F. J. Taylor

Verizon Launches Direct Ad Attack Against the iPhone

Ho-hum. When will they ever learn?

First of all, this "commentator" is just regurgitating flak he read elsewhere, or is paid to shill for Verizon.

Android, while a neat step in the right direction, will NOT be the "iPhone killer" - any more than Zune and scores of others were "iPod killers."

As usual, the sad, lame, wannabee "competition" is skating to where the puck was - while Jobs, like Gretsky, skates to where the puck will be.

Most of iPhone's few "faults" have already been cured, and the rest soon will be. "No keyboard"? Who cares? Most of us who use the iPhone have already adapted to the new tech. "Keyboards" are clunky, VERY old (125 years) tech. Only dinosaur type users think they "need" them - and dinosaurs are, in case you hadn't noticed, going extinct at a rapid rate...

Also, Droid will almost certainly not interface as smoothly with the Apple OS as the iPhone does - it remains to be seen if it will even interface with Windoze as well as the iPhone already does. This is of importance because although Windoze is still the largest OS, their Vista cost them a LOT of business - which, along with those enamored of Apple by iPod and later the iPhone, have migrated to Apple platforms - and once there users tend to NEVER want to mess with buggy, slow, clunky Windoze again. (I know I won't! I refuse to even help friends still mired in Windoze these days - I send them to the local computer shop. I'd rather stick sharpened pencis in my eyes than return to Windoze!)

With China about to open to iPhone (already popular there using jail-broken copies), global sales should do well.

No, I will be using my iPhone for a very long time. While I would love to go back to Verizon, who I was with since they were Airtouch, I hope I have made it very clear to them that I will never return unless they have the REAL iPhone, not some sad wannabee version.

Handset OS Fragmentation is Here to Stay

While Dean has a number of good points as usual, he misses several facts - here in Europe, iPhones are flying out the door - they cannot stock enough to keep up with demand. Even in countries where it hasn't been "officially" released yet, it is selling like hotcakes. I understand from friends in Asia that the same applies there - there are even iPhone knock-offs and look-alikes appearing. (Be careful of where you purchase them!)

The iPhone already number 2 or 3 (depending on whose figures you use) among smartphones - this is only 6 months after its release, and before the release of SDK, the 3G and MS Exchange-capable, increased capacity versions, etc.

All of this indicates by any reasonable standard that the iPhone is indeed rapidly changing the face of the entire industry.

As to the overall theme of platform wars, etc, I imagine that they will continue for some time, although it is my hope that the Unix-based platforms (esp. those who have embraced Open Source) will prevail, as they are quite simply the smoothest, most stable, most secure, and best.

For me personally, Apple will remain the platform of choice for all those reasons and more. I am just waiting to get my iPhone till they intro those items I mentioned above (probably later this year) and (hopefully!) drop the locked provider deal so I can deal with a provider of my choice.