To iPhone or Not To iPhone

Being a gadget family we...um, or should I say Shelly was looking at getting the iPhone when it came out. I say Shelly cause I am not a big fan of Apple in general and in specific....the iPod.

Show me the money.

The first concern I had was that it was not going to run on the 3G or "third generation" network. That is mainly because for Cingular, 3G is only available in very limited areas. I'll steal a term I have read and will consider the network the iPhone will work on as 2.7G. The past several months AT&T was busy "tweaking" their infrastructure to make it run a bit faster.

I have a Motorola RZR phone and have at times...well in extreme cases of boredom when I am away from home, have accessed the Internet. It is undeniably pathetically slow. It's like waiting for ice to melt, water to evaporate, something like that. I did not buy the phone to surf the web so that was not and is not an issue with my current phone.

I think a salesman would have to show me exactly how fast this baby is for internet if that is one of their selling points. I mean don't show me in the store where you are obviously working with Wi Fi...no, take me into the parking lot and bring up a favorite web page of mine, then some click throughs, etc etc. Let's see how it works in the real world.

I have WiFi in my home as both computers are wirelessly connected so the connectivity issue is moot in my home but if I am out and about whether walking or a passenger in an auto (I wouldn't encourage driving while texting) and feel the urge to check on a hot stock or see what the latest damage Hamas has done in Gaza I should be able to, not because I necessarily want to but because I can and they said so. I should be able to do this without running to the nearest hotspot to make it happen at a reasonable and prudent speed.

The second issue I had was that AT&T was going to charge you for the wireless data plan. I admit I have no clue as to how many of us actually use our phones to surf the internet aside from the occasional ring tone download. Considering the issues above, what if I just want the two features that make the phone??? You know....combining the iPod with the phone... a la iPhone??

You can't do it. You had to purchase the unlimited iphone data package that adds another $20 to your bill. Considering I now pay roughly $100/mo for two phones and minutes I never use up in a month I think I don't want to pay for more services that I will not use thank you very much. Maybe its the "build it and they will come" mentality or in this case make it available and they will use it but I am skeptical. Most people have internet available to them at home or the office or both so I don't see a big mobile internet on demand amongst the working folk. I may be wrong. In any case, why not offer the phone without a data plan would you please?

I won't go on to list the activation delays or the inability for the owner to swap out the battery which are temporary although painful when it happens.

My main issue with this device is...well, apple.

Now don't get me wrong. I am all for the David vs Goliath (Apple vs Microsoft) but Apple is very highly proprietary and so much so its almost to the point of monopolistic. Take the iPod. You buy from iTunes and transfer to iPod but you can't buy from iTunes and download to any other mp3 device than from Apple.

You cannot buy music from another service other than iTunes and put on the iPod easily. You have to jump through hoops...meaning there are 2-3 steps you need to take to place songs from others services onto the iPod or from iTunes onto foreign devices.

You might suggest converting to Apple.

I like a little competition in the market place and I don't want to pay for the privelege in owning an Apple product down the road. Meaning, if the battery dies, I don't want to be without my product while it gets shiped to Apple, repaired/replaced and shipped back. That is likely the time you would want to use the product the most.

So, in the end this gadget was not bought. Not due to any of the reasons above but because Shelly couldn't justify the price. So, it was price alone.

To have an 4GB or 8GB mp3 playing phone with that screen size I would have given some amount of consideration to if it were lower in price.