1. I have almost no interest in free or cheap wi-fi. It just doesn’t matter to me anymore. If you have a card that can get on the net quickly just about anywhere, why hunt for free wireless access? An added benefit is that the card allows you to work where others cannot – no more muscling others to get that prime table at Starbucks or your local coffee shop.
2. I use my broadband access card in lieu of corporate wi-fi at times because the card connects so quickly and delivers such great data rates. Why bother waiting to negotiate security settings and wait for my WLAN card to connect when I can just plug in and get access straight away?
I’m surprised that more people aren’t pointing to these cards as a real threat to municipal wi-fi or paid wi-fi subscription/a la carte services. Sure, the cards are expensive – they don’t have much of an installed base and the current adopters aren’t exactly the most price sensitive lot. But everyone I know who has one of these cards loves them and will tell you the benefits at length. Given that so many of the pitches I hear about the for profit public wi-fi use case rely on the “road warrior” as an adopter, I think they’re missing a growing trend.

Finally, it’s worth pointing out that only the newest Caltrain cabins are suitable for working – the newest trains have power plugs, tables, and arrangements that are more conducive to 30-60 minutes of work.

If the iPhone has been able to do it, I wonder why the Treo and Blackberry haven’t had similar levels of success. And do you think it’s rationale for app developers to be building iPhone-specific applications?

If US broadband penetration tops out in the 50-60 percent range in the near term, that means that about half of the country doesn’t see fit to have Internet access at home. If they can live without it at home, I bet they can live without it on the go as well. Unless prices come down on the mobile data side, I’m not sure why an increasing number of people will want to spend more on an expensive, slow connection?

Without a great low-end device that can expose “the masses” (or normal people) to the joys of data in a cost-effective way, I don’t see why the market for mobile data will grow quickly.

After reading all of the early iPhone reviews, I’m convinved the iPhone team would be nuts to focus on matching all of the high-end features that the Blackberry offers to corporate clients. We already know how large that market is and I doubt the iPhone would grow the pie. The only interesting thing to see is whether a lower-end iPhone with a good data plan and a better network would drive mass adoption. The consumer market has yet to see the combination of a great device, a reasonable hardware price point, a strong nationwide carrier, and a sensible data plan. The closest we’ve seen to that nirvana is the Sidekick, whch I’d argue struggles more from being restricted to T-Mobile than anything else. Cult status is the best you can hope for given that the device is restricted to the #4 carrier in the United States. The Blackberry Pearl is great, too, but I don’t hear anyone making the Pearl vs iPhone argument in a convincing fashion. Apple is in a great position to make this happen, if they focus and get the price point down.

To get specific, I think the device needs to be below $200 in price, with a data plan in the sub $20 per month range for unlimited usage, and be offered on one of the top two networks.

The one wildcard in this whole thing is what major corporations decide to do. If more companies put good, data-capable devices in the hands of a wider base of employees. Putting devices in their hands would also include picking up the tab for the data connection. If this were to happen, we might see something akin to what happened with landline broadband – consumer adoption driven by a combination of low prices and employer subsidies.

Arguments I Don’t Buy

Lack of Corporate IT Support – I don’t think the lack of IT support for the iPhone will inhibit adoption. Early versions of the Blackberry only worked on the desktop. And if enough executives pick up the iPhone, I guarantee you that IT departments around the country will find themselves trying to hack together ways to support the device. IT adoption for devices like this can happen from the top, not just from the bottom.

High Price Tag – I don’t buy this one either. People are paying more and more for consume electronics devices. Also, Apple customers are used to paying full retail price for new products — you rarely find Apple products on sale or at discount unless it’s an end of life issue. Given the pent-up demand, I doubt Apple will be under any pressure to lower prices on this iteration of the device anytime soon. If anything, I think the high price will only increase the aspirational appeal of this device.
Arguments I Do Buy

Battery Life – I have certainly had my “everything” device bonk out due to battery usage and it is not cool. If you have one device that does everything, losing battery support for that device essentially cuts you off from the world. Reading the stats on battery usage, it appears that users who really push the device to do everything it can do (web browsing, audio, video, photos, and voice) could experience battery life issues.

Touch Screen – I do think this could be an issue. I have damaged every touch screen device I’ve ever owned. And the lack of keyboard might be a real issue – the only way to know is actually use the device and see how well text input without tactile response works. I do a lot of texting, email, and IM – I can’t imagine how I’d be efficient without a “real” keyboard.
My Complaints with the Curve

Better support for instant messaging – I’ve owned a lot of phones in my day and I would say one of the more life-changing experiences I had was owning a Sidekick 3 for a brief period of time. As someone who makes heavy use of IM, having a device with great IM and a full keyboard really makes mobile IM useful.

Better web browsing -The Blackberry has a serviceable web browser on Cingular. I can get to most pages I want to see, but not all pages render correctly and the browser tends to break tables and other formatting elements. Given that the iPhone will be using the same EDGE network as the Curve, I doubt I’ll see any improvement in browser speed. That doesn’t mean that the iPhone browser won’t provide a better experience (transcoding, page presentation, etc), but I don’t think it will be any faster.

So, as far as I can tell, the iPhone has the possibility of solving only one (at most) of these two issues right out of the box. That isn’t to say that third parties won’t develop the apps I want in the IM realm, but we won’t have that functionality on Friday. The Curve does everything I need it to do and I just don’t feel compelled to buy an iPhone. What am I missing? Help me out.

The thing that gives me pause is I that I am not entirely sure who the target customer is for this device. The simple answers would be “everyone” or “geeks” but those don’t seem to fit. Here is how I have been thinking about it:

This is an expensive device. Even with subsidies, this will not be a budget phone. Typically most higher-end phones are bought by businesspeople or geeks. If Apple can change this dynamic, it will change the entire mobile phone industry as phones that are currently considered expensive suddenly look affordable by comparison.
This is a very powerful device. This is one of the most powerful phones I have ever seen. It has so many things I love (Google products, Mac OSX widgets, etc) neatly bundled with the device. This seems like overkill for your average user, though. But it will be perfect for the Macheads and device junkies out there.
This is a very risky (in a good way) user interface -

So when I add all of this up, I am not sure that this is going to be the kind of thing that can sell 14 million units (or whatever crazy numbers are being tossed around) in the first year. The RAZR, which was edgy in design but pretty pedestrian in terms of UI and price point, took two years to hit 50 million units sold. The RAZR has always been an affordable option – I don’t know if a more expensive and more complex device will be able to achieve those same metrics. I think that there are enough gadget junkies and Mac lovers to propel this thing to success. But tens of millions of units in the first year seems unattainable to me.

The other thing is that while the Macworld audience loves the slick user interface (and I admit that it looks gorgeous), I am not sure how well it will be received by mainstream consumers. Will it be simply elegant or simply confusing? I frankly worry a bit more about the UI being a barrier to adoption and usage more than the price point. But if anyone can get this right, Apple can.

There are 3 basic reasons why I probably won’t rush right out and get one when they come out:

I like keyboards - Have always had a phone with a traditional keypad or QWERTY keyboard. The idea of going back to something else is not that interesting to me at the moment — text entry is a lot of what I do.

I have scratched or otherwise damaged ever touch interface device I have ever owned – I have owned Palm Pilots, iPods, and other touch interfaces devices. They all end up getting scratched and beat up. I would be really sad if I scratched that gorgeous screen.
This is one of those posts that might look really silly in a few months. I’ll revisit it when we get closer to the launch date and know more about how some of the features and functions work.

I continue to be a bit of a skeptic about the value of having Wi-Fi on my mobile phone. I have yet to see a really compelling use case. Need mobile email? Blackberry or the new add-ons for Exchange work fine over a GPRS connection. Web browsing? Any EDGE (or higher) phone ought to do the trick, albeit slowly. VoIP applications? Not compelling. The only wireless connection I have that is less reliable than my cell phone is my WiFi connection. Complex switching/handoffs from mobile to WiFi – sounds like a good concept but I have yet to see a really compelling implementation that actually works. Plus, WiFi radios tend to be battery hogs.

I am all for packing more features on phones. At this point, I would rather see the money spent to enable WiFi used to add other feaures, like better cameras, sharper screens, or more on-board memory for content. And a beefier processor would’t hurt either.