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Re: Friday, January 12, 2007
Doesn't the "revolutionariness" of this device at least to some extent depend on how Apple is able to treat/relegate the carrier to being a content-agnostic "dumb pipe"? I tend to think that the semi-revolutionary mobile UI is a step in that direction - and yes iPhone being a "computer with a mike, a screen, a speaker and a pile of other input and output openings" does tend to reinforce the "intelligence at the edge of the network" meme. But a couple aspects still concern me. One is the Cingular-exclusivity (I'd never consider this device regardless of price point until at least one other carrier and preferably T-Mobile since they work better nearly everywhere I seem to use a mobile device). Another is Apple's perceived closed-to-outside-development platform (think they'll release some form of iPhone SDK?) and silo'd iTunes vertical content distribution and rights management business model. Sync everything on this device through iTunes, huh? That said, I guess I don't really mind that Cingular is adding some of the value to iPhone in the form of the random-access voicemail selection service (seems to be a reasonable place for carriers to compete and differentiate with each other), and I'm encouraged that the embedded Safari browser ought to at least allow client-side JavaScript mashup development. So I guess I agree with Doc that allowing/preventing Skype is a good test case, which is just a specific example of the general principle of allowing any other application or service to more-or-less seamlessly move between GSM and WiFi connectivity to the internet.
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