For weeks, Apple fanboys have been in anticipation of the iPhone 3G launch. I’ve heard or read on Twitter people pondering whether or not they should camp out at their nearest Apple Store. I certainly hope you didn’t. Especially with this heat wave that’s been going on.
Today, Steve Jobs took the stage at Apple’s development conference and took a whopping 90 minutes before introducing the next iPhone. I, personally, was underwhelmed.
Here’s what the new iPhone offers:
- 3G speeds. Jobs said it was faster than the Nokia N95 and the Palm Treo. But what about the Blackberry Pearl, Blackberry Curve, HTC Touch, Palm Centro, or a whole host of other smartphones?
- GPS (the current Google Maps works fine for me)
- Better audio
- Flush headphone jack
- 8GB at $199, and 16GB at $299. I’m assuming these prices will be subsidized by a 2 year contract. This is a smart move by Apple as energy prices are so high. But this should have happened with the first iPhone, especially since it didn’t have all the capabilities of a true smartphone.
So there you have it. Oh yeah, you’ll have to wait until July 11th.
If any of this had happened with another handset maker, there would be an abundant number of blog posts slamming the company. I mean, Apple could at least have let the launch date slip into rumorville, right?
But I suspect most fanboys will forgive Apple. After all, it was A-listers like Michael Arrington that perpetuated false rumors about the iPhone. I hope the hype leading up to this event is a good reminder that it’s more important to listen to the rockers rather than the rock stars.
Last but not least, not selling the iPhone until July 11th leaves the market WIDE OPEN for Blackberry, HTC, and Samsung. They all have hot phones coming out this summer. And if we’re really lucky, we’ll see progress on the Google Android.
Don’t believe me? iPhone actually helped to boost sales of other smartphones last year. And don’t forget that 3G won’t make anyone type faster on that virtual keypad. And it’s not guaranteed to keep Safari from crashing either.
The apps might make it worth it, but shelling out $9.95 for some of them (and $99 a year for MobileMe) won’t be appealing to consumers faced with $4/gallon gas. And they won’t stand up once Android hits the market either.
Anyway, those are my thoughts on Steve Jobs’ keynote. What do you think? Leave a comment, but bashers beware - I will not approve yours if you have nothing better to say than “apple rocks and everyone else sucks.”
This thing has 3 Comments
Well done. I hate to say I agree with you but I do….mostly.
Can you call us FanMans from now on?
RIM is still in big trouble my instinct says no to the looks-like-MS designed Samsung Instinct. Even more amazing that Instinct would have never happened had Apple never developed the iPhone.
I forgive you Steve and I have faith in your rage and frequent outburst to get this new phone manufactured soon.
I am so ready for a smart phone, I’ve just been holding off for the right one. The HTC phones look sweet, but they run windows mobile. If an Android HTC phone hits the market this year (which rumour has it, will happen) I might have to wait, but the iPhone will probably be out sooner and I’ll probably impulse buy it if the data plan here in Canada isn’t too crazy.
@Randy - I’m not sure that RIM is in big trouble. Apple iPhone sales dropped in Q1 while RIM and Palm gained. I have my doubts about the Instinct only because the Samsung Glyde’s touch screen went out of control, calling people without my permission at 7am.
But the Instinct has been given more attention, will have a camcorder, comes with 2 removable batteries (and a battery charger), removable micro SD (you could potentially have more than 16GB) and a ton of other features. And if that wasn’t enough, Samsung just announced the Omnia, another new touchscreen phone.
@Ian - I, too, am looking forward to HTC offerings. I’m very intrigued by the HTC Touch Pro which has a slider keyboard. I loved the physical keyboard on the Samsung Glyde, it’s just the touch screen (and Verizon) that I didn’t like. I would REALLY love it if the HTC Touch Pro is released with Google Android, but so far it’s slated for Windows Mobile - and will be released in Europe first as most HTC phones are.