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Apple, iPhone 4, and Competition

Bwana — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 22:10:34 +0000

I recommend you watch the WWDC 2010 keynote before reading.

If you watch the video above, you’ll note that I was generally impressed with the announcements made by Apple. I’ll attempt to go into more detail on this post as to some of the other features and what I think about them.

History repeating itself?

Before I talk about the iPhone 4, I want to comment on a statement that Steve Jobs made regarding the pre-iPhone world. He said that before the iPhone and App store, things were completely different. If you think about it, he is absolutely right. I can barely remember what it was like to run apps on my phone, perform firmware upgrades, check email, and surf the web on my smartphones. iPhone was definitely a game changer in 2007-2008.

So will the iPhone 4 be a game changer as well? It’s really hard to predict these things, especially with how often Apple reinvents features that sucked on other phones in a way that we love them somehow. Distortion field? Magic? I don’t know, but it’s a force to be reckoned with. Take for example, the engineering of the iPhone 4 case. What other smartphone maker will take you into the manufacturing process and explain to you why they made the choices they did? I can’t think of many. Apple has put together an integrated antenna design that I have not seen before. Has it been done before? I don’t know, because other companies don’t bother to share these important information. Some may dismiss Apple’s focus on their stainless steel + space age glass design as “useless” or a “distraction from what’s not there” but I disagree with both of those points.

The Screen

My Mechanical Engineering background kicked in a bit when I saw the manufacturing process in action. It sounds pretty unique. Has anyone else done this? I don’t know because companies don’t openly share this information. Apple uses a special lamination technique to bond the screen to the glass, so no more dirt particles as stated by John Gruber:

It’s mentioned briefly in Apple’s promotional video about the design of the iPhone 4, but they’re using a new production process that effectively fuses the LCD and touchscreen — there is no longer any air between the two. One result of this is that the iPhone 4 should be impervious to this dust-under-the-glass issue.

Combined with Apple’s pixel-packing “Retina” technology, we have the makings of an absolutely amazing reading experience. Did you notice how many times Steve Jobs referred to the screen being akin to reading high quality print? Apple sees the trend that everyone else is talking about: the death of print. This is a preemptive strike to capture that rising market through the iPad and iPhone 4.

Two Microphones

For the first time on the iPhone, Apple has introduced a second microphone for “noise cancellation”. Before FaceTime was announced, this didn’t make a whole lot of sense, but now it does. I imagine this will be utilized during video calls and video recording. Currently on iPhone 3GS, the audio quality is not that great on recorded video. I imagine this will not be the case on iPhone 4. We will have to wait and see if this second microphone will help at all.

The A4 Chip and Battery

Apple was proud to announce they are using their own A4 processor in iPhone 4. Not only does this chip offer great performance, but it does so without the cost of heavy power consumption. I think it’s amazing that Apple is able to produce a 40% increase in talk time while providing more power, functionality, and a slimmer design. Again, a lot of critics will overlook this as “ho-hum” because it’s not some futuristic amazing bell or whistle, but I will disagree and will say this is an enormous feat and Apple should be commended.

The Gyroscope

This one surprised me as it did others. The gyroscope has opened up new doors for developers to create spatial awareness type games. Steve Jobs gave a great demonstration of this using a clone of the popular puzzle game, Jenga. As he turned around physically, the iPhone’s display updated its point of view. This is absolutely brilliant!! Think about some of the applications that could utilize the new CoreMotion APIs to create amazing experiences. Kudos to Apple for this one.

The Camera and HD Video

Steve Jobs did an outstanding job explaining protons to a bunch of journalists, and I believe they understood him completely. He went into detail about how megapixels aren’t everything (by the way, thank you Steve for re-iterating this important point). iPhone 4 uses a backside illuminated sensor to produce sharper photos. The 3GS brought a huge increase in quality in photos over the 3G and I wonder if iPhone 4 will do the same. Apple’s example pictures are there, but I’m a bit skeptical until I take my own photos with the thing.

I was extremely happy to hear that Apple has enabled HD video capture from iPhone 4. It will be 720p at 30 frames per second which is perfect for most of us. I doubt it will be professional grade HD video, but I think it will be on par with popular pocket HD cameras like the Creative Vado 3 (which I own), Kodak Zi6 and the Flip HD series. As I stated in the video, I think this opens a new market to Apple which was previously untapped. Pocket HD cameras are fabulous, but we don’t carry them everywhere. We carry our phones everywhere. This is a possible game changer in terms of iPhone reach.

While HD video is not new to smartphones, the ability to edit them on your phone is not common. iMovie for iPhone completely blew me away. This is a fabulous idea and will definitely encourage iPhone 4 owners to shoot more video and to edit it (with transitions, titles, effects, and music) right on the phone! While most of us travel with a laptop where we can edit video, we don’t always have them with us. We carry our phones everywhere. Yet another possible game changer.

Apple is creeping into other markets with iPhone 4.

The Name Change

iPhone OS is now known as iOS. First off, I hate the name, but that doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things. It actually does make sense to come up with a single name for the OS that powers three separate mobile devices: iPhone, iPod Touch & iPad. Apple was smart this time and licensed the name from Cisco. I welcome the change, but I hate the name.

iOS Tidbits

Apple reiterated a lot of points they covered in the iOS 4 launch event including multitasking, folders, and iAds. All of these are great additions to a polished platform that is getting better and better. I was happy to see iOS will be a free upgrade for all supported devices now.

And Now, Competition

Steve Jobs was on the defensive in this keynote more-so than ever before. He addressed many of the concerns raised by Google’s Android camp including: App approval process, market share, and App store health. For the first time (that I’ve heard of), Apple has publicly acknowledged their main reasons for rejecting apps in the App store: 1. Use of private APIs 2. They crash 3. They don’t do the functionality they describe. When we hear of all of the horror stories of why apps are rejected from developers, it’s usually one sided. We never hear Apple’s side of it and now I’m really skeptical about all of the developers who cried foul. Were your apps actually stable? Did you use private APIs but aren’t telling us? Did your app do other things you didn’t describe? Before this knowledge, we could only assume Apple was being evil and randomly rejecting applications. It’s something to think about.

Apple also did something that I was pleased to see. They didn’t make useless jokes and cracks about their competition. Google, on the other hand, felt it was needed to constantly bash Apple’s products, process, and philosophy. It’s this attitude that has me leaning towards the Apple side of this competition. I acknowledge Android’s incredible momentum and their feature set differentiates itself from iOS in many ways. I hate to see unprofessional, childish acts when your features could speak for themselves.

With this competition, Apple and Google have two very different approaches:

Google – Appeal to technical features, capabilities, and freedom

Apple – Appeal to emotional ties through technology

Which do you believe is more powerful? I’m going to say it’s Apple for me, but that’s not the case for everyone. Android has snatched up all the people who are frustrated with Apple’s “limitations”. They’re also capturing folks who want an alternative to the iPhone. Let’s face it, Android is the only real alternative to the iPhone in the marketplace in terms of point by point features. Nokia and RIM may dominate the worldwide marketshare, but neither of these two companies has a direct answer for the almighty “app store”.

If you watch the FaceTime video, you’ll see very clearly why Apple does what it does. You see families connecting and sharing intimate moments through technology. This can be done easily with iPhone 4 because there is zero setup, zero configuration, zero worry. You can’t say the same about Android. Android appeals to those who want to tinker, who want to configure, who want to customize, and there’s nothing wrong with that, but it’s a difference in their approaches. We know video calling on smartphones has been around for a long time on Symbian, but you don’t hear about ordinary, non technical people using it. Why? Because it’s hard to set up, requires technical know-how, and the experience sucks overall. Apple comes in, and makes the experience as simple as a phone call. See what I mean? Android will likely have 50 applications that crop up that do the same thing as FaceTime and we’ve already seen the Qik app on the platform. Will it be as seamless as Apple’s? No. That’s the difference.

Some people don’t want it be seamless. They’d rather have total control of the experience than have it be easy as possible through Apple’s implementation. Apple wants to move the technology in the background and let you make a video call. Some call it “draconian”, I call it “a great experience”.

Apple controls the experience for a reason, and that reason is so you can experience emotion through your technology and not experience technology for emotion.

Conclusion

Overall, iPhone 4′s unveiling went great. Even with technical difficulties, Steve Jobs was able to show why he is king of keynotes. He took control of the situation and actually made it pleasant.

Apple continues to innovate despite the critics. Look at all the engineering that went into iPhone 4 before passing “ho-hum” judgement. Realize that Android is great where it is, and iOS is great where they are, and these two packages offer different perspectives on smartphones. The choice of platform is personal and depends on your preferences and desires.

From An iPhone To A T-Mobile G1

Bwana — Sun, 03 May 2009 19:06:52 +0000

T-Mobile was gracious enough to supply me with a G1 review unit. I’ve been playing with it for about a week now and I’ve seen and learned quite a bit. A lot of people are curious about how it compares to the iPhone’s experience. It’s a hard question to answer directly, so I’m going to be producing a series of videos on Bwana.TV (my video blog) about the Android experience and some of the applications that are available. Unfortunately, I’m not able to purchase any applications since the review unit is tied to a separate account, but I’ll do what I can amongst the free applications.

So stay tuned to Bwana.TV for a bunch of T-Mobile G1 videos, and how it compares to the iPhone experience.

How Much Have You Spent On iPhone Applications?

Bwana — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 14:53:06 +0000

The iPhone is taking the world by storm. (no pun intended RIM) Yesterday, Apple announced their quarterly earnings for Q4 2008 and the results were shocking to say the least. Apple reported they sold 6.9 million phones last quarter which achieves their goal of 10 million in 2008. Also surprising is that Apple is now the 3rd largest supplier of phones. Here are my thoughts on the matter:

Click to Play

It is also known that RIM and Google are planning to implement their own version of the iTunes App Store which has proven to be wildly successful. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, right? Doesn’t this all sound familiar? Remember when the iPod first started to boom? I digress.

I’ve found the iTunes App Store to be a great addition to the iPhone universe, especially since there are a good amount of high quality free applications. The question I have for everyone is, have you been tracking how much you’ve been spending on the iTunes App Store? I know some people are well aware of how much they spend on songs in the iTunes Store and elsewhere, but do you truly know how much you’ve spent? For me, it’s easy: I’ve spent $5.99.

The only application I’ve bought to date is Tuner by Nullriver, Inc.

I’m quite proud of this since I was tempted so many times to buy other applications, but I refrained. I’ve made it this far by focusing on all the great free applications on the iTunes App Store. Some of these include Evernote, Pandora, Facebook, Twinkle, Remote, AirSharing, Pro Football App, and College Football App. In these days where many are cutting back on costs (myself included), free is a great price.

So, what apps do you feel are must haves for the iPhone/iPod-Touch? Have you tracked your spending in this temptation store? Do you care? Let me know in the comments.

T-Mobile G1: Beware Of The Limitations

Bwana — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 19:50:47 +0000

Today, the Google Android platform had its coming out party, and the first phone to use Google’s new mobile software, is the T-Mobile G1. Rather than bore you with all the details you’ve read about one the web already, I’ll summarize some limitations of the T-Mobile G1:

No 3.5mm headphone jack. (Update 09/25/08 – T-Mobile will eventually ship adapter but not in first shipments)
No modem tethering
Includes only 1 GB Micro SD memory card (expandable to 8GB)
~~Data transfer limited to 1GB/month~~ (Update 09/25/08 Lifted by T-Mobile)
Lack of Microsoft Exchange support out of the box
No desktop/computer sync option. All data in the cloud!
No A2DP/Stereo Bluetooth
Google Account required to use
No video capture
Update Copy & paste is limited to form fields. It is not global.

Granted this is the first release of many Google Android supported phones, some of these limitations can be taken with a grain of salt. The major limitation I can see at this time is that Google Android is all about cloud computing, and I don’t think adoption rate will be swift with that limitation. Not everyone is ready to completely move to the cloud. Since I haven’t had first hand use of the device, I can’t really recommend it or not, but on paper, if I were to make a decision today, I would pass on this model.