we get it... daily
June 30, 2007
ourPhone
Recently got a note:
Hey E.C, I read your "review" of the iPhone and I agree that the privledge of beta-testing for only $600 is a job best left to morons. The iPhone's specs are impressive, but not for what they're asking, and not on EDGE instead of UMTS/HSDPA. I was just wondering if you'd shed some light on the phone you guys do use? Just a morbid curiosity I guess.
OK, since you ask.
We tend to switch every couple of years, we're gadget lovers after all, but right now most of us are using the Motorola Q.
The Q does everything we want.
Media players for MP3s, AVI, WMV (oddly enough no MOV, Apple is pretty proprietary in their device support, but it's not a big problem.)
Expandable memory via standard mini SD cards.
Swap out batteries (a larger one for more capacity when we're really on the road.)
We can tether it to a laptop, giving us the choice of watching SlingPlayer TV on the laptop or on the phone itself. Sync's all our contact, note, and to-do data seamlessly.
Keyboard with predictive typing, voice commands, expandable with 3rd party applications (we can even run a little Telnet app so we can work on the site remotely.)
And we get mail from three different services on the phone.
We can stream music down easily, the necessity of keeping it all in RAM isn't a problem.
Bluetooth automatically hooks into the Evilmobiletm's audio system for hands free operation.
There's more of course, but those are the high points. It's an industrial strength telecommunications device, not just a pretty toy.
In other words: None of the above is available with the oh-so-hot iPhone.
To be clear, we do believe Apple will eventually get this right. They'll wise up to the stupidity of a closed-system phone. They'll eventually allow non-retarded phone carriers to offer the phone. It's possible they'll even wise up to how much closed battery systems fuck up their users. Their short-sightedness on the whole activation thing isn't technologically driven, so that can get addressed fairly easily, if they stop being greedy/paranoid.
Yeah, the iPhone limitations can all be fixed. Could have from the start, but Apple built a closed system from the get go and it takes time for them to be convinced they've made any mistakes. That's the problem with "superior" people, they're turn around on mistakes is pretty slow.
We think it's probably going to take them three years.
And by that time, the rest of the industry will be offering even better phones, with more open systems...
And what will you choose then?
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