Things I’ll Need in iPhone 2.0. Or, the iPhone Review That’s Nearly One Year Old
I stood in line at an AT&T store last summer the day the iPhone first became publicly available. I thought the local Apple store would be mobbed. Four hours later the AT&T store was out of phones. With not much hope, I drove to the Apple store. Within 15 minutes I was inside buying two iPhones. So my relationship with the iPhone started out well, on balance. But I kept on using other phones on the side.
The virtual keyboard of the iPhone has been the cause of many near automobile collisions. Don’t believe in guardian angels? OK, but I don’t think I’m that lucky. I don’t have the fingers and toes to count the number of times I’ve been accelerating into the car or truck in front of me when I look up from http://m.twitter.com or Mail just in time to stomp on the brake. Honestly, I’m not that stupid to be trying to do actual work while driving. But I would like to check voicemail without unlocking the phone > touch phone icon > touch voicemail icon > grok the visual in visual voicemail (i.e. who called, and who do I want to listen to?) > touch the voicemail. And that’s about the time when I’m startled into an emergency braking procedure. Not to mention typing emails. Some at Joyent claim to be just as proficient on the touch keyboard as, say, a Blackberry Curve (one of the phones I kept using this past year). Has this claim been tested? Your mileage may vary, sure, but would any of us want to put up with this on a laptop keyboard? Touch to me implies physical. Gesture, now that’s where the iPhone excels. I say all this, but will also admit, in the end, I left the Curve. I really didn’t want to carry two devices. And Grandcentral SMS messages for voicemail reduced the number of touches required for voicemail.
While we’re on the subject of tactile interfaces, can we talk about the simple issue of object selection? I’m not Andre the Giant, but I find myself repeatedly frustrated trying to pick out the right item in a list on the iPhone. I want to call Mary, but I dial Mark. End Call. Try again. Dialing Marla. End Call. The Blackberry is brilliant for the little wheel that allows one to whiz through a list then press to select. There are up/down buttons on the iPhone that only seem to control sound volume. When I’m in a list, couldn’t those buttons be used to navigate?
It would be nice to have a bluetooth phone that does more than just wireless headsets. This was a shock to me last summer. That’s all for bluetooth? So, I was carrying around a Verizon EV-DO card for a while this past year, then saw the Nokia N95. I dumped the EV-DO card. The N95 is nearly perfect. Except for the operating system and the awful web browsing experience. But there was QIK and the 5 megapixel camera that would be great if photos didn’t take 5 seconds to click. That’s right. The take a picture workflow is: “OK, let’s take a picture. Smile! 5. 4. 3. 2. 1. Snap.” Doesn’t work with kids. But the N95 just works as a 3G modem practically out-of-the-box with my MacBook Pro. And there’s bluetooth synching for contacts, photos, music, calendar. I’ve become a fan of the slider form-factor of the N95, too. The N95 sits behind my Grandcentral account, too. That allows me to choose which phone to roll with. However, practically speaking, it’s almost always the iPhone. Unless I need GPS turn-by-turn. The N95 does that, too. And internet radio (remember: 3G). And Skype. And I could turn my phone into a wi-fi access point.
I abandoned the iPhone as an iPod within a week after purchase. The recessed plug was bone-headed design (if we can call it design). Is it just me or does “iPhone compatible” mean “works if nothing moves”? For this reason, the current iPod Nano is a better iPod for my needs than the iPhone.
The iPhone is the best mobile web browsing experience bar none. Nothing comes close. I’ve used Mobile Firefox on a Nokia N810 (another dalliance this past year) and it’s not close. Maybe it’s not the rendering that’s the problem so much as the absence of the incredible pinch gesture on the iPhone. Pinch and Flick are the killer apps on the iPhone.
Speaking of apps, I recently jailbroke my iPhone using ZiPhone. The experience has been great. I am sceptical about Apple’s plan to drive all application installs for the upcoming iPhone 2 through the iTunes music store. We’ll see how that works out. I’m sure we’ll see some great applications.
Do we have to wait in line for iPhone 2?
8 Responses
The virtual keyboard of the iPhone has been the cause of many near automobile collisions.
I have a real simple solution to this “problem” of yours. See if you can guess what it is.
Seriously, maybe you don’t care if you kill yourself while driving, but please show a little consideration for the others on the road.
@Kenn: you’re right. The first step is to admit I have a problem.
Also, your checking-voicemail-while-driving thing, while extremely dangerous, is more or less solved by the ol’ press-and-hold-the-1-key trick. Accessed that way, voicemail works like any other AT&T phone.
It’s still annoying to have to pay attention to a screen while you’re trying to drive, just like it’s annoying to have to hold a baby while you’re trying to smoke and drink a cup of coffee. But that doesn’t necessarily mean there’s a design flaw with the baby.
@Tim: I disagree that press-and-hold-the-1-key works the same way. Yes, pressing the “1” goes to voicemail. It’s what’s required to get to the “1” that’s different.
Are you able to swap your SIM between your N95 and your iPhone?
I jailbroke my iPhone a while back, and love it. Never going back. It’ll be interesting to see how the whole iTunes app store shenanigans work, and if there will be any decent open source apps on it to play with – I’m not holding my breath.
@David Different, yes, but requiring users to do stuff before dialing a number is not unique to the iPhone. The lack of tactile feedback certainly makes muscle memory a little harder. I wish they’d let you set double-tapping the home button to bring up the phone keypad.
As a motorcyclist I got very hot under the collar reading this story – well over 90% of motorcycle accidents are caused by cagers who are not paying attention. In my case, virtually every time some self-absorbed idiot has pulled in front of me, cut me off, merged into me, turned left in front of me, or otherwise put my life in danger, it is because s/he is yapping on a damn cell phone. Put it down. You are not that important that you need to be gabbing on the phone (iphone or otherwise) or checking your voicemail whilst you (attempt to) drive. The typical conversation is something like “oh honey, but we decided on 1% milk, not skim, and could you check my drawer for the black socks you know the ones I wore to the Smith wedding? Yeah, uh huh, yeah I got the lawn mower blade…” If you really are that important and must use your phone to assist NASA with their latest launch codes, then PULL OVER. Remember, studies have proven that cell phone yappers drive worse than drunks. So it is only a matter of time before you crash your stupid over-sized gas guzzling cage into someone else, or worse, kill a pedestrian or motorcyclist. And your only defense to the judge will be “well I was argunig abotu what kind of milk to get.”
@Thomas: see my earlier comment. Sorry. I was “confessing” to using the iPhone in the car to make an extreme point that the touch interface isn’t perfect. By the way, I hate when motorcyclists travel up through the middle of slow moving “cager” traffic.