Jun.18.2007 Steve Jobs is a prick but the iPhone may not be
In the most recent New York magazine (which, by the way, you should be reading regularly to have cocktail talk fodder), is an interesting look into the man behind Apple, the iPhone, the iPod, and, uh, the iMac…Steve Jobs and where the so-called “Jesus Phone” will end up long-term.
It took half an hour, no more than that, after Jobs unveiled his gleaming new toy for the bloggers to dub it the Jesus Phone. Here was the gizmo we’d all been pining for lo these many years: a music player, camera, e-mail tool, Web browser, and cell phone, all rolled into one impossibly seductive package. After watching Jobs enact the ta-da moment with typical brio—“I didn’t sleep a wink last night”—even cynical observers were smitten. “What a weird fucking day Tuesday was,” Josh Quittner, the editor of Business 2.0, remarked. “It was as if we were all participating in a shared consensual hallucination … All these supposedly hard-bitten tech reporters wandering around like they were getting laid for the first time.”
[iPhone competitor Helio's CEO Sky] Dayton goes on to enumerate what he sees as the iPhone’s other shortcomings: “No removable battery. No removable memory. No GPS,” he says. “It has a bigger screen, so watching a movie on it will be better—but with no removable battery, you’re not really going to want to do that and make phone calls. So you’ve got the houseboat problem: It’s neither a house nor a boat, it’s both, and it’s not particularly great at either.”
I’m not going to quote too much because it’s an interesting piece if you’re interested in seeing what an educated look at what the iPhone’s long-term chances are. Needless to say, there’s a cautious attitude being taken to it because, the reality is that it’s doing what other phones do, just not as well with slicker marketing. Which is fine. The “polished turd” model of product creation is no doubt a successful one in the short term. The buzz is palpable (albeit not steady), Apple’s stock is rising up as we get closer to the iPhone’s June 29 release date, and you’d be hard-pressed to not see an iPhone commercial when you watch TV for an hour block.
But are people ready for this buy? Are the millions of greasy-fingered Americans (and let’s be real here, those are the people they need…the people who will absolutely destroy that delicate touch screen with their scuzzy burger juice-laden fingers) willing to spend $500 on a phone and increase their monthly bill for multimedia usage for a phone that acts like it’s too good for them? I’m not sure. Businesses are already saying they won’t/have no reason to install it to their employee base, a key indicator of Blackberry’s rollicking success.
The iPhone’s success or failure (Jobs currently pegs 10 million iPhones sold by end of 2008) will determine where your portable technology goes in the next ten years. Though Jobs may be a schmuck, his success or failure will affect your life just like the iPod has. All I’m saying out there to the analysts and people deciding the business impact of the iPhone release is…don’t forget about the greasy fingers.
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