Why I Won’t Purchase an iPhone (in June)
Yesterday, like many people, I ‘watched’ the MacWorld San Francisco 2007 Keynote Address with complete and total fascination, waiting with bated breath for Steve Jobs to tell me what device I’d be coveting for the next period of years. It was a very interesting experience that did not disappoint.
However, despite it’s unquestioned coolness and awesomeness, there are a number of reasons why I won’t buy an iPhone in June:
1) It’s too expensive. The initial $499/$599 prices are high. Then you have to factor in the Cingular subscription price which I’m guessing is at least $40 a month (locked into a 2-year contract).
2) Though I’m extremely confident Steve Jobs and co. know what they’re doing, I’m still concerned about bugs/problems that might emerge with the first release. If anything about this phone is fragile or buggy, the first generation buyers are going to feel the pain.
3) Apple has a consistent history of making rapid improvements on their iPods - they have pretty much destroyed the competition by re-inventing and re-vamping the device at least a few times a year. It’s almost certain they’ll follow this pattern with the iPhone. Why purchase this model when 3-6 months later they’ll release an improved thinner version that has more storage space, a bigger brighter screen, a better camera, etc.?
Conclusion: over time the price might come down a little and the device will get better. I’m willing to watch and wait a year (or two or three) - which is how I handle most of these kinds of developments.
My off-the-cuff ridiculous prediction - the executives of Wii and iPhone will put their heads together. In two years people are going to start violently swinging the iPhone in the direction of their television sets.
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I wholeheartedly agree with your conclusion. I love Apple and the products that have emerged in the past few years but seriously I don’t like the Cingular and 4 or 8 mb or memory. You know that will be one of the first things Apple will upgrade. I will wait a year or two but will buy Apple’s smart phone. Hopefully it will be more compatible with the OS than any of the windows mobile devices currently on the market.
It really depends upon if you need it. Also old items don’t lose their value in terms of practical use. For instance I had a 10 G 2cd Gen iPod that served me fine. My big complaint was that it was a bit cumberson at the gym, my primary place of use. My wife bought me a 2G Nano which held all my workout songs and a few podcasts but could be carried with an arm strap. But realistically, was my old iPod any less useful?
Of course not.
My big qualms with the device, as I mentioned over at Kulturblog are the storage size and virtual keyboard. The latter in particular might be a non-starter depending upon how well it works.
As I think about it, I become more and more surprised at the exclusive U.S. deal with Cingular. Maybe it’s necessary for a number of reasons. I don’t know for sure.
From time to time, for the past number of years, I have read articles about internet phones and the like, that are supposed to be much cheaper. It would seem that the iPhone would be an ideal means to explore the possibilities of this technology (which I admit, I know very little about).
Gee, that price sure caught me, not to mention I’ve got a network of phones on another service (one that had coverage of my in-laws when other services did not).
The virtual keyboard is probably a neat idea though.