N. Courtney

Research In Motion vs. Apple: The Smartphone Showdown

To TanToday you can and always have been able to buy mp3 players that play music, video, and podcast I have one and I can copy and move files from any device I want something you can't do with an iPhone and as I've stated before I don't have a RIM but I think most people who stand in line for anything (e.g a communications device or a movie) are IDIOTS, PERIOD. Being and engineer it's very disappointing how companies follow others like lemmings to the edge of a cliff, I haven't seen a touch screen yet that doesn't look like crap after one or two years. If you rub something constantly the friction is going to wear down the surface, but as long as Apple keeps coming out with a new phone or cutting the price after people have spent hundreds of dollars for innovation only to see a newer lower cost model come out they'll have customers. We're a throw away society so toss out that old iPhone and buy the new one.

Apple comes out with a new phone with 3G, a slashed price, offer exclusively on only one carrier yes you can take a GSM phone to over 200 other countries and use it most people aren't going to take a cellular phone with them abroad. I have a mobile phone that opens with a keyboard, 3G, voice dialing, and I've had it over year, I find it interesting that Apple would come out with a subsidized iPhone when they were still selling the original at a higher price, most companies lower the price on older models and price the newer at a higher price, but then again when they first offered the iPhone and all those IDIOTS who stood in line and paid 599.00 for a phone only to see the other IDIOTS pay 399.00 several weeks later, only to see an improved model come along and sale for 199.00 yeah people who buy iPhones are real geniuses.

The same geniuses that are going shop at the App Store for the iPhone for third-party iPhone apps that are coming to market.

Apple earlier this year unveiled plans to launch an iTunes like store, dubbed App Store, to support its iPhone, allowing users to shop for games, navigation tools and other applications the same way they browse for digital music. The outlet could explode into a $1.2 billion business by the end of 2009, Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster has predicted, with perhaps 95% of users downloading two applications a year. $1.2 billion with 95% of user downloading "2 APPLICATIONS A YEAR", there are over 6 billion people on the planet I'll go out on a limb here and say I doubt if 1% of the worlds population has an iPhone you may have more people with iPods but not iPhones because in the U.S alone you can only use a GSM phone on a GSM network which is dominated by the same exclusive carrier Apple uses and that would be AT&T most of the mobile phones in North America are CDMA networks. Anyone can download from iTunes for music, but the applications for the iPhone are exclusively for that phone and I haven't heard Apple say anything about open access, like some of the other phone manufacturers like Sony ans Samsung, or companies like Google.

Makes me wonder just how much are these third party applications are going to cost? Most of the applications I have on my phone I downloaded for free, from the many websites out there that offer paid and free applications. Apple doesn't seem to think this way, and just like iTunes which is boasting how many downloads they've had, and that's only because every television show advertises their television programs and the songs played in episodes are available on iTunes, I never downloaded anything from iTunes, all my music came directly from the artist websites themselves or I bought them online from another site. More artist are choosing to do this or the labels themselves, you can download music from Sony's music site directly. I'll pass on taking a bite from the Apple, and we all know how the story ended for Adam and Eve.

As stated Motorola's RAZR was all the rage, and now Motorola has shut down their engineering division, because they had too many engineers designing phones e.g trying to use cutting edge technology to get rid of the antenna as well as seeing how thin they could make a phone. Apple's iPhone is all the rage now and it driven by engineers who see the touch screen as the new standard for human interface how often do you have to wipe off a greasy fingerprint? to see the wide visually stimulating display, the better question is why would you make a phone with such a visually stimulating display have a touch screen display? Would people tolerate this on a big screen high definition television?, because it makes these engineers think their one step closer to having gizmo's like Captain Kirk, or better yet Captain Picard seeing as how Captain Kirk used a tuner knob on his communicator.

iPhone 3G Fallout: Good for Towers, Bad for Palm

VASTLY under estimate the power of the iPhone, the same people who will buy an iPhone are the same people who bought the iPod a device that people said the same thing User 210048 has stated. 1. People who buy a communcations device for how sexy it looks are mre or less the same people who need to feel important are lacking self esteem, these people buy to show off, the iPhone sets the standard I'm an engineer, and the touch screen has been around for a while the reason they're not adapted in the first place is because of longevity, as I stated on a another board, take a good look at any touch screen display that's been in use over a year or two and scractches start to appear from the friction and repeated pressing in certain area of the screen.

The fact that Apple offers one phone in their portfolio, and was still selling an expensive feature rich phone only to come with one at a subsized price point reiturates the point of just how easily some people can be manipulated into buying anything. The iPod was suppose to be the standard that raised the bar for playing music and video, but people who bought the device soon found that you couldn't take music and video and transfer it to any other device of your choice, Apple controls all aspects of that device, I have a device that can do the same things except I can transfer my music and video where ever I choose, gee am I seeing a trend here, I can buy an iPhone only if I switch to the carrier Apple chose exclusively in the U.S..

One day I hope people wake up and realize that the subsidized phones are a bad deal, Oh but wait they have recent legislation that's being discussed by law makers to do something about high disconnect fee is in the process, but what the people who want this legislation don't realize is that the reason they're getting a sweet deal on the phone is that it's SUBSIDIZED by the U.S. carriers the carriers buy the phones for a much higher price than they sale them, hence to get their money back the customer is put into a 1, 2 or even three year contract agreements. Apple was selling a phone with a bunch of bells and whistles for an exorbitant price and people were still having to sign contract agreements, just as they are with the new iPhone that just came out a 2 year contract, that will probably be just about the that phone will start having problems, and when they come out with a new iPhone that people will upgrade to and be locked into another 2 year contract. I don't hear people singing the praises of the iPod like they once did when they first came out, and the same will happen with the iPhone. Me I just need a phone to make phone calls reliably. If i want sexy I'll find a woman, not a hand held device.

User 210048 is right facts are not deniable, if they make it, and sale it, their is a sucker or a lemming who will buy it. Pretty much the same way some people believe campaign promises. I get a trade magazine that cover the wireless industry and one of the writers said the same thing as User 210048, how Apple raised the bar, I just want to know what Apple is telling the customers who had bought the first and more expensive iPhone, only to come out with what User 210048 says techniacl issues which have been addresses, and come out with a supposedly superior flawless new phone for a much lower price. SUCKERS!

iPhone 3G Fallout: Good for Towers, Bad for Palm

I find it interesting that people actually think people are going to to leave their carrier to get an iPhone, most people are in one, two or three year contracts, and they're not going to pay an early termination fee to go buy 200.00 or 400.00 phone, except trendy yuppie types who want to impress people, and who are some of the same people who live above their means, and live to impress. Until the communication industry adopt an open model for taking a telephone, your phone number, and the applications on it to another carrier they're always going to be trying to come up with ways to get customers, why would someone buy a phone, and buy applications for that phone and carrier and then switch carriers and risk losing the investment they've put into that phone.

You can put all the bells and whistles on the iPhone or any other phone, and it's not going to make people switch AT&T subsidizing Apple was a bad idea, especially for consumers when most manufacturers are trying to get their product out to as many people as possible, Apple goes with this same business model as they did with the iPod exclusivity. Verizon is the number one wireless carrier for a reason, and they don't sale iPhones, but they did have smart business since to buy Alltel. AT&T got an exclusive deal to sale iPhones. Which one of the carriers will sign an retain more customers in the long run, and customer defections usually aren't good for the business or it's investors.