emptyage

links for 2007-07-03

• iPhone user's guide
  Not that you really need it, but here it is.
  (tags: apple iphone reference manual)
• Alternative iPhone Activations: No Contract, Widescreen iPod / Wifi
  Get your wifi and ipod on without the telephony.
  (tags: iphone)

Your iPhone Sucks: A Play in One Act

Our hero, having purchased an extra iPhone for a friend in Denmark, and sent it away via Federal Express on Sunday, has now gone to his bank, to find out about things like routing numbers and swift addresses so that his Danish friend--actually, an American living in Denmark, but this doesn't matter--can re-pay him via a bank transfer. As he leaves the bank, he pulls out his iPhone to email said friend with a humorous account of the bank staff's unfamiliarity with these apparently quaint concepts. He wears a black T-shirt from a comedy troupe in Atlanta, dark blue jeans, and hideous yellow Adidas. A security guard, standing at the bank's doorway and wearing a bulletproof vest, stops him to ask him about his phone. It is the first time a stranger has inquired about it.

Security Guard: Hey, is that an iPhone?

Our Hero (smiling): Yeah, yeah it is.

Security Guard (walking over): Can you show it to me?

Our hero: Sure, here, look, I'm just sending an email.
(He holds out the phone to demonstrate.)

Security Guard (looking skeptical): I've heard you can't type on it.

Our Hero: Well, I don't know. I've never had a BlackBerry, so I may not be the best judge, but I think it's pretty easy. Here, look.
(He closes out the message he had been working on and opens a new message window. Turning the iPhone sideways, he thumbs out the message "Here I am typing stuff." He does it very quickly. Security Guard raises his eyebrows. He is, quite obviously, taken aback.)

Security Guard: It's not really got a lot of memory, though, right?

Our Hero: Well, it's enough for me. It's got more than my nano, which is the iPod I always used to carry, before this. Since you need to sync it regularly to charge it anyway, it's probably not such a big deal.

Security Guard: I've heard that the glass scratches really easily, and once that happens it's just useless.

Our Hero: Well, we'll see, I guess.
(He gets the point now, Security Guard doesn't have any questions about the iPhone at all. All his questions have been answered. No, Security Guard wants to tell him he's doing it wrong. Security Guard wants to ruin his enoyment of his device. Security Guard wants to shit all over it, because that's how a fun-shitting shitmonger like Security Guard rolls. Our Hero pockets his phone, and begins to edge away.)

Security Guard: But which one is that, is that the four or the eight megabyte?

Our Hero: It's the eight gigabyte, they're...

Security Guard (interrupting and speaking quickly): That's not enough. It needs to be more. It's not really very much memory.

Our Hero: Well, like I said, it's enough for me.
(He's had enough now, and is uninterested in continuing the conversation. He starts to walk around the corner. Security Guard calls after him.)

Security Guard (speaking very rapidly now, trying to catch Our Hero's attention. It is uncertain who he is talking to): I think it's not enough! It's not enough for movies. And I heard it scratched so easy. I don't think it's so good. I'm not sure about it.

Our Hero listens to Security Guard's voice trail away as he rounds the corner, gives him a quick glance, wave and smile, and then continues on.

Our Hero: Okay, bye!

He goes on his way. and when he reaches the shop next door, he again removes the phone from his pocket, and sends an email to his editor as he waits for his panini to come off of the grill. He smiles.

-curtain-

Originally posted on mat.vox.com

iPhone: Six Things it Needs

I'm in love with my iPhone. It's already, by far, both my favorite iPod and my favorite portable computer. As to cellphone? Yes and no. Overall: certainly; there's nothing else like it. But when you get down to particular features, it's lacking in some areas, and I've found that I already have a few quibbles. (And you'll see most of these listed elsewhere.) The nice thing is that all of these can be fixed with software updates:

1. Voice Dialing.
I never realized how much I used it until it was gone. Essentially, everyone I call on an even semi-regular basis has had a voice tag in my phone. Yeah, the iPhone's address book is crazy-cool; it's remarkably easy to scroll through your contacts, and to jump to a particular letter in the alphabet. But I don't want to scroll at all. I want to go straight there, simply by announcing who I want to call.

2. Bluetooth syncing.
Let me get this straight: You shipped the iPhone without support for syncing it wirelessly with my Mac? The world's most advanced phone isn't capable of doing what my phone three years could do? And you say you make all the software and hardware in question? Lame. Fix this.

3. IM
How am I supposed to bother Andre while he's working if there's no IM support? This may be good news for Andre, but for the rest of us, it really stinks.

Plus three items I'd like to see from others:

I've also already found myself putting together a wish-list of accessories and add-ons. Having covered the iPod accessory market pretty extensively for the past several years, I've become something of an accessory addict. More will come, but in the meantime here's what I want:

1. A Headphone adapter.
The era of the earbud has come and gone. Even if I hadn't dropped a C-Note on nice in-ear headphones, I'd still refuse to use those little white ear canal torture devices. Thankfully, this is on the way. Please arrive soonest.

2. A Multi-Dock
I was pleasantly surprised to see that my car adapter works with my iPhone, as does my desktop dock. (Sort of.) But here's the thing: The wife and I have a shameful number of iPods. I write about them for a living, which necessitates my buying a lot of them, and I'm an unusual case. But I would be willing to bet that most iPhone buyers will also have at least one iPod. I don't want to dock my iPod one place, and my iPhone in another. I don't want to have to take up yet another USB port. I want a dock with two stations: one for my iPod, one for my iPhone. Even better: include a station for my shuffle as well. Slap a remote on that sucker and I'll write the check today.

3. A Very Basic Neoprene Case
I've already got two cases for the iPhone that accessory-makers sent me. But both are belt holsters, and I can't kick that look because I'm not a fucking dork. However, I am all about cases: if I'm going to plunk down more than $150 on some gadget that I'm then going to shove in my pockets with my car keys, I'm also going to spend another $20 on a case. What I'd like is a very basic neoprene case with a clear PVC frontside, sort of like this, that will protect the screen while allowing me to manipulate it, and that allows access to buttons and the camera lens, without adding bulk.

And to step back from particulars for a moment, looking at the iPhone overall in a trees-and-forest view, it's pretty easy to asses: The iPhone is bar-none the coolest new consumer technology product to ship since the Atari 2600.

links for 2007-07-01

• iPhone Central: "Obvious" missing features
  Exactly
  (tags: iphone)