

The iPhone is White Label Hardware - dbreunig
http://dbreunig.tumblr.com/post/120243478/the-iphone-is-white-label-hardware-with-the

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mcantor
Full disclosure: I recently purchased a T-Mobile Android-powered G-1, with
which I am more than a little enamored. Feel free to discard the following
post as fanboy tripe.

Couldn't this article have just as easily been written about the G-1, or
certain models of Blackberry? (Especially since Android is open-source. Isn't
it?) It disturbs me when Apple products are treated like the exclusive
apotheosis of their niche. I remember reading an article in which the
journalist blathered spastically about "iPod-jacking," the paradigm-breaking
practice of two people swapping headphones on their iPod to see what the other
is listening to.

Huh???

ANY pair of MP3 players could accomplish the same thing, just like any modern
wi-fi/GPS/accelerometer/etc. enabled smartphone could accomplish what this
article is talking about.

Also, I have an open question: I'm perplexed by people who criticize Apple for
keeping apps out of the store. Aren't you free to publish your app on your own
website, which any user can navigate to, and install your app from there? Are
people angry because, if Apple doesn't let you in the app store, you're almost
definitely going to get less customers? (That's a fair thing to be angry
about). Or... are people angry because, if you get kicked out of the app
store, no one can install your app AT ALL?

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dbreunig
Author here.

I agree with you: the G1 (and G2!) is a very capable device. As Android is
adopted by more and more device manufacturers, Android could very well become
a ubiquitous, ambient computing environment.

The reason I focus on the iPhone is for two reasons. First off: it's hardware.
No matter how good the G1 is, the crux of the phone is it's OS. That's the
standard being pushed in that case. With the iPhone, they're pushing the
hardware and software standard.

Second (and this is by far the larger reason) is the install base. There's
40,000,000 iPhones and iPod touches in the market! The ubiquity and large
adoption of this device is why it's "White Label." People already have it. For
comparison, as of Jan 09 the X-Box 360 had ~28 million units in market. A
large % of which might not even be on X-Box Live.

The penetration of the iPhone is what makes it special in this case.

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mcantor
I think I see what you were getting at now, about the market penetration. I
still don't really understand your point about hardware vs. software. The G-1
and iPhone are both pieces of hardware with pre-packaged software on them. Is
there really anything the iPhone's hardware is capable of that the G-1 isn't,
in some profound way? They both have wi-fi, GPS, accelerometer, calculator,
touch screen, etc.

The iPhone really has become startlingly popular; I think I had a knee-jerk
reaction to your article because Apple's incredible aptitude for branding
always makes me a little queasy. People get so excited about Apple that and
Apple this, that functional alternatives like the G-1 and Blackberry go
unnoticed, and in the end, the market suffers because consumers are complacent
instead of asking, "Can't it be better?"

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GHFigs
_in the end, the market suffers because consumers are complacent_

I believe you're projecting your own preferences here. Unless you have
evidence to suggest that the average iPhone owner is not happy with his
purchase, saying "the market suffers" is a bit much.

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gchucky
That's not what he's saying. He's saying that the market suffers because of a
lack of competition - and I tend to agree with that.

And as a side note, this article seems to sort of be leading towards that
sentiment: "there’s very little reason for start-ups to even attempt to pursue
the wonky world of hardware."

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GHFigs
_He's saying that the market suffers because of a lack of competition_

Huh? What lack of competition? The post is _about_ the competition.

 _this article seems to sort of be leading towards that sentiment_

He's referring to stand-alone devices, not other smartphones.

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aaronblohowiak
AT&T lock-in is one of the larger barriers preventing the universality of the
iPhone as "the" mobile computing platform.

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GHFigs
The author means universal in the sense of a universal remote control, not
universal adoption. Also, a big chunk of that 40 million is iPod Touch owners,
who are not subject to carrier lock-in.

The point is that it is a sufficiently generic and popular platform that many
companies that might once have rolled their own hardware have diminished need
to. If the platform supports what they need and they can make do in a market
of 40 million (and growing), why not? For consumers it is the same way; why
buy a device when you can just download that functionality? It raises the
threshold of utility.

The market doesn't have to be universal, it just has to be big and and
consistent. Right now the iPhone is the only platform that can claim to have
both of those qualities.

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sunkencity
Yeah, comparing the iPhone to the horror of making a J2ME application the
iPhone is truly the currently best device for applications.

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JimmyL
It's an interesting argument the author is making, but it sure sounds like
it's a bit of a reach at this point. Sure, the iPhone has nice market
penetration in a certain demographic (who are more likely than others to buy
gizmos) but I strongly doubt that you'll see companies that would have
otherwise developed hardware, not do so. Instead, I think you'll see the
flourishing of products with small enough niches such that if they had to
build their own hardware, the product would have been shelved. This section:

 _Even established businesses seemed to disprove their own divisions: as
tomtom showed off their upcoming navigation software I was left wondering why
they need to make their own devices anymore._

is the epitome of that reach. Why does TomTom need to make their own devices
any more? Because they don't want to add in an implicit $60/month data fee to
use their service, which you have when it's iPhone based. Because if it's
strictly iPhone, you can't give it to your parents as a gift so they stop
getting lost. Because they make some nice margins off their high-end hardware,
which they can't on an iPhone. Because they don't want to limit themselves to
the (comparatively) small demographic of people with an iPhone who drive in an
area with a cellular data connection, as opposed to the much larger one of
people who drive cars that have 12V accessory plugs.

Likewise with the ZipCar application - they're not going to go iPhone-only,
since it's giving up free market share. So they'll add an iPhone interface for
coolness purposes and to appeal to a certain demo (which they probably do
pretty well with already), but it won't fundamentally change their business
plan.

The Pasco demo (focusing on teaching science to kids) also seemed somewhat
contrived - who's gonna outfit a lab with iPhones to do readings? More
importantly, what makes more sense for a school board buying a new lab's worth
of equipment - buying sensor packages that work with a dedicated ruggedized
central station that the school owns, or buying ones that require all students
to have and use expensive and relatively flimsy cell phones of one particular
brand?

So yes, I think that the iPhone represents an interesting new platform and
will enable some new business opportunities (especially at the small end of
the busines ecosystem), but it's not going to cause the end of all commercial
customized hardware.

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jonknee
Except for all the artificial limitations (no background processes is a huge
let down) and the fact that Steve Jobs can crush your iPhone businesses if he
chooses.

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jodrellblank
How is it a let down? For two years, two releases, two versions of software
and one beta of OS 3 it hasn't been present. It's only ever been mentioned by
Apple to say they aren't doing it, and always they've been discussing,
advertising and working on push notifications as an alternative.

Given all that, why were you in any way expecting it?

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jm4
Maybe because it's possible on competing smartphones?

I was curious about the new features in IPhone OS 3 and decided to take a look
at the list. Copy and paste? MMS? Voice memos? Search? You've got to be
kidding me. The competition has had that stuff for ages.

If Apple couldn't deliver that stuff on day one that's fine, but it should
have been released in an update shortly afterward. It's absurd that 2 years
later people are still waiting for basic functionality that's been available
elsewhere the whole time.

Don't get me wrong. Although I choose not to use the iPhone, I still like it.
Despite the fact that it does some very basic things badly or not at all, it
does have some neat features and has driven the competition to work a little
harder. The iPhone made mobile app stores commonplace. The 'find my phone' and
'remote wipe' features are very cool and I haven't seen those on another
phone. I'm looking forward to how the competition responds.

What does bother me, though, is all the Apple apologists coming out of the
woodwork to brush all of their faults under the rug. Apple does some good
things and some not so good things. In my opinion, a lot of the features in
this update are things that people should not still be waiting for. I also
think we don't need to be in the habit of excusing the lack of background
applications. We're so fond of innovation, yet this missing features prevents
the kind of innovation happening on other platforms.

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potatolicious
> The competition has had that stuff for ages.

Then by the performance of the competition, we have to surmise that either
users don't care about said features, or said features have such flawed
execution that the majority of its target users simply choose not to use it.

I would lean to the latter. Sending MMSes on most phones is a _pain_ ,
recording a voice memo less so, but still convoluted. Search? Oh boy, yeah,
some phones have this, but it's an even greater pain to get to.

And this is where usability rears its big ugly head again - the one thing that
software engineers tend to ignore (because they themselves do not demand it).
It's turned out that all along the UI has been the magic key to everything.
For better or for worse, Apple hasn't just made the iPhone _easy_ to use,
they've made it _fun_ to use, and that's something the competition has yet to
clone.

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jm4
_Then by the performance of the competition, we have to surmise that either
users don't care about said features, or said features have such flawed
execution that the majority of its target users simply choose not to use it._

That's a strong statement that I can't agree with completely. We can probably
agree that most users don't care about most features other than dialing. When
I asked why scrolling through a contact list on a Motorola RAZR is so slow the
response I got is that most users don't use the contact list.

If most people don't use most of the features of their phones that's fine. But
I do, and giving me a prettier package isn't going to change the fact that it
doesn't have the features I'm already using. Apple is clearly more interested
in less demanding users and have made a boatload of money that way. That's
fine too.

But if you want to talk smartphones for power users, I think the iPhone has
been missing some important features. In other areas, they've clearly
surpassed the competition. This is a good thing for everyone. Even though I
don't use an iPhone I've got a much better browser on my phone because of it.

Personally, there's no way I'm buying a smartphone that doesn't do MMS or
copy/paste when there are others that do this in addition to just about
everything else the iPhone can do. But I put a premium on features instead of
user interface and it's not as if the worthwhile competitors' user interfaces
are from the stone age.

The competition hasn't exactly been left destitute since the release of the
iPhone either. If anything, their product line ups have only gotten stronger
even if market share has decreased. Sure, Nokia is in the toilet, but I think
it probably has more to do with the fact that they've more or less been
sitting on their asses for a few years than the iPhone. I won't even bring up
Windows Mobile because it's just sad. Blackberry, excluding the Storm, is
looking better and better. Despite the fact that the design and build quality
of the T-Mobile G1 is a cruel joke, Android is something worth getting excited
about. If someone puts it on nice hardware we could end up with a very cool
phone.

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GHFigs
_power users_

I am perpetually at a loss for what this term means. On the one hand you're
describing these features as "basic" but on the other they're for "power
users". Is that not a contradiction?

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jm4
I think you are trying argue semantics instead of any particular point, but
I'll clarify things anyway. When MMS, for example, has been available for
years from every major carrier in the US on even some of the cheapest phones I
would consider it a basic feature. The fact that many people don't use it
doesn't change that. If that were the case, you could just as easily make the
argument that text messaging doesn't necessarily need to be included because
most people don't use it.

The bottom line is you can't sell me a so-called smartphone in a pretty
package and sing the praises of all its bells and whistles when it doesn't
have the features I use on a daily basis. When you can get MMS on a free phone
from MetroPCS it seems like a pretty glaring omission on the iPhone.

I'm not just picking on Apple. I was using Apple products long before it was
the cool thing to do and I happen to like them, but let's be realistic. I
owned a Sidekick a couple years back and had the same complaint. The thing is
marketed as this socially connected, multimedia phone and it can't even do
MMS. The 4 year old POS Nokia I switched from was able to do that. The
Sidekick was, rightfully, ripped for this so I don't understand why Apple gets
a free pass.

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GHFigs
That doesn't even remotely answer my question. All you've done here is restate
your personal preferences as if they were data. Don't do that.

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jmtulloss
Apple's hardware isn't appropriate for every situation. If it were to be white
label, they would need to make the software available to other hardware
developers, and that's never going to happen.

This article is more about software than hardware, the apps largely don't care
what hardware it's running on.

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upinsmoke
Your sentence doesn't make any sense, you start with "Apple's hardware" then
you talk about "make the software available to other hardware developers". Do
you mean hardware accessories for iPhone? It's in 3.0.

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jmtulloss
What? No. I mean they would need to make the software (iPhone OS 3.0)
available to 3rd party hardware developers in order to have a "white label"
platform.

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akirk
I just don't get why Apple doesn't just sell a higher-priced, unlocked iPhone,
so that you don't have to get yourself screwed by your local carrier.

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dbreunig
As always: business. AT&T is effectively paying Apple to prevent that very
scenario.

AT&T is weathering the downturn relatively nicely thanks to their exclusive
deal with Apple. The ~$200 check they cut Apple per 2-year contract is paying
for that exclusivity plus like-advertising.

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akirk
Sometimes I just wish that they would focus more on the customers' needs :)

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symesc
Oh FSM I love it when someone gets it exactly right!

