grubby mitts being the operative phrase here .... smudges all over your funky touchscreen !!! Is bad enough on my regular phone (clamshell) never mind on something all singing all dancing (oh & proprietary)

"Apple's genius is in the interface. If you don't care about such things or are stuck in the Windows way of organization then I'd say don't bother with the iPhone. Otherwise, be ready to think how you ever got along without an iPhone when you've got your grubby mitts on one!"

Funny I always thought Apple's genius was marketing and hardware. Selling you something that you could get better and cheaper elsewhere but creating an artificial "cool" factor. They do things that other machines do better but convince you that it is radical an innovative. They also create the most closed platform possible. Really it is nothing to do with Windows or non Windows but more whether you are effected by the reality distortion field.

....and it will be wonderful with all those fingerprints.

Martin

Maybe Vodafone will get the rights to distribute Microsoft's oFone

"Funny I always thought Apple's genius was marketing and hardware. Selling you something that you could get better and cheaper elsewhere but creating an artificial "cool" factor. They do things that other machines do better but convince you that it is radical an innovative. They also create the most closed platform possible. Really it is nothing to do with Windows or non Windows but more whether you are effected by the reality distortion field.

....and it will be wonderful with all those fingerprints.

Martin"

It's the perennial debate between that which is functional and that which is aesthetic. Apple to me hits the sweet spot between the two. I guess it hits the sour spot for you?

I don't want to just live in a house but a house that's aesthetically pleasing if possible. A council house will have doors and windows and a kitchen just like a beautiful house but are they they same? For people who find no existential pleasure from having an object that has been thought through functionally and aethetically, both houses are the same as they serve the same function. For me, I like to think life and the objects in it is beyond bare function.

Long time ago Motorola UI was good. in the old times i had da very basic moto phone and it had customizable menu under one button while at that time nokias only dreamt of such thing, so i could access all needed functions with 2 keypresses.

I know we all love stats, so Uncle P has scrounged around the Interweb to find this ... think it may affect Apples "marketing genius" quite a bit ....

iPhone demand in the UK is 'soft', survey finds | The Register

it makes sense.

but what makes me very enthusiastic is that i think the iphone looks like an absolutely fabulous product and yet it is their first generation of phone.

if you think back to the first generation ipod, not that long ago, its quite different than the latest ipods. so the futures bright... the futures apple haha.

Those stats are only interesting if you consider the size of the global handset market. This was 110 billion dollars in 2005, and 136 billion in 2006. By 2011 it should exceed a quarter of a trillion dollars.

If apple "only" picked up 1% of that market, I dont think they'd be too upset with 2.5 billion dollars worth of sales. And lets face it, the iPhone, like the iPod, is going to be a huge driver for people to go out and finally get round to buying a mac. So with the handset sales and the secondary selling, Apple wont be losing any sleep over these "low" figures.

http://www.itfacts.biz/index.php?id=P6569

That sounds like PC-speak to me (I don't have a clue what you've written means either). If it was Mac-speak it would be written as: "Love me ! I'm cute".

dave

Fraser, the point I was making is that if you take EU subscribers as a whole (circa 200M) & then Apple give rights to only a single carrier, they will fail to penetrate, based on the fact that users in the poll are not willing to switch networks. For example, Voda is the largest carrier (95M+), but the Voda subs include stuff in New Zealand, SA, Australia, Egypt etc .....
Apple have failed to see this, as usual our cousins expect everywhere else to be the same as the land of "Apple" Pie, but the European market is much more fragmented.

Easy tiger, I wasnt disagreeing with you in any way.

Just merely saying that Apple dont *need* to conquer the global handset market with the iPhone. They'll be hard pressed as it is to meet production targets.

I'll be up for buying an iphone, but only once I've actually played with one and checked the usual requirements - namely does it work as a phone, does it have an alarm, and how easy is it to send a text message.

If I have to change provider to get one though, I dont see myself taking the plunge unless it's seriously, seriously brilliant.

i must say, i would be willing to change provider to get an iphone.

as a mac user who salivates at the prospect of great synchronisation for the first time, i think it will be a seriously brilliant product for me.

im 100 percent sure it will have an alarm.

text messaging is also handled very very coolly on the iphone. try a search on youtube for iphone sms to see what i mean.

krlock

Trust me, I'm a mac fan and I buy practically everything they make (including the appleTV which so far has been brilliant).

I've seen all the videos, but until I hold it in my hand and have the full tactile experience I wont be convinced. In none of the videos I've seen has the user been sitting on a cramped tram or train, or standing in a bar texting football scores to mates.

Sure, the interface might be cool, but if the device is flashy enough that I look like a git when I produce the phone from my pocket, I ain't gonna bother. There's already a certain animosity towards ipod users, and the iPhone is bound to provoke an even stronger reaction.

If it's got the same wow-factor the ipod had at launch (remember your first time using the scrollwheel?), the same intuitive interface as OS X, the same build quality as all current mac laptops and desktops, and the sheer simplicity offered by the Airport extreme/express or AppleTV then a few hundred bucks and a change of provider certainly wont stop me getting one.

I shouldn't really pipe up about something I haven't touched, but ...

Really? No matter what the tariff?

I just did that. From what I saw, I'm not sure I like the idea of a small QWERTY keyboard on a touch screen. No tactile feedback, and if you have to use one hand, IMO predictive text is better.

But I admit I'd have to try the SMS inyerface [sic] first.

Ooops, missed a word in that sentence. I meant say that a product that has been thought through to be both pleasing to the senses and functional should be the best.

Yes, I'm just trying to justify my uncontrollable love for cute Mac stuff.

in my opinion, the biggest thing it does not have (bar use-replaceable battery) is

UMTS

to have so much functionality and be limited to GPRS and EDGE is odd. Ok, Wifi is onboard but the device could actually kick-start internet-on-the-go and video calling.

well, i am assuming that the tariff isnt going to be massively prohibitive. i have a feeling it will be on the steep side though, but i will simultaneously go down with a severe bout of early adopter disease haha.

re the touchscreen i see what you mean about tactile feedback of course, but you either have a keyboard or a touchscreen. apple are the first who are showing us a very intuitive fully touchscreen interface, and i simply cant wait to get my hands on it. of course, i am very curious also about how grubby the screen will get. i suppose if i can afford the iphone, i can afford a couple of wet wipes to clean the screen with.

krlock3.

& with WiFi we get back to the crappy battery life of large screen touch screen phones ... plus music playing, plus video , plus chewing up battery when writing an SMS , plus voice calls on top .... LMHO ....

very true. battery life will be interesting to see.

slightly mitigated by the fact that i think you will be able to charge via usb.

im not sure but i heard rumours that the iphone might have 2 batteries, one for the phone and one for the other stuff.

regards the non replaceable battery, i never had a phone where i decided to carry around a spare, and the fact that you can make a nicer design without the battery compartment, is fine with me.

havent noticed where you put your sim card though. anyone?

whilst I don't carry around a spare battery for my phone, I can say it lasts 4-5 days and if the battery died (which typically will happen after, say, 1000 charge cycles or 3-4 years) then......I'm.......annoyed.