Tag Archives | iPhone

How Low Can iPhones Go? Wal-Mart Says $99. Maybe. (Actually, I Kind of Doubt It.)

Posted by Harry McCracken on December 4, 2008 at 7:56 am

walmartiphoneBoy Genius Report, which has a pretty good record for reporting stuff about phones before anybody else, has posted about the possibility of a $99 4GB iPhone to be sold exclusively by Wal-Mart. It does look like Wal-Mart will become the fourth iPhone seller (after Apple itself, AT&T, and Best Buy). But Boy Genius goes to pains to say that the $99 bit is a rumor from a source of unproven reliability. And as I think about it, it seems unlikely.

For one thing, I’m not sure how well the math works: At the moment, an 8GB iPhone is $199 and a 16GB one is $299. That’s a $100 premium for an extra 8GB of memory, so it’s not clear that reducing the memory by 4GB would save Apple and Wal-Mart enough to slash the price of an entry-level iPhone by $100. And a $99 iPhone would be big news and a big hit–I have trouble believing that Apple would allow Wal-Mart to rack up all those sales and deny its own stores, AT&T ones, and Best Buy to get in on the action.

Then there’s the fact that a $99 4GB iPhone would represent a major cutback in the phone’s capability to hit a low price point. That’s certainly a Wal-Marty thing to do, but it sounds out of character for Apple, which stopped selling the 4GB iPhone (which originally sold for $499) as soon as it could.

I’m not saying it won’t happen. I’m just saying I can think of more reasons why it won’t happen than ones why it might. I do think, however, that there will be some sort of sub-$100 iPhone eventually–maybe one that’s a lot like current models, once component prices have come down and Apple has released a true next-generation iPhone or two. But not now. Probably.

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All Hail iPhone, Savior of the Smartphone Market?

Posted by Ed Oswald on December 4, 2008 at 12:09 am

jobsiphone… that’s the way investment banking firm Needham is angling it. Along with reporting that the iPhone now controls 16.6 percent of the market for the quarter ending in September, it also said that the iPhone 3G’s success alone is helping to keep the entire smartphone market from collapsing.

Growth was flat from quarter to quarter at 28.6 percent, and Apple’s hit phone helped to keep the industry from going into the crapper much like the rest of tech.

In a way, this contracts some earlier data by iSuppli which suggests that overall the mobile device market shrunk by 1.1 percent in the same said quarter. However, there was no break down on numbers by device type, so there’s no way to really compare and contrast with confidence here.

Either way the biggest loser here is Nokia. Their share has collapsed as the iPhone became a hit. This time a year ago, the company had a commanding 63 percent of the market. Now, that has fallen to just below 44 percent for this past quarter.

Nokia’s strength remains in Europe, Needham notes. Here in the US enterprise clients, who still are a significant chunk of smarphone users, are showing a preference for RIM and Apple’s platforms. Analyst Charlie Wolf chalks this up to the fact that Symbian (Nokia’s OS) is considered “less robust” that either of its two competitors, and Microsoft’s struggles in signing on handset manufacturers.

There’s one caveat to this, and that’s Android. Wolf says he is unsure of the effect of Google’s mobile OS, but if the success of the T-Mobile G1 is any indication, Steve Jobs might want to watch his back.

(Hat tip: Electronista)

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Is There an iPod Shortage? Apparently!

Posted by Harry McCracken on December 3, 2008 at 4:00 pm

missingipodOver at Cnet, Tom Krazit has blogged about an analyst’s report that the iPod shortage that began at Amazon.com seems to be spreading to other venues. Which surprised me–not least because I didn’t know that Amazon was suffering from an iPod shortage.

But it is. I just checked, and while most of the myriad iPods (from the 1GB Shuffle to 160GB Classic) seem to be on hand for immediate delivery, Amazon itself doesn’t seem to have any 8GB or 16GB iPod Touches in stock, though you can order them there for fulfillment by other merchants.

(Side note: Is iPod Touches correct, or should that be iPods Touch?)

The only other sign of a lack of iPods I found at Amazon was the listing for the 1GB green Shuffle. The company doesn’t expect to be able to get that model to customers by Christmas, which will no doubt ruin untold holidays. (Okay, maybe not–especially since Apple.com has them in stock.)

A spotty supply of even a few iPod models at one major retailer suggests that Apple’s music players continue to sell briskly, which makes for an interesting contrast with this BusinessWeek story which speaks of the possibility that iPod sales may be down this quarter for the first time ever. Even if Apple has a merry Christmas iPodwise, the gist of the BW article is surely on target: Most of the folks who want iPods have them, and it’s going to get harder and harder for Apple to come up with new models that make for tempting upgrades. For instance, I can’t imagine that many owners of third-generation iPods Nano have felt much of an urge to splurge on the fourth-generation version.

In that light, it makes sense that the iPod Touch is in short supply–at Amazon, at least–since it’s a relatively recent model that’s a great leap forward in many respects compared to the classic models, the Nano, and the Shuffle. (Anecdotally, the Touch seems to be one of Apple’s most-loved products–everyone I know who has one adores it, which is not something you can say about the iPhone.)

Long term, Apple is going to have to sell lots of iPhones–and to come up with other compelling gadgets–to make up for the fact that the world’s need for iPods is declining. Short term, it’ll be fascinating to see if there’s ever a new iPod that is, indeed, strikingly new rather than a modest refresh…

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Vlingo: A New Way to Talk to Your iPhone

Posted by Harry McCracken on December 3, 2008 at 9:24 am

vlingoWe have an iPhone mini-trend on our hands: voice-controlled search. A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about Google’ clever Mobile App for the iPhone, which lets you perform Web and local searches by lifting the handset to your ear and talking. Today. Vlingo, the developers of a BlackBerry voice app, released a version for the iPhone. It’s both a direct competitor to Google’s offering and one that’s quite different in functionality, pros, and cons.

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Okay, Just How Dumb Are iPhone Owners?

Posted by Harry McCracken on November 30, 2008 at 4:23 pm

dunceOver at Forbes.com, there’s an article on a worthwhile topic: iPhone applications for businessfolk. There are, however, some things about the piece that I just don’t understand. Such as the fact that it seems to argue that buying an iPhone will let you save money on the pens and paper you’d otherwise tote along when you travel. ($200 to $300 for the phone plus two years’ worth of service fees make for a hefty investment to avoid buying a few Bics and memo pads.)

More important, I’m also mystified by this bit:

Gregg Brockway, president of TripIt, a start-up that organizes travel itineraries online and on mobile devices, says iPhones are the greatest gadgets that business travelers don’t know they have. “Smart-phone sales are up 80%, so the whole category is on fire,” Brockway says. “But only a third of business travelers who have a smart phone realize that they can access the Internet. Of the business travelers who do realize, only 50% of them use their phones to actually access the Internet.”

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Joost for iPhone: Good, As Far as It Goes

Posted by Harry McCracken on November 29, 2008 at 12:04 am

joostlogoJoost, the pioneering video site from the folks behind Skype and Kazaa, is available in a new, smaller form tonight: on the iPhone. In some ways it’s quite impressive–it faithfully brings the Joost look, feel, functionality, and content into an app that feels at home on the iPhone. What you think of it will likely boil down mostly to how you feel about the programming that Joost has to offer.

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25 Unanswerable Questions About Apple

Posted by Harry McCracken on November 26, 2008 at 1:10 pm

unanswerable

Everybody has two businesses, the old saying goes: their own business, and show business. It’s the same with technology, except everybody’s two business are their own business…and Apple’s. No other tech company on the planet is followed as avidly, nor is any so routinely second-guessed. And if anything, controversy over Apple’s decisions and dramas intensifies with time: I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if someone, somewhere, still contends that Jobs and Wozniak should have slashed the $666.66 pricetag of 1976’s Apple I to better compete with the $495 Altair.

Apple’s long history is rife with defining moments…and, therefore, with roads not traveled that might have led to radically different places. I call the twenty-five items in this story “unanswerable questions” because none of them have right answers: Nobody knows what would have happened if things had turned out differently. All you can do is speculate. Which is what I do, briefly, for all of the questions below. But mostly, I’m curious what you think. These questions may be unanswerable, but it’s still a blast to try and answer them anyhow, as I hope you’ll do in the comments…

Let’s start at the beginning, shall we? After the jump, that is…

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UK Ad Authority: Apple Misrepresented iPhone Web Surfing Speed

Posted by David Worthington on November 26, 2008 at 1:09 pm

iphone2Apple’s iPhone commercials are running the risk of getting lumped in with herbal Viagra ads. The UK’s Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has forced the company to pull a commercial that the ASA had proven exaggerated the speed of the iPhone’s 3G network connection.

The iPhone’s Achilles heel when it comes to such claims is that cellular network speeds are not uniform, and Wi-Fi access is spotty. The “real” Internet that it portrays doesn’t really exist.

The ASA upheld the complaints of 17 individuals who said that they were misled by the advertisement. The ad showed Web pages and Google Map data loading in split second time, bracketed by a disclaimer that network speeds vary by location. The company told the BBC that its claims were, “relative not absolute.”

Apple CEO Steve Jobs may have put his foot in his mouth when he said that the iPhone provided the “real” Internet. That statement was universally panned by pundits and customers alike after they experienced the real iPhone on real networks.

Furthermore, Apple has yet to deliver in its self-imposed deadline for bringing background-processing capabilities to the iPhone, and its e-mail delivery has been more pull than push from the onset–requiring the user to select shorter intervals for checking mail. As much as I enjoy my iPhone, the company would be better served by executing on its promises, and it should stop making make claims that it can’t deliver on.

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A Zune Phone? Likely.

Posted by David Worthington on November 24, 2008 at 3:39 pm

It is plausible that rumors about Microsoft being close to announcing its answer to the iPhone are true. Microsoft must maintain parity with Apple, and its acquisition of Sidekick creator Danger Inc. has given it the industrial design known-how to get the job done.

UK-based technology news journal The Inquirer broke the news that Microsoft will supposedly be unveiling the device at the 3GSM conference in February. The Inquirer also reported that Nvidia has been tapped to supply its graphics chip set.

I won’t speak to the veracity of the report, but it does contain very specific information, and that itself is compelling. There is always the potential for a red herring, but there is a solid chance that Redmond has something up its sleeve. It has matched the Apple iPod line up product by product, and has attempted to differentiate itself on price and features.

Microsoft’s lack of an iPhone alternative is a glaring omission, and the company needs a smart phone if it is to remain a viable alternative to Apple. The iPhone is popular among consumers and is gaining a foothold in the enterprise.

CEO Steve Ballmer would argue that the Windows Mobile platform has the potential to gain a preponderance of market share, but thus far it has not, and it lags far behind Symbian. Microsoft has relied on its partners to develop compelling devices, but few — if any — stand out.

It needs to step up the user experience of its Windows Mobile platform. Meaning, it needs to ship Windows Mobile 6.5 and work diligently to get 7.0 out the door.

A source at Microsoft tells me that a new wave of Windows Live services will launch next week. Perhaps those services will provide a glimpse into what its Internet-enabled smart phone could offer.

With all of its stars aligned and by tapping the know-how of Danger Inc, the creators of the famed Sidekick, Microsoft could produce an interesting product. Microsoft did put a heavy hitter (Roz Ho, former head of its Mac business unit) behind its efforts to absorb Danger into its Entertainment and Devices division.

The question is when would it ship? And who knows what Apple and others will have out by then. Microsoft can’t always be playing catchup if it wants to succeed in the phone biz.

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Apple Sued Over Safari Mobile Technology

Posted by Ed Oswald on November 24, 2008 at 12:53 pm

apple-logo-2Apple is the target of a lawsuit over its use of certain technologies within Safari Mobile, the browser used on both the iPhone and iPod touch devices. Filed in US District Court in Tyler, Texas, the suit alleges technologies that allow Apple to display and navigate web pages infringes on a patent awarded just last month to a Los Angeles based firm who also apparently has a location in Tyler.

EMG Technology is the holder of the patent. The company was founded by Elliot Gottfurcht along with two partners. Apple may not be the only one to be sued: the company said that it is also looking into suing HTC and RIM as well for similar infringement.

The patent involved, #7,441,196, is described as such on the US Patent Office website: as an “apparatus and method of manipulating a region on a wireless device screen for viewing, zooming and scrolling internet content.”

Lawyers for EMG elaborate:

“the ‘196 patent claims cover the display of Internet content reformatted from HTML to XML on mobile devices — the industry standard currently displayed by the iPhone. Additional patent claims include the technology for manipulating a region of the screen for zooming and scrolling.”

It did admit in an interview with Reuters that it specifically targeted Apple due to it’s popularity. I have to say, however, wouldn’t it have been probably more worth it to go after RIM since it has about three times the share right now? Just a thought.

Jeffer, Mangels, Butler & Marmaro have been tapped to represent EMG in the case. This law firm has experience in prosecuting some large infringement cases, including a $1.35 billion verdict against Medtronic in 2005, one of the largest judgements ever for an intellectual property dispute.

Damages in this case are unspecified, however.

Apple is not commenting on the situation as it has a standing policy of not commenting on ongoing litigation.

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