Section: Gadgets
Jul 16th, 2007
Long an issues with car enthusiasts, the NYT covers feature creep and how it effects everything from mobile phones to sporty cars. You’ll find yourself nodding your head in agreement throughout. Here’s an excerpt:
Their grief is not just nostalgia. Drivers who miss the subcompact Japanese cars of yesteryear, and runners who yearn for the discontinued New Balance 855 running shoe with an anti-pronating roll bar, are victims of “feature creep,” said Jon Linkov, a managing editor at Consumer Reports. This phenomenon, generated by market forces, media hype and twitchy retailers, creates a cycle in which products are constantly improved even if they don’t need to be.
[ Love It, It’s Perfect, Now It Changes ] NYT
Jul 2nd, 2007
The iPhone combines two huge interests of mine, mobile technology and Apple computers. This is the device I’ve been waiting for since I bought my first mobile phone and in a sense the piece of technology I’ve wanted since the dawn of the internet. And since it’s January introduction, it’s also the most anticipated gadget of all time. Yet somehow it lives up to the impossible hype. My experience with the device has been phenomenal thus car. The exterior design, the features and most of all the interface are truly game-changing in every sense of the phrase.
But getting the iPhone wasn’t easy at first. The ATT store I was at sold out with the 25 person in line… I was 27. You can imagine how the other 200 felt behind me. Luckily my wife was standing in line simultaneously at the Apple store. In fact as I learned the ATT store was sold out, she was buying two 8GB iPhones… one with my name on it. So I certainly can’t complain.
Activation took at most two minutes. It was incredibly quick and amazingly painless.
Using the device is addicting. You simply don’t want to put it down. The feel, the texture, the weight - everything adds up to this presence that’s hard to let go of. It’s truly unlike any other device I’ve ever owned.
However it’s not the physical presence that makes the iPhone so successful. It’s the interface that is truly revolutionary. What Apple has done with the iPhone and Multi-touch is bring a high-concept interface to the common man in a broadly used device. Analogies are difficult but the best I’ve heard is the introduction of the graphical user interface, the mouse and the Macintosh computer. However I think the iPhone and multi-touch signals an even more revolutionary change in the way we interact with computers.
But let’s not get too high level. There are still some issues I have with the phone. While each of these are rumored to be addressed in the near future with software updates, they’re were mentioning anyway:
- No MMS (can’t send or receive an image other than using email)
- No video capture (even though the camera module technically supports it)
- No visible file system
- Crippled Bluetooth - no over the air syncing, transferring files, or remote control functionality
- No auto-focus on the camera
- No true RSS reader
- No games
- No MP3/AAC ring-tone support (not even for non-DRM files)
- No 3rd Party Apps
- No Bluetooth/Modem tethering with computers
- No 3G
- No GPS
Most of the above I’m giving up in swapping my SonyEricsson W810 for the iPhone. Yet I could almost care less. The exceptional user experience and added features make up for these omissions in spades. And if the rumors are true, most if not all of my qualms (perhaps all but the last three) will be dealt with in the coming months.
If you haven’t had some time yet to pay with the iPhone and you’re interested in technology (and frankly the future), you owe it to yourself to march down to the Apple store. The iPhone is the future. It’s the moving sidewalk and flying car in the palm of your hands. And it’s only $500.
Of course you’ll want the $600 8GB if you can find one :)
Jun 29th, 2007
Jan 10th, 2007
The biggest fear I had about the iPhone is that Apple would close the OS and not allow for 3rd party development. But with OSX being so successful in bringing in developers I never would have thought Apple would actually keep the OS closed. It now appears they will be doing that (at least for the time being). One theory is that Apple will eventually open the OS up to development in a similar way to how they are opening up the iPod to game developers.
It looks like Cingular will only sell you the iPhone if you renew your contract for another two years. I had assumed (as with other phones they sell) that you could pay a bit more and simply get your iPhone without a contract agreement. I’m guessing this will eventually change and that this is more to keep iPhones tied down to Cingular service for as long as the exclusive agreement (2 years?) between Cingy and Apple is in effect.
continued →
Jan 10th, 2007
Apple his the ball out of the park in almost every way yesterday with the iPhone. Yet there are still a few small concerns I have:
Uncertainty over the ability to add 3rd party apps (This could be a big strike against the iPhone as compared with Symbian devices like the Nokia E62 and SonyEricsson 990i. Hopefully we’ll know more about this soon.)
Lack of 3G Data (Yes I know this adds expensive and size, just a shame it couldn’t sneak into this first version of the iPhone)
continued →
Jan 9th, 2007
And my new phone coming this June.
I’ve been doing a lot of thinking of how Apple could improve the mobile phone. Looking at my SonyErcisson w810, I was begining to wonder if the iPhone would truly be a next generation device or simply a better version of the same mobile phone I currently owned. What Steve Jobs showed off today at Macworld is truly a game changer in every sense of the word. It’s a better music phone than the best out there, it’s a better smartphone than any I’ve seen, and it’s a better iPod than is currently available.
When you look at it on the surface, the iPhone isn’t a revolutionary device like the Mac or the iPod. But the more when you think about the power that comes with truly integrating all the iPhones features you start to get a glimpse at the potential of the platform. It’s because of this that you almost can’t measure the iPhone against other handsets. The inteface, the platform and the iTunes integration make it a device like nothing on the market. And it’s the things we’ll be able to do with it we haven’t a clue about that will make this device insanely great.
With the iPhone Apple has both simplified the mobile phone and added features that were desperately needed. Today they have completely blown away my (high) expectations.
They also have completely blown away the competition…
Dec 6th, 2006
As anyone who knows me can tell you, I have serious problem with phones. (A) I want a new one every 2-3 months and (B) I tend to hate most of the handsets out there. Over the last few years I’ve almost exclusively owned SonyEricsson phones (except for my POS Razr that is sitting at the bottom of a drawer somewhere). Intuitive interfaces and incredibly powerful, they are the closest thing to an Apple product in the handset market.
But the holy grail seems to be upon us… Apple’s own smart phone is heavily rumored to be released next year. Appleinsider has a report today that goes into more detail than we’ve seen before:
It’s believed that the initiative, which is different and slightly more ambitious than the company’s “iPhone” project, truly gained momentum about three years ago alongside the development of Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. Some of the device’s original features, such as Bluetooth remote control of certain Mac OS X functions, were meant to coincide with those that would have subsequently appeared in the final version of the Tiger operating system.
continued →
Oct 19th, 2006
…has been greatly exagerated over the years. But there’s something to this latest statement by the CEO of Symbian that has resonated with me:
Clifford cited the rates of technology adoption in India to back up his point. In India, the PC market is growing at 5 million units a year, while mobile phones were enjoying the same growth per month.
Symbian’s head of propositions, John Forsyth, later argued that “in five years’ time you’ll wonder why you need a PC at all.”
Speaking to ZDNet UK at the show, Forsyth said that “phones are beginning to eat into the space” that laptops were designed for.
It’s interesting in that, for the past few months, I’ve had my eye on a Nokia E61 for it’s QWERTY keyboard, QVGA screen and wifi capabilities. But it never occurred to be now that what I’m wanting is basically a laptop that fits in my pocket.
[ Symbian Forcasts the Death of the PC ] Cnet
Sep 13th, 2006
ON SOME night in the future a young man walking along Market Street in San Francisco may suddenly think of a friend in Rome. Reaching into his pocket, he will pull out a watch-size disc with a set of buttons on one side. He will punch ten times. Turning the device over, he will hear his friend’s voice and see his face on a tiny screen, in color and 3-D. At the same moment his friend in Rome will see and hear him.
“If he does not see or hear him, he will know his friend is dead,” the engineer concluded.
I’ve often assumed the same thing when someone doesn’t asnwer. If you can get back that last sentence this article from 1956 is incredible in it’s vision of the future of telecommunications.
[ Your Telephone of Tomorrow ] modernmechanix.com
Jul 30th, 2006
Cnet pits the 10 year old Newton Message Pad 2100 against the new (and much hyped) Samsung Q1 UMPC. The winner by knockout? Hint - it’s the one with 30 hours of battery life.
[ Apple Newton vs Samsung Q1 UMPC ] Cnet/UK
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