b a d p o p c o r n

I eyed the iphone up

Written by Moe on June 26, 2007 | 6 Comments

Will the Iphone be a huge seller. Yes. Is it worth getting now. Nope.

Why will it sell?

It looks nice and it’s Apple. Apple has a devoted following. Some follow so blindly it makes successful suicide bomber recruiters give props. Apple makes great products but the iphone is riding the Apple branding like Turtle rides Vinnie Chase’s fame. People are now convinced that anything Apple releases will be good. I remember reading a TechCrunch article on this. I would give you the link but I don’t enjoy searching the TechCrunch site. Anyway, the article showed a poll where an overwhelming amount of people felt the iphone was the best cell phone. This was crazy then because most peopled polled most likely never held or even seen the product. This is very similar to the Lebron James NBA draft. People were convinced that this kid was going to be the greatest thing since sliced bread without knowing much about him. They just knew that he was on ESPN every hour.

Simply put. It’s too hyped not to sell but that doesn’t mean its going to change the world. Well, not right away.

Why is it not worth buying yet?

Was Lebron James amazing his rookie year? Yes, but he wasn’t the best player in the league. Will the iphone be a good product when it comes out? Yes, but it won’t be the best cell phone available. It is the first version of a product chain that Apple has never released. There will be problems in the first version, probably big problems. I want one but I would rather wait for the second version after real user bugs have been found. Let the sixteen year old kid with sticky fingers text every five minutes for about six months.

Is it over priced?

Depends on how you look at it. Apple somehow convinced a large amount of people to spend three hundred dollars to get a video ipod that they don’t watch that much video on. Think of all your non geeky friends that have a video ipod. I am willing to bet that more then half of them don’t really watch videos on it and probably don’t use up all the disk space. So why do they have it?

It looks nice and other people want/have it. Yea, thats it. Apple made sure that the iphone looked amazing. It’s just like the hot chick your friends all want to hook up with. At first its all about the looks and the reputation you get when you have her. It’s only after a few months you realize her touch screen interface has major drawbacks and you might have been better off waiting a year for her sister to be legal.

Upate (June 26th 6:04 pm)

CrunchGears has some reviews up. My favorite has been Mossberg’s and Pogue’s videos.

Pros I didn’t expect

  • You get used typing on it and it becomes easy
  • The wifi feature seems amazingly cool
  • Internet browsing might actually work on a phone now

Cons

  • The battery is sealed inside so if it gets messed up you have to send it back to apple.
  • The regular data connection uses AT&T edge which supposedly sucks.
  • No Flash or Javascript

The internet feature looks remarkable. I shall write a comment to this blog about it later.


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Posted in Apple, Technology

6 Comments

iPod Updates

Written by Corey on September 16, 2006 | No Comments

With the iPod software version 1.2, I can finally set the brightness of the backlight on my iPod. This feature was the first, ok third, thing that I tried to change after I got my ten months ago. I have always felt that the backlight was just too bright even in various lighting conditions. This week when I updated and found this feature it was very exciting.

There were two other updates that I found and made use of straight away. First you can change the max volume output very nice for those concerned about their hearing (like me) and now when it is plugged into my computer the backlight is on (very dimly) so it is now easier to see if it has finished charging.

It is pretty neat how these small changes have enhanced my overall iPod experience.


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Safari Javascript Debugging

Written by Ben on November 23, 2005 | No Comments

I really really hate Javascript. And out of all the things that I can whine on about, the fact that it’s hard to debug nearly tops them all.

So, it makes me happy to have discovered that Safari has a hidden Javascript debug console. Just type the following in a terminal and restart Safari:

defaults write com.apple.Safari IncludeDebugMenu 1

(I am running Safari 2.0.2 (416.12) on OS X 10.4.)


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Waiting at the Apple Store

Written by Ben on November 8, 2005 | 1 Comment

Getting service at the Apple Genius bar is gawd awfully slow even when you’ve made an appointment ahead of time. My cousin (Elliot) and I had spent an hour in the Pasadena Apple Store waiting in line to get help on Camellia’s iBook. (The iBook had a bad LCD). This pre-dinner stopover was not especially enjoyable on an empty stomach.

I am making a simple plea for those “Apple Geniuses” to actually use their genius brains and help customers in a timely manner.