading podcasts--just about the same way I use my cable modem at home. Given that my iBook's wireless card died this past week, I'm actually using tethering even in places with WiFi access and not regretting it. Sometimes I even use tethering in my truck if I need to desperately get a map or don't want to interrupt a huge torrent download. Right now I'm not just tethering my iBook, I'm using OS X's Internet Sharing and a mobile router to share the EVDO connection with several other users, and even with my iBook crippled due to a RAM failure (just 256 megabytes under its hood right now), it just ran a speed test at 664 Kb per second--through a cellular phone attached with a USB cable.
Aside from a hack that requires a jailbroken iPhone that allows another computer access to some Internet services through a SOCKS proxy via the iPhone's EDGE connection, there appears to be no current way to use the iPhone as a modem. Even if there is, the AT&T EDGE network is much slower than the EVDO network of Sprint. Sharing a connection with several other folks that originates with my Samsung EVDO phone is okay; sharing a connection using EDGE would be much more painful. The EVDO speed--remember, provided by a company I greatly dislike--is so fast that I'm considering getting a Cradlepoint router so I can share it without needing to tie up a USB port or two on my iBook. And interestingly, the device I'm most often sharing my EVDO connection with via WiFi is my iPod touch--almost making it what a 3G iPhone could be.
So, yes, I love the iPhone interface, as well as Apple itself, but unless and until a 3G iPhone with the ability to tether is unveiled, I'll be sticking to my iPod touch and my hated Samsung using hated Sprint--who has the fast data that I desire. So, Apple, I love you, I love the iPod touch, and I'd love to have an iPhone--with a couple of additions. Until then, sorry, there's no iPhone for me.
This dashes the hopes of a special Apple Event, even as the self imposed due date for the iPhone SDK draws near. Although there is still hope for an event, it now seems highly unlikely to happen in February.
Video of the performance is located here.
-- Update 2 (this would be the correct name, not 1.1.4), will bring new features:
* Support for Flash, files with extension .Docx
* Adding a mini file manager
* Adding a "clipboard" to manage copied and pasted text, and send files to the clipboard via email or bluetooth
* iClips Management (is this the name of apps distributed via iTunes?)
* A more complete bluetooth manager
* iChat accessible only via wifi
-- But it would not bring:
* Management of MMS
* Video capture
* Editing of office files
As always, take this report with a grain of salt as it says the update is due in a matter of days...we'll see how things pan out.
"Looking forward to our first show at Madison Square Garden this week (sold out)!," he wrote. "Also, look forward to a special show that we're doing in NYC in conjunction with Apple...shh...it's a secret..."
Speculation has been running high as Apple has indeed done small, special press only events in the past. It would seem likely that they would do something special for the release of the iPhone SDK.
Anyone want to predict if this one will happen?
According to recent reports, there are almost 1.4 million iPhones in the "wild," There's been a lot of speculation as to where missing iPhones go. Now, according to China Mobile (China's largest wireless carrier), there were approximately 400,000 unlocked iPhones operating on their network. In other words, one out of every 10 iPhones sold globally are being used by China Mobile customers.
In another article written by Business Week, there was even speculation that some iPhones were being "leaked" from factories in China. The story went on to say that in addition to the phones, schematics and repair instructions were also being distributed. Even more shocking was that the supposed source of these "leaks" could be an Apple employee.
What's more...even if the phones are bought legitimately through an Apple store, what's to keep people from sending them overseas to their relatives or re-selling on eBay or by other means?
iJailbreak 0.5.1 is here. It requires you to implement bootloader and doesn't work with any other version of firmware. Try it at your own risk of course.
We'll be waiting on the sidelines for the news of the iPhone SDK which should arrive at the end of this month!
The one thing that the iPhone's Safari / WebKit based browser does not have compared to it's sibling desktop version is Flash. Without the Macromedia Flash plugin, some sites are rendered useless (which to me just means they aren't standards compliant nor accessible).
From GearLive.com
"We already have had a couple people ask about the supposed battery and CPU issues that were holding Flash back from being included on the iPhone in the first place. From what I am hearing, it was a complete fabrication. Flash has not yet made it to the iPhone solely due to business negotiations. As we said, it is now on it's way!"
According to the site, Flash integration may even be introduced as soon as the end of February, which should coincide with the release of the Apple iPhone SDK. Again, we'll believe it when we see it.
Today yet another challenger to the iPhone has come to the table, this time from electronics giant and cell phone veteran Sony Ericsson. Much like the iPhone this phone has a touch screen interface, however it has an 800 X 480 resolution.
In a nutshell, the X1's specs include: Quad-band EDGE plus quad-band HSDPA 7.2 with HSUPA, Wi-Fi, GPS, a 3.2-megapixel camera with DVD quality video playback and capture, FM radio and Bluetooth stereo. It includes a powerful 520-MHz ARM11 processor, but the downside is that it runs Windows Mobile 6. Oh yah, and it has a keyboard.
We think that this phone is cool hardware wise, but we know that the magic is in the software...let's see what Sony Ericsson can do...Hang on to your hats, the competition is going to get heavy.
Some of the early "forerunners" in this category are the Treos, Blackberries and UMPCs. The Treos and Blackberries are definitely always connected, but I feel that they don't quite get the convergence aspect right. UMPCs may also be a good example as they feature a full-fledged operating system, but tend to be a bit on the bulky side. My cousin has a UMPC and to tell you the truth, I don't think you'd want to wear one of those on your hip, well, maybe some people may, but I sure won't.
In any case, back to the iPhone...as many sites have suggested, the iPhone is not a perfect product and to be fair, not many products are when they are first introduced, BUT we do feel that the iPhone comes pretty close. In this article, I will give a few examples of how the iPhone delivers what I would like to call a next generation experience.
Many industry analysts and observers alike have criticized the iPhone for not including 3G access, but because Steve Jobs felt that battery life and coverage would suffer, he chose to stick with the slower, wider coverage EDGE technology. It was a gamble that I think paid off because always being able to access the Internet as it is meant to be rendered is why the iPhone is such an important piece of technology.
One example of how the iPhone changed my life was when my wife gave birth. With the EDGE Internet access and an almost feature complete browser (no Flash or Java VM), I was pretty much able to live tweet my wife's pregnancy, blow by blow. To be able to post updates to Twitter from the labor/birthing room and share our experiences with the Internet community was just amazing. Not only did my friends get to feel as if they were there in the room with us, but I also have a record of what we went through that night (as it was a 16 - 17 hour ordeal).
In addition to twittering the laboring process, I was able to upload photos of our child to my Flickr account pretty much as soon as he had been delivered. A few weeks earlier, a relative also had delivered their baby and they sent photos the old way, via email. Let me tell you, even with a high speed connection, downloading three to four 3 Mb files or larger is not fun for anyone. After I saw that, I decided that I wouldn't put anyone through that again. So, I took a lot of pictures, uploaded them to my Flickr account and used the iPhone's mail client to notify all of our friends and relatives that the baby had arrived safe and sound. There would absolutely be no way for anyone to do something like this with a laptop or a "traditional" smartphone device (Treos and Blackberries).
These were just two of my experiences with the iPhone and how I used it's unique blend of technologies to do things never before possible with any other internet connected device. And, with the Software Development Kit coming sometime in February, the iPhone will once again allow users to do things they've never even thought possible.
In the meantime, if you have any stories you'd like to share, send us an email and we will consider publishing your story here at the iPhoneNewsBlog.
Cell phones during this time were out of the reach of the common consumer and most people carried pagers. If you had a cell phone, you probably had the DynaTAC or had one installed in your car. Then, in 1993, BellSouth/IBM introduced the Simon. Billed as personal communicator, I actually was lucky enough to be involved in market testing for this device. Interestingly enough, I feel that this device paved the way for future phones such as the Treos, Blackberries, Windows Mobile Devices and of course our iPhone. In addition to being a phone, the Simon was also: a pager, calculator, address book, fax machine (yes that's right, it could send and receive faxes) and e-mail device. The one feature I feel that is worth mentioning is that it was a pen-enabled device (no handwriting recognition) that had a touch-screen interface. Sound good? It was considering it's feature set. The downside, it was huge, weighed 20 ounces and would set consumers back about $900.
"If you love Facebook so much that you check it every time that you're at the computer, just think about how great it would be to check it every time you're nowhere near your computer. Right on your phone."
I contend this is probably the truth with high school kids since all of the ones I've seen with wireless laptops are constantly on Facebook or some other gaming site!
Check out Apple's ad with Facebook site here.
Today Apple announced the arrival of the iPhone 16BG model and iPod Touch 32GB model.
The iPhone now comes in a new 16GB model selling for $499, and the 8GB model for $399. A bit unexpected for some, theiPod touch now comes in a 32GB model for $499, along with the already available 16GB model for $399 and the 8GB model for $299. We have a feeling the 8GB model will stay for 6 months more before they kill it when they offer a 64GB iPod Touch our a completely new model before the Christmas / Holiday season.
"For some users, there's never enough memory," said Greg Joswiak, Apple's vice president of Worldwide iPod and iPhone Product Marketing. "Now people can enjoy even more of their music, photos and videos on the most revolutionary mobile phone and best Wi-Fi mobile device in the world."
Both iPhone 16BG and iPod Touch 32GB are available immediately in Apple Retail outlets and online.
I think this is a pretty good solution but won't be the solution that Apple comes up with. Apple's solution may be similar but probably a bit more intuitive. Nonetheless, this is a very interesting and well put together video. Check it out:
iPhone Copy and Paste from lonelysandwich on Vimeo.
Watch out for Garmin's new iPhone rival known as nüvifone! Known best for its GPS mapping gizmos, Garmin held a press conference this past Wednesday that showcased how they will be getting into the cell phone market.Dubbed the nüvifone, it actually may look familiar to iPhone users since it has the same sized touchscreen display and form factor and it's used as the sole controls for the phone. Just like the iPhone, the only other controls are Power and Volume. The nüvifone will feature Wi-FI, ACC/MP3 audio, MPEG-4 Video and a web browser. Sound familiar?
Now why would anyone buy this over an iPhone from Apple? Garmin is betting that folks would rather have one thing that the iPhone doesn't: a true GPS unit built in.While the iPhone software update has triangulation software built in to give an estimate to where the user is, there is no true GPS for the current crop of iPhones. The Garmin version will work in Ameria and Europe and have a true GPS receiver built right in that will be able to communicate with Google for further information. The built in camera will geotag all photos captured.
There are a few other things that Garmin's Nüvifone has that the iPhone doesn't: video capture, faster 3G cellular internet, MMS messaging for sending photos and videos to other cell phones.
John Gruber of DaringFireball originally was excitied about the idea of a true competitor to the iPhone but upon close examination of their screenshot gallery had this to say:
"Upon further examination, I'm getting a much stronger vaporware vibe from this. For something due by September, they're awfully short on details. Their screenshot gallery is entirely comprised of mockups, not actual screenshots or photos from an actual prototype. (Unless the Nüviphone is going to pack a 1400 × 795 display, which is pretty unlikely.) When Apple pre-announced the iPhone six months in advance, they had real screenshots and actual prototype hardware. No word at all on how you type, what OS the device is using, Mac/PC connectivity or synching, or what rendering engine the web browser users. Whole things smells less-than-half-baked. Update: Engadget has "hands-on" photos, but none with the prototype turned, you know, on.In my mind, Garmin's Nüvifone will have to catch up to whatever Apple has ALREADY got in the bag for iPhone v2.0 and other iPhone related products. The Nüvifone may attract some that want a different phone, but I'm confident that iPhone 2 will simply be the next revolutionary version of the iPhone and will send Garmin back to the drawing board again.
Garmin also seems to be implicitly encouraging direct comparison to the iPhone and Apple: the hardware is obviously iPhone-esque; the screenshot mockups are entirely set in Myriad (the iPhone uses Helvetica, of course, but Myriad is Apple's branding font); and even the name, "Nüvifone", contains the substring "ifone"."
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