Cheese With Your Whine?

Entitlement. The belief that one is deserving of certain privileges.

The new fashion in the iPhone blogging world is to complain about Apple's latest software update for the iPhone. Gizmodo and Leo LaPorte have both written articles complaining. People want to install their own software on the phone. They want to use it with whatever mobile network they want. They bought the phone, it's their property to do whatever they want with it. Here's the thing, no one can stop owners doing whatever they want with the phone after they purchase it. Not even Apple. Apple is not coming into their home, seizing their iPhone, and updating it. It is the iPhone owner who chooses to connect the iPhone to Apple's servers. They know exactly what they are doing. They don't even have to update the phone to use it with iTunes.

If someone purchased an iPhone thinking that the phone is not worth it as is but will improve in the future, well, that person was counting their chickens before they hatched.

If you want to purchase the iPhone and do whatever you want with it, you can. Just stay away from Apple. Don't update the software. Don't ask Apple to do anything for you. What makes you think you are entitled to Apple's help? When you are purchasing the iPhone, you are not paying for Apple's assistance in helping you do whatever you want to with the phone. If you want to improve the iPhone, do it yourself. You even have a hacker community to help you.

Double Click the Home Button

This isn't a complaint about the new double-click feature of the iPhone's home button to bring up iPod controls or phone favorites. I love it. It's tremendously useful. But, I'm wondering, why stop there with one button? It seems like the whole concept of the iPhone and its one button was to move toward a different way of doing things that didn't involve mashing a lot of buttons multiple times? Why not add more buttons so the home button doesn't have to be clicked twice? There's plenty of room to the left and right.

Now, let me be clear, I don't want them to add buttons. But what exactly is going on here? Why are they adding functionality to buttons? There's a button on the cord, the volume rocker on the side, the sleep button, and the home button. That's four buttons, and there's also the mute switch on the side. It just seems odd.

The iPhone As a Gaming Device: Part IV

At the Beat Goes On press event, Steve Jobs announced games for the iPod Nano. Some games would even ship with the Nano. This tells me that Apple either is building games internally, or is working closely with contractors to build casual games for their devices. Apple has its priorities right in giving games to the Nano before the iPhone, after all, the Nano is their best-selling device. But if they really want to "get aggressive" with the iPhone for the Holidays, they need to release a free game for the iPhone. Just make it a simple puzzle game, maybe port the Nano's Soduku game, and give it some special eye candy for the iPhone's gorgeous screen. To me, that's the missing piece of the puzzle. That, and maybe another $200 off the price.

iPhone Terminology: Goodbye "iPhone Optimized"

Because of the iPod Touch, we can no longer say a website is iPhone optimized because the iPhone no longer has a monopoly on touch-screen, Safari web browsing. Bloggers are starting to use the ugly phrase mobileSafari interface. Hopefully, something better comes along.

The grammar of tech changes as quickly as its hardware and software elements. The phrases iPhone optimized or iPhone friendly were correct usage for a whole two months. Now they will slowly dribble out of existence, surviving only in outdated websites and Google caches.

Roughly Drafted on iPhone Sales

A great read from RoughlyDrafted.com concerning the latest noise/link baiting concerning whether 1 million iPhones sold is good or bad for Apple's projected 10 million by 2008. From the article:

"Frommer's idea ignores that same reality by imagining that iPhone sales will schlep along at a linear pace. Had Frommer tried to calculate an "annual run rate" for the iPod based on a portion of third quarter sales at any point over the last half decade, he would never have been close to accurate. That’s because Apple’s iPod sales roughly triple every winter quarter.

1. In 2002, it sold nearly as many iPods in its winter quarter as it did the first three quarters combined: 219,000
   

2. In 2003, it actually sold more iPods in its winter quarter than in the first three combined: 733,000
   

3. In 2004, it again sold more iPods in its winter quarter than in the first three: 4,580,000
   

4. In 2005, it sold more than 4 million units every quarter, but still sold nearly three times as many in the winter: 14,480,000.
   

5. In 2006, it sold more than 8 million units every quarter, and then sold over 21 million in the winter quarter.
   

6. In 2007, it has maintained quarterly sales between 10.5 and 9.8 million per quarter."

$100 Apple Store Credit

Ya done right by me, Steve Jobs. Ya done right by me.

I'm already thinking about how to spend my $100. Now, if they'd only drop the the Apple TV by $200, they might have another million products sold.

iPhone Sees $200 Price Drop

Where's my $200 back? I have to admit, that was the first thought in my head. Selfish, selfish, I know.

The price drop was a very wise move for Apple to make, especially before the Holidays. Everywhere I go, people tell me they love the iPhone, but, "It's just too expensive." There was no way around that.

So, what will a $400 price tag mean? First, it means that the new iPod touch won't sell. Let's see, an 8 gb iPhone for the same price as a 16 gb iTouch? I think I'm going with the iPhone. Some would argue there is the little matter of $60 a month over 2 years for phone service. But people are paying that much for their current cell phone. Might as well do it on the iPhone as a crappy Samsung flip phone. So, does a $400 price tag mean sales of say, 5 million, by January 1, 2008? I would guess no, but I'm no longer a teenager, and teenagers are the ones you gotta sell it to. $400 sounds about right for a good Christmas gift for a spoiled middle class teen, a no brainer for a rich teen, but it's too expensive for most regular to lower middle class teenagers. I think their parents will be buying them a Wii instead.

Did you catch how Steve Jobs said Apple was getting ready to sell their millionth iPhone? I honestly thought they had sold more than that, but when I think about it, it makes sense due to its limited market. 1 out of 30 people own an iPhone in the US (assuming all patrons were US citizens, which they weren't).

The price drop means one more thing: Apple is a lot smarter than Sony. Sony should have taken the early adopter's money and dropped the price of Playstation 3 to meet or beat the 360's price by now. I don't care what it costs to make it. You want to stay in the race, don't you? But I am curious, why did Apple price the iPhone so high in the first place? I feel like I had to pay the I'm-a-single-dude-with-discretionary-income tax. Ya got me Steve Jobs. Ya got me.

John Gruber on the iPhone's Pricing

If you haven't added Daring Fireball to your RSS reader yet, you need to. There's an excellent post (accessible in the site's archives) on the iPhone's pricing.

"There are millions of people who have already spent $399–599 on an iPod within the last few years. With the exception of storage capacity, the iPhone does everything these iPods do, and, well, a whole lot fucking more. Why wouldn’t these same people think about spending $499 or more on an iPhone?"

Whenever someone asks me how I like my iPhone, I rave about it, but I always end by saying, "But it's too expensive to be really popular." I still think I'm right; yes, this current version of the iPhone will sell millions (does that make it popular?), just like the expensive models of the iPod have sold millions. But also like the less expensive iPods, the iPhone won't sell tens of millions until there's a Nano equivalent.

About That Samsung's Touch-Screen "iPod-Killer"

Gizmodo is getting their hands on all the new touch-screen stuff. Their latest hands-on is the Samsung YP-P2, the touch-screen mp3/multimedia player that I freaked out about a couple posts ago.

Their verdict: the touch-screen interface is "crude." It made me realize that there are probably only two, possibly three, companies in this world who have the software talent to make polished complex touch-screen devices, Apple and Microsoft. Maybe somewhere a company like Sony or Nintendo has a software guru or two under payroll who could, with enough resources, put one together. But only Apple and Microsoft have enough "bulk" software talent to continue on with business with usual and still put out a polished device.

LG KU990 Is Not an iPhone Killer

Gizmodo had a hands-on with the LG KU990 smart phone and have announced their verdict: not an iPhone killer. There is one aspect of the phone which I find interesting however. It's the 5 megapixel camera. It's interesting to ponder if Apple could/would add a real camera to the iPhone in future versions, especially if they are able to slim down the phone over time. The big roadblocks are probably phone size and battery for the flash.

The camera functions for the iPhone led me down another path: Could Apple get into the camera business? I wouldn't mind seeing what Johnathan Ive and his team could do with camera design. They've already got half of the equation: iPhoto. Isn't that the half that all camera companies have fought desperately to get, and lost?