It’s the App Store, stupid
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Last year, I resisted the temptation of the first generation iPhone. This year I’ve succumbed, and my iPhone 3G is on the way (my cunning plan to wait a week after the launch and just walk into an AT&T store and pick one up as been scuppered by the strong demand).
So what’s changed? Part of it is that my resistance has been worn down by the many reports and sightings of people happily using (and raving about) the phone. Also, we’re now just out of contract with Sprint, so there’ll be no early termination fees for jumping carriers.
But the 3G version of the phone also offers some solid reasons to jump on board now.
Reasons to be cheerful
For me, 3G isn’t one of them (yet), as Santa Fe is still only covered by the EDGE network, and AT&T’s promise of 3G by the end of year is tempered by reports from folks who can’t seem to get it even when blanketed in 3G blue according to the coverage map.
But GPS could well be handy, especially tied to some location-aware apps. Which brings me to the thing that I’m most excited about - the App Store.
Opening up the development environment to third-party developers really turns the iPhone into a viable mobile platform. I use OmniFocus and Harvest every day on my laptop, so the ability to use them in their iPhone incarnations makes a big difference to me.
Add in a good RSS reader (I’m waiting for a version of NewsFire, but might have be content with NetNewsWire for now), and (also for now) a Wordpress app to update some of my blogs (they’ll be a MarsEdit for iPhone app along shortly, which will be great).
Merlin Mann and his commentators have some useful insights into the sort of applications that would really fly, and Stephen Fry (elegant as ever), argues:
Believe me, in a very few weeks you will see things being done on an iPhone that will make you gasp and stretch your eyes. The built-in accelerometer alone will inspire people to amazing new heights of ingenuity. The accelerometer is a sensor that knows which way up the iPhone is: you can expect pedometer software, software that plays you music chosen according to how fast you are walking and where you are walking (thanks to the GPS), spirit levels, pinball games with tilt, games in which the iPhone itself is the steering wheel, apps that show you on a map where friends are - we cannot even guess what is coming.
Any chance of an external keyboard?
One of the few things I really liked about my old Palm TX was its fold-out wireless external keyboard. It positioned the TX above the keyboard, and made it very easy to dash out blog posts or longer email messages. Hell, I even wrote chapters of a book that way.
I’d love to see a similar add-on for the iPhone. That way it could just be a handheld device most of the time (unencumbered by an onboard slide-out keyboard with tiny thumbable keys that don’t work very well), but when you needed to plonk it on a table and get some real writing done, you could pull out your external keyboard and get typing.
But for now there’s definitely enough good stuff going on with the iPhone 3G to make me stump up the cash this time round.
(photo by kirainet)