by Playfuls Staff |
10th January 2007
This is how Steve Jobs insisted on presenting Apple’s long expected phone, still dubbed iPhone, despite the fact that Linksys had previously launched a phone with the same name.[more]
Apple first ventured into the world of mobile phones in collaboration with Motorola. Motorola ROKR, the first mobile compatible with iTunes, was launched in 2005 but didn’t prove to be a massive success.
The fact that Apple registered the “Mobile Me” brand last year gave way to a new wave of speculations. Now, at Macworld 2007, Steve Jobs finally put and end to the rumor mill and revealed the craved iPhone, a significant step made by Apple in the ever-expanding and profitable mobile world.
In his key-note, Jobs indicated that Apple’s smartphone will without any shadow of doubt be named iPhone, despite the fact that Cisco’s division Linksys had recently launched a VoIP phone named exactly the same. Many analysts speculated that, in resurrecting its long-dormant iPhone trademark, Cisco was attempting to benefit from the halo effect of Apple's popular iPod music player.
In fact, at Macworld 2007, Jobs linked the presentation of its craved iPhone to the revolution produced in 2001 by the company’s most successful product, the iPod. He didn’t mention from the beginning that he would present to the audience and to the media an Apple phone, he just said (and insisted on this aspect) that everyone is about to see not less than
three revolutionary products, which he sequentially brought to the screen behind him.
The first new product would be a new, widescreen, touch sensitive iPod, the second would be a revolutionary mobile phone and the third- a breakthrough Internet communications device. For a few moments, he let the audience enjoy the news, making the people believe that was all. But just when everyone was beginning to wonder how these
three products will look like, Jobs added triumphantly that the devices are NOT separate, gathering the cheers and ovations of the crowd.
One of the hilarious moments of the presentation was when Steve Jobs said Apple is going to re-invent the phone, immediately afterwards displaying on the large screen behind him an iPod, complete with 1950's rotary technology.
Apple’s iPhone is actually a lot more different and the name iPhone is rather a commercial choice, given the fact that from what we’ve seen it looks more like super-advanced smartphone (but iSmartphone would probably sound too bad…).
What is interesting is the fact that it exceeds the most optimistic expectations of both true-blue Apple fans and industry analysts. Not only the sleek, Apple-branded style is impressive, but the whole touch-screen technology (demoed live by Jobs) - which doesn’t need a stylus, it only works with your fingers- brings enthusiasm to both fans and media.
Basically, the iPhone is a touchscreen phone, with the capabilities of an iPod, running OSX, with built-in WiFi (802.11b/g) and Bluetooth 2.0, as well as a 2.0-megapixel camera. It will be symmetrical both horizontally and vertically, for user 'tilting' to view videos. It’s 11.6 millimeters thin, it has an 8GB storage capacity (unknown right now if that's expandable) and it recognizes unintentional input. The device is a 2.5G quad band GSM and EDGE mobile phone . iPhone supports push e-mail, mobile telephone, text messaging, Safari web browsing and other wireless information services. It also features a widget engine, although it is not clear how significantly different this is from the Mac OS X Dashboard.
You operate the iPhone with your fingertips. Apart from buttons that appear on the touch screen, the only physical buttons are volume up/down, ringer on/off, sleep/wake and a Home button. There’s no tactile feedback when typing, which can make writing a message on the screen kind of difficult for some persons.
One of the cool things worth mentioning is the proximity sensor integrated in the iPhone, which automatically turns off the light on the screen when you hold it next to your ear, in order to save power.
It also has a spelling-correction software, that almost instantly “figures-out” what you wanted to type (in case of a typo) and if you decide that is the word you wanted, you can press space to continue.
During his key-note presentation, Steve Jobs also revealed how you can browse the Web with the iPhone or how you can make, of course, a call. The Web-browsing experience was truly amazing, since with you can see the entire web-page displayed on the large screen of the iPhone, but you can also zoom-in and out by double-touching a portion of the screen (the whole web-page is impossible to read as displayed on the device’s screen, with fonts being of course too small).
For the mobile phone part, Apple will partner with Cingular (AT&T). Steve Jobs also indicated that the iPhone presented at Macworld 2007 is only a prototype, and that we’ll definitely see some improvements and tune-ups by June, when Apple’s product will be commercially available.
"The iPhone is a disruptive technology that could revolutionize the market," said Carmi Levy of the InfoTech Research Group. "It's the most compelling converged device we've seen so far. Apple is hoping that when you leave the house, the one device that you'll carry will be the iPhone."
"The handset market is a massive market," he says.
"The iPhone will not immediately displace conventional cellphones from the buckles of the nation, but it points the direction. If Apple converts on the promise of the iPhone, Apple today and Steve Jobs will become much larger and more iconic. It's going to be an interesting ride."
Some fans have expressed though on forums their disappointment concerning the high price ($499 for the 4GB model and $599 for the 8GB model). Many of them consider buying a PS3 for the same amount of money, or a rivaling brand of smartphone like BlackBerry.
