It’s time for you guys to have your say…
Following the announcement yesterday of the Apple iPhone 3.0 OS, it’s time to take stock, and see if it really is the all-powerful game changer that Apple fans say it is. Or, as many people are saying on the net, is the iPhone still playing catch-up, and the only people who believe it is the best phone in the world are rabid Apple fans?
Let’s start with what was included in the software update…
The big two additions were copy/paste (which does work across different apps), and MMS (so iPhone users can now send and receive picture messages). Closely following those are two enhancements to the Bluetooth service, allowing peer to peer sharing, and stereo audio, through Bluetooth. There’s the new keyboard, which you can use in landscape view (unlike its predecessor), as well as the new Spotlight app, letting you search through the entire device for whatever app or contact (or whatever) you’re after.
Oh, and of course, it now features push notifications, such as when you receive an email, or app pushes, but that leads onto something that wasn’t included: background processing, or, to put it another way, multitasking.
That leads on very nicely to the question in the title of this discussion. Will the iPhone be all-powerful when it gets the 3.0 OS, or is it, in fact, still playing catch-up with the phones that have been doing the new features it offers for years? With the iPhone being proclaimed as the ultimate phone (well, the only phone that should exist, by particularly fierce Apple fans), I find it hard to see how that claim can stand up when it’s only now getting features that have been standard on mobile phones (especially MMS), since Sony Ericsson released the T610, in 2003. And while users may say that the design is the important thing, surely it’s better to have a feature that you don’t use, than not have it, and need it?
Also, never forget that although you may not use MMS, that doesn’t mean thousands of people don’t…
Setting aside the nonsensical ravings of the particularly deranged fans (you know, the ones who say that having a hardware keyboard ruins the purity of a phone), there is a way forward. There is a point to agree on, and I want to thank Dan, who made a point that made me understand the iPhone a lot better. Five words, that make all the difference…
The iPhone isn’t a smartphone…
Yes, that’s what Dan said, and yes, he does have an iPhone 3g. And he speaks a lot of sense (although I never thought I’d say that about Dan).
If you don’t try to view it as a smartphone, it makes a LOT more sense. View it as a mid-range feature phone that happens to have a touchscreen, more like the LG Viewty, and then it can compete. Then it makes sense. In fact, it’s the only way it makes real sense, because if you put it up against a real smartphone (even after installing the iPhone 3.0 update), like the upcoming Palm Pre, the only thing it would be able to compete on is its looks. Features-wise, any other smartphone in the world can tear it to shreds…
And now it’s your turn. Do you see iPhone 3.0 as the best mobile innovation in recent times? Or do you think the iPhone still can’t compete with the vast range of phones out there? Keep it civil, keep it clean, but let’s get this discussion going…
