AOL : Internet :: iPhone : Mobile Internet
My apologies in advance because I'm sure this has been discussed (just in hundreds of separate threads) but I wanted to get a general consensus within one thread.
I remember a day when it was not common place to see someone reserve movie tickets on moviefone.com while at the bar having a drink. In fact, I remember when having an unlimited data plan was considered to be overkill. In any case my point is with the advent of the iPhone the idea of looking stuff up on the internet at any given time is now actually a given - especially for those not so tech savvy.
Notice how the entire mobile industry is trying to retool to tap into the almighty resource - the masses. Instead of focusing on just the business heads and paper pushers, the manufacturers and providers (even microsoft and RIM) are trying to bridge the gap in a hurry. However, a new contender has seriously made a footprint - the actual WM phone manufacturers.
HTC has TF2D/TF3D, Samsung has TouchWiz, SPB has its Mobile Shell, Garmin is coming out with a WM phone (so I'm sure it has its own unique interface), BellUI, <insert iphone interface clone here - winterface, ifonz, etc>, Toshiba's new disco phone, even Acer's got an
ace up its sleeve. Couple all this with diving prices when it comes to flash storage technology as well as new technologies in processing power (hello snapdragon), even solar power technologies - its pretty exciting.
I guess my point is that whether we like it or not, I feel like Apple actually did something remarkable here (again) - serious interface innovation in technologies we always had to make us geeks giddy again. More importantly interface innovation so that mom now knows how to check the weather on her phone (well maybe not such a good thing for some). To me, its kinda like watching shrek - adults will laugh at it for one reason, kids will laugh at it for another.
For us its a godsend - let the htcs, toshibas, samsungs,
lgs, etc compete with their touch interfaces. But also let them churn out the interfaces for us to enjoy. I know the geniuses here will figure out ways to get them to work.
I'm kinda excited
Are you?