When the iPhone was announced back in January, we knew that something really special was about to be released. Sky high expectations were set, promptly followed by a frenetic launch that established a new standard for any other consumer electronics product to match. Even though some users experienced difficulties during the activation process, while others complained about the sluggishness of the AT&T network, the actual product seems to meet everybody's expectations, high or low. Mine were definitely on the high end of the spectrum, and after three days of experimentations, here is what I came away with.
First of all, the device is a perfect embodiment of what we have learned to love about Apple. Steve's company is all about the user experience, and no other product I have ever used does a better job at giving me an exceptional one. The packaging is superb - the crystal clear tray is a class act in and by itself - the form factor is even sleeker than any picture could show, and the user interface unbelievably snappy. My phone was activated five minutes after the box was opened, and my T-Mobile number was transfered to a new AT&T account less than 5 hours after activation. In the meantime, 10,770 contacts, 4GB of music, and 15 pictures of my snow flake had found their place on my new electronic companion. Any other phone I ever owned would simply crash after loading about 3,500 contacts. With the iPhone, my entire database of contacts took less than 15MB, and was synchronized in about 5 minutes. Try beating that!
Second, the device is not only beautiful, it is also perfectly functional. Battery life is on par with any smart phone or BlackBerry device I have tried, sound quality is excellent, and the virtual keyboard is a lot more usable than I would have expected it to be, thanks largely to a smart auto-correction algorithm that seems to work in most cases. I used the keyboard with either one index or two thumbs, and a little practice takes you close to what you can get out of a Treo. I do not believe that anyone will type faster with an iPhone than one could with a BlackBerry, but if you keep your emails short while being away from your dekstop's or laptop's keyboard, this should not be much of an issue. Beside, one should keep in mind that the device is called iPhone, not iPDA, and there are very legitimate reasons for this.
Third, the applications that ship out of the box, be it iPod, Maps, Mail, or Photos, are absolutely first class. They appear faster than many desktop applications I have used, and the user interface is cleverly designed to handle the execution of most operations with just one thumb. Some simple features are still missing - like the ability to delete all emails in one shot - but I would expect upcoming updates to address most of these.
But for all its talents, the iPhone's killer application is its web browser. Simply put, the iPhone is the very first device that allows one to get access to any website on the go, instantly, and for anyone serious about Office 2.0, this is a huge deal. As you could expect, the first online application I tried once I got online was Salesforce.com, and I was pleased to see that I could comfortably use it in order to retrieve any piece of information. Granted, creating new records through such a small screen and without the help of a keyboard would be more challenging, yet it remains possible for the rare instances when such a need should occur.
Of course, many people complained about the fact that the iPhone does not allow third-party applications to be installed, and the only way to extend the device's core set of features is through the Safari web browser, which only works when the phone is connected through AT&T's rather slow EDGE network. While I understand the need for supporting third-party applications, I actually believe that Apple's decision to use the web browser as primary development platform is the right one, and one that will take the industry at large down the Office 2.0 path that has been advocated on this blog for the past 18 months. Through such a limitation, application developers will have to leverage the web browser platform to the full extent of its capabilities, and invent new workflows that will largely contribute to turn the vision for Office 2.0 into reality. Early adopters such as Etelos and Zoho are clearly sharing the vision, and I expect many more vendors to follow suit very soon.
Three days into my new life as a mobile knowledge worker, my feelings of joy and excitement are slowly but surely supplanted by expectations for other things to come, and make the overall experience even better. First on my list is the need for better data synchronization. Today, contacts and calendars are synchronized through iTunes, with the iPhone connected to one's computer. Tomorrow, I must hope that such synchronization will be made possible over the air, through a .Mac account. Down the road, I would also like such synchronization to be extended to other services such as Google Calendar or Salesforce.com, possibly using applications such as Spanning Sync. Second is the ability to stream music from my iTunes library to the iPhone. While the 4GB or 8GB of memory that come with the device are enough for the songs I listened to the most, my complete music library takes about 60GB, and doubles every 18 months or so. Needless to say, the problem is even worse for my video library, which means that streaming is the only practical way forward. Granted, this will take a faster network, but it should come as no surprise to anyone that the second generation of iPhones will provide support for faster networks, as soon as Apple's engineers can figure out a way to support them without draining too much battery power.
But what I really take out of this first Phone 2.0 experiment is that old frontiers have been erased, and that we should be left free to dream up brand new devices that will build upon the experience gathered with the iPhone. First, in perfect Apple style, less is more, and five buttons should be the maximum that any such device should be allowed to provide. Second, the multi-touch technology positively works, and user interfaces should be completely redesigned in order to take advantage of it. Third, an Office 2.0 device powered by a simple web browser might be all we need to get things done in tomorrow's highly connected world.
Based on such a realization, I believe that the time has come for a new Tablet PC, or what Apple might call the iTablet. Unlike the original Tablet PC or Axiotron's ModBook, the iTablet should be a lot smaller than a laptop, and be nothing more than an iPhone with a larger screen and a detachable Bluetooth keyboard. Much like Palm's Foleo, it should turn on instantly, have no concept of windows, and support most applications through a plain vanilla web browser, in perfect Office 2.0 fashion. It should have a battery life of more than 12 hours, be about the size of a DVD case, and support both multi-touch and pen based operations. The keyboard should snap on the tablet's back using magnets like with the HTC Advantage, data should be stored on flash memory and an optional SD Card, and the device should support both UMTS/HSDPA and GSM/GPRS/EDGE alongside WiFi, much like the HTC Shift.
Steve, Tony, Dave, and all: your device is a thing of beauty, and you've made my life as a mobile phone user a lot more enjoyable. I thank you for it, and very much look forward to the next things you have in store for us. Bravo!
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