Yeah the whole AT&T thing has turned me off from an iPhone. Why would I get an iPhone? Two main sellers for me would be a bathroom/waiting room/arcade time waster, and to really keep me from carrying an iPod and a phone (my pants get heavy ).
But the unimaginative “plans” AT&T have devised and their not so great service has truly turned me away from an iPhone purchase. AT&T wants your first born, your right leg, your armpit hair, and TWO years of servtitude in order to even allow you to activate an iphone.
I would have paid $599 for an iPhone that was unlocked and the ability to take to a carrier of my choosing but the $199 although appealing for upfront costs still doesn’t make me feel any love if I have to walk into a store to activate it and then agree to two years of premium service that in my opinion I can get better service and coverage from another provider.
You guys in the U.K. have it better
The only way I can give a good anology on this AT&T two year marriage is this.
Imagine an iPhone. Now imagine that it would only work with VIsta and you could not buy Vista from anywhere but rather you had to go to a Licensed MS store to activate it and then you had to license Vista for Two Years in order to use it. Now the kicker. Since AT&T gets the exclusive 4 year agreement. After your two years is up you have one choice in order to keep using your iPhone.
Relicense Vista for another two years (at higher fees I presume).
Yup it actually works out to a 4 year agreement to AT&T to be able to use your iPhone.
What I truly wonder is if you terminated your contract could you still use your iPhone as an MP3 player and wiFI (no phone). (Basically an iPod Touch) or would they remotely “wipe and lock” your phone and you are left with an iBrick?
Keith - that’s what the rest of the conf is for. WWDC only ends when Jobs leaves the stage as far as the media is concerned, not the rest of the attendees
As for “It’s only a phone”, well, I think that was rather the point of this keynote. It’s emphatically not just a phone, it’s a whole new computing platform, and they wanted to make that very clear.
Only in terms of tariff prices. We’re still locked to one carrier
We don’t know that, though. Nobody’s original iPhone agreement has ended yet, so we don’t know what their plans are beyond that point. One would assume that you still have to be on AT&T, but you’re just on a monthly basis. (That’s how it works with all contract phones in Europe, though of course it might be very different in the US, I don’t know for sure.)
Certainly an interesting question, and one that will hopefully be answered soon as people try it out when their contracts expire. I find it hard to imagine them bricking the phone so long as you fulfilled your minimum contract length, but of course this is AT&T we’re talking about…
Ahhh, but the iPhone works and works well in my everyday life. It does what I need it to do with both the basics (phone, voice mail, contacts, etc.) and more (mail and maps are two biggies for me, the latter saved me from endlessly driving around Austin (I had never been there before) with an amazingly accurate locator, complete with directions from where I was to where I wanted to be).
At my no-internet parents’ place, I was able to check something for them on the web, and later on surf a bit, play some music, and watch a couple of faves shows (and a movie) and talk to my sweetie back at home.
In other words, I look at my iPhone and see a device that makes my life not only easier, but a little bit more fun (and I am not talking about games since the only addiction… uh, game I have trouble not playing is Solitaire). I mean, yeah, it also doesn’t do cold fusion, but somehow I still enjoy using it.
Would I like having additional features? Sure. I’d love A2DP bluetooth, and a battery that lasted a long long time, and I could really use a Notes features (that latter will probably be addressed with a 3rd-party app, which is fine with me). But all-in-all, the new features the iPhone is getting coupled with the ones it already has are wonderful.
(Although I do laugh that the one thing the old Disneyland Carousel of Progress promised me would be in my future - video phone - is still not on it. Sigh. Sooo disappointed… Ok, not really.)
Edited to add: I’ve been through four wireless companies and never once changed, five if you count that I had ATT Wireless twice, so I’m not all that concerned about the contract. I will have a contract with some company, and they all seem rather similar to me.
That’s where I disagree, though. There is Macworld SF for showcasing the iPhone and gadgets. As I said, it’s fine to make a big deal of the iPhone at the keynote, just not for the whole keynote. Jobs is the bigwig, and I think there’s something just plain wrong about standing in front of however many hundred developers and hijacking a talk that should be aimed at them to pretty much ignore the majority of them and direct his talk at the world media. There should be at least some recognition of all those developers who make his platform great beyond the iPhone. There may be the rest of the conference for the developers that are there, but the tone and the buzz should be set in the keynote, as it normally is. Instead, this keynote was just one big sales pitch. I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree.
• If more people drank more beer they would drive less. If they drove less gas would be cheaper. More Beer = Cheaper Gas Prices. Conclusion? Governments should subsidize beer costs in order to bring fuel prices down.
• Can I file for disability? Because Gas price are crippling me.
• Do you think politicians wash their hands after all that handshaking?
• The Atari 2600 was iconic
• Most people talk on forums while they are at work. Most people talk about work while they are at home.
Actually, at this point, spending over one year (and what now, four keynotes?) talking about the iPod and precious little else (where the precious little else is a major operating system release and an entirely new class of laptop).
Stop all this kvetching! (I know, I know . . . it’s fun.)
Apple are selling more laptops than they ever have; more high-end workstations then ever; more XServes then ever. There is an increasing tide of businesses that are giving up on PCs and moving wholesale to Macs. They are selling more Macbook Airs then expected. In other words, their computer business is doing great. They are also going to make colossal amounts of money on iPhone sales (a product based on the OS X kernel and therefore benefitting from whatever the core team does).
The keynote is a tiny part of the developer’s conference—just look at the session list.
(And, er, um, have you considered the possibility that there were a lot of iPhone developers in the audience?)
Now,
Keith, raise the price on Scrivener for the next update so you can go to the damn developer’s conference.
I would but I had to take out a second mortgage to fill the tank up in my truck with gas.
On a side note to contribute to this discussion what would people have said if the WWDC during the keynote and all during the conference NOTHING was said about the iPhone during the keynote and all during the conference. Only a small public note release was ever mentioned. Instead all they talked about was Final Cut Pro. The whole conference was about nothing but editing video and the benefits of the H.26 codec. You spent thousands of dollars to attend this event and all they discussed was Final Cut Pro. All the news was about the new version of Final Cut Pro.
Would you feel just a little let down if they never mentioned the iPhone 3G except for a small press release that said “It will arrive some time this summer with new features.”
I think the whole point Keith was making and I was agreeing with is the WWDC is an actual developers conference for all developers. So you would think they would have spread themselves out a little more in the keynote on multiple subjects that would effect the people attending, Developers.
Instead they ONLY focused on one type of developer for over 90% of the whole conference.
iPhone Developers.
But I also noticed that even for iPhone developers they never mentioned (that I know of) that Apple will soon be doing their own chip designs for the iPhone, iPod, and other handheld devices. And they never addressed the question of whether this would change things for the developers.
IN other words Apple’s main focus for a long time has been the iPod and iPhone and little has been discussed about the future of developing for OSX and Mac Hardware.
Look how they pulled the rug out from under Adobe and all of a sudden just stopped development for Carbon 64bit. The result. Adobe Photoshop will be 64 Bit in CS4 for Windows Only. Mac will not see 64bit Adobe CS until maybe version 6 (Not 4. Not 5 but 6).
This is a huge blow to the Mac Platform for Designers and other people who use Photoshop. It puts a very bad taste in our mouths that the PC version of our software for the next 3 years or more will run faster, better, use more available ram, and be more efficient and productive on a WINDOWS box than on a top of the line Mac Pro Dual Quad machine.
How does that compute for Apple?
SImple. An iPhone Nets Apple about $399 ($199 +$200 subsidized).
A bottom of the line Mac Pro with nothing extra except Apple Care Plan nets Apple about $3000
Roughly put for every 1 Mac Pro user Apple loses it would take 8 iPhone consumers to just break even for the loss of that one Mac Pro User.
The number 1 reason users purchase Mac Pros for? Photoshop.
So lets say Apple loses a small amount of Mac Pro Users to Windows machines because for versions of Photoshop 11 and Photoshop 12 the Mac version will be around 20% SLOWER than the PC version. Will still be only able to address less than 3GB of Ram where the PC Version can access over 16GB of ram, the Mac Version will only be available in 32bit instead of 64 bit which of course means it will NOT benefit from SNow Leopard being 64 bit at all. And the Mac Users will have to wait until around 2013 before they even catch up to the PC version. Add the fact that Snow Leopard is dropping PPC support completely and you have the makings of a perfect storm.
The next upgrade cycle many heavy Photoshop users will probably leave the Mac Platform and go with the PC platform in order to gain better speeds and productivity. Adobe will already transfer software license from Mac to PC so software is no problem. Hardware wise, especially on networks, the transition will not be that painful because most high end shops already support a mixture of PCs and Macs.
So say because of this huge dilemma 250,000 Mac Pro Users leave the Mac Platform for Windows to gain better speeds and productivity.
You would need to sell 2 million iPhones to just break even for that loss. Also take into account that the Pro users tend to spend MUCH more on peripherals than most iPhone users do. Where an iPHone user may purchase $100 dollars worth of extras, a Mac Pro User will spend around $1,000.
So in lost 3rd party revenue you would need an additional 500,000 iPhone users spending each around $100 in addition to the first 2 million in order to just break even for the loss.
Now also take into account that most highly productive shops have an upgrade cycle of 3 years where they would purchase new High End Macs.
You would need an additional 2.5 million new iphone users to compensate for the loss.
I am actually using small numbers. 250,000 Mac Pro Users is a very small number. Especially if you take into account that over half of the Mac Market is for desktop publishing.
To give you an idea of the numbers.
In the third quarter of 2007 Apple sold 634,000 desktop computers (mac mini, iMac, Mac Pro). For a revenue $956,000,000
They sold over 1,130,000 Laptops for a revenue of $1,577,000,000
Now they had a total revenue of $308,000,000 for Peripherals and Other hardware
For a total revenue of $2,841,000,000 (yes that is over 2.8 billion dollars in Q3 2007)
iPhone AND iPhone related products and services? 270,000
For a total of $5,000,000 (5 million dollars)
Why only 5 million? Overhead costs and R&D.
The iPhone is a perfect tool for Steve’s strategy to take over the living room.
What do people do at home on a computer?
Surf the internet.
Check Email.
Organize and schedule their daily planners.
Send photos to family and friends.
Listen to music.
Get directions to plan a trip coming up.
Play games.
Talk to people on the phone.
Watch Videos.
Skim over Work Files (like Office Files)
Now look at that list and look at what the iPhone’s capabilities are.
The iPhone does each of those main things so now people can do what they do at home on their phone which then leads consumers towards the Apple product name for Home stuff.
The iPhone is a very good “bait” to get people to get a look and feel of Apple products. It also teaches them the “Apple Way” (simplicity) of doing those chores I listed above and then in turn may persuade them to purchase a Mac for home use or a Mac Laptop.
iPhone is very successful for doing this and will help Apple extend their market share.
BUT.
How big was the news that Apple just decided to drop their Carbon64bit API’s? Where does apple stand on Carbon? Is Carbon being dropped completely in Snow Leopard or will it be supported and if so is it only 32bit or will Apple take back up Carbon64bit development for a limited time to allow developers to switch over to Carbon.
This was the point when resources where moved AWAY fro OSX development and pushed onto iPhone development, causing a long delay in the release of Leopard.
This delay also has many people feeling that Leopard was released too early and should have been tested more before release. Leopard was considered the buggiest initial release of OSX since 10.0 first came out. Now Apple’s OS X direction is this.
They will release a service pack for Leopard. (SNow Leopard). They will strip all the PPC code from it except for internal use. They are not supporting Carbon64bit and could drop Carbon altogether pretty soon which means developers will need to switch to Cocca which could cause some delays in major applications (All of Apple’s software is not 100% Cocca yet but still carbon).
My long and drawn out point is this. From 2006 to 2007 Apple switched gears on developers and threw them for a long loop when they decided to drop Carbon64bit. This move will severely effect the Graphics art community (Main users of Adobe Creative Suite) and will alos effect many Developers who still have Applications in Carbon.
Apple has turned its focus to the living room and is now pouring it appears almost all its resources into devices like the iPod, iPhone, Apple TV, and iTunes. And are even trimming down OSX to better fit those needs. But in doing so they are also making rushed decisions that are actually hurting current Mac Users and Mac OSX Developers.
To devote a Developers Keynote to just one product means they only answered questions about that one product but in doing so leave many questions for future products up “in the cloud” of confusion.
Adobe is one of the biggest developers for Apple.
So far they dropped a ball in ADobes lap about Carbon 64 development that just disappeared. And then Jobs also sticks it to Adobe about Flash and iPhone development.
Apple makes really nice stuff don’t get me wrong but if Adobe decided to just quit developing for the Mac Platform that would hurt the whole Mac Community very badly.
By Apple deciding to turn this year’s Developer’s Conference into this year’s iPhone Developers Conference and Release Party I bet there are many developers small and big that are walking away from it feeling confused and a little put out. Apple needs as many developers as it can get its hands on. Snubbing them in my opinion is a very rash and arrogant move on Steve Jobs behalf.
Sorry for the long novel. Don’t get me wrong. I am the biggest Apple Fanatic around. I just think that for the past two years Apple has been switching gears and direction and are focusing all their attention on gaining the living room that they are actually make some decisions that are alienating a lot of users.
It is worth pointing out, however, that the only people to blame for Adobe falling behind are Adobe. Apple warned them years ago that Carbon support would eventually be deprecated. Instead of doing something about it, Adobe twiddled their thumbs and made new icons.
That “short novel” was 1,835 words.
Do you have a living to make?
Vic-k is retired, but what’s your excuse?
Oops, gotta go. Agent’s calling on the iPhone.
If they spent the keynote on developer subjects the media attention would have been nil. Seen any front page New York Times articles on the Oracle Dev conference, lately?
Judging by the session lists, I’m guessing the Mac developers are not feeling left-out.
No offence, Dave, but that’s not the point The point is that most years the keynote touches topics that concern the developers but also have a wider interest - the development of a new OS and what it is going to offer in terms of frameworks (cool things for developers and users); a move to new hardware which means work for developers and cool advances for users, and so on. But this year the whole thing was skewed. The whole keynote was aimed entirely at consumers (and, admittedly, iPhone developers) and there was nothing for Mac developers (or Mac users who aren’t interested in an iPhone). Not every developer can attend WWDC, but we’d still like to see something from Jobs that concerns us in the keynote to the most important event of the Mac developer year. As I’ve said now until I’m blue in the face, half an hour or even an hour on the iPhone - fine. The whole two hours (with an advert played twice) - not fine. I’m sorry, but the keynote of a developers’ conference should have something in it for the majority of developers. You can argue all you want that it wouldn’t get the press coverage etc etc, but it’s not like the announcement of a new iPhone wouldn’t have got press coverage anyway. It’s beside the point that general users or the press keep an eye on the keynote. A “keynote” is supposed to set the key or tone for what is to follow. That is its definition. At a developers’ conference it should set the tone (a buzz of excitement) for the developers. If they want to rename it to “pre-development press announcements”, fine. But until they do, it should have something for developers above the general user. Sorry.
Anyway, I don’t know why I’m going on about it. It really doesn’t matter. I was just really, really disappointed by the keynote because I couldn’t give a stuff about gadgets such as the iPhone. I’ll carry on quietly developing Scrivener for the Mac regardless.
Actually, I just ought to add that I hope Dafu doesn’t take my above post wrong. Dafu - you’ve been around here for a while and I totally respect you so I hope you don’t take my disagreeing with you as being rude! I think, as is my wont, I’ve overstated my point, but that is nothing unusual.
Best,
Keith
No offense taken, Keith—I’m aware that in the past you’ve become exercised whenever Apple seemed to be diverging from a focus on pure Mac development.
If you look at the developer’s conference keynotes historically, however, you’ll see that this last one is simply the continuation of a consistent trend away from developer-centered topics to marketing-centered topics. Conference keynotes in the '90s didn’t nearly have the razzmatazz that the recent ones have.
I might also argue that developers are interested in products that will sell their products and if they can produce software easily for new hardware they’ll be even more interested. A case in point, the winner for the Apple Design Awards iPhone Productivity Application was written by the Omnigroup—a dyed-in-the-wool, XCode-using Mac developer if there is one (aside from you, of course).
Now, I am hoping that Cornwall will prove conducive for iScriv, whoops, Scrivener development. Do let us know if I’m right.
Dave
P.S. Planks can be arranged for 3-legged insouciants as well.
Guilty as charged. Although it’s more the fact that so much development has gone into the iPhone when, for example, the OS X text system hasn’t been significantly enhanced since Tiger. (Actually, that last point may not be entirely true - I think the text system went through a lot of internal changes in Leopard, it’s just that long-term gripes and the buggy features introduced in Tiger such as lists and tables weren’t touched.)
Anyway. You’re probably right. It’s probably just me, as I haven’t seen anyone else bitch about the keynote anywhere. And I do have a long-standing hatred of mobile phones…
).
