Steve Jobs unveils plans to dominate RIM BlackBerry, Life, the Universe, and Everything

Apple will rejigger the iPhone in a sweeping effort to satisfy email-addicted business people, video game junkies, and third-party software developers who don't mind getting Apple's approval for their applications. Today, during a press fest at its Cupertino, California headquarters that did not include The Reg, Steve Jobs and …

[Ed]

Impressed

I have to say I'm impressed. Sure, there are a few things that are a little less than ideal - being forced to use the App Store being the main one, but beyond that it seems to be a really good environment for developing apps in. I was particularily impressed with the profiling tools working with the 3D game they showed - my experience of profiling tools and 3D games is that the whole thing falls apart due to getting 1 FPS or so...

The cost of entry ($99) for developers is reasonable. It'll put off people with incomplete and bad applications and not really act as a barrier to anyone else. It's not as if even the cheapest freeware developer can't find £50 to spare as a one off cost...

I guess the only other issue is that we have to wait till June and the fact that the beta site is down and now giving a 404 :(

[Anonymous Coward]

meh

it will go the same way as the cellular palm & PPC. People apparently DON'T want a full featured mobile (hand held) computer, that offers almost the same as a full featured PC. People like the RIM devices because they serve a basic function, very well.

Microsoft screwed the pooch with PPC's because they only supported outlook, and who knows what the hell Palm was thinking?

Now Apple wants to shoot themselves it the foot?

<lecture> get your house in order by allowing people to choose the carriers they want and offer mail clients that are friendly to systems other than outlook (ie Notes <trying to keep the bile from escaping>)... The road warriors I support want a tool, NOT a toy, which is all it is (inside or outside of the US). </lecture>

[Webster Phreaky]

Bwah ha ha ha ha .... this it tooo funny

The ONLY way Apple could dominate the RIM Blackberry would be to buy RIM and put Apple's name on the Blackberry ..... just like Apple does with every other product they and don't actually make or engineer. Can you say Red Chinese Sweatshops?

[Daniel B.]

stevie-boy learns!

So... It seems like Apple finally realized their iPhone was not much of a "smartphone" without REAL apps.

Though now I am sad, as these announcements mean that the iPhone now might be a real competitor against RIM. Aaaaagh!

Though the iBone's still got its quirks: no QWERTY physical keyboard!

[Nick Cooper]

Misleading

Not really a comment... just I think the title is misleading as it gave me the impression Steve Jobs said they'd build 4 Googles.

[Seán]

It's still crap though

No 3g, no MMS, no expansion slots, hideously expensive, and riddled with DRM. Only an apple fanboy would bother.

[fluffy]

4 Googles = 12 Amazons?

That just seems so wrong, somehow. I had no idea a search engine and advertising company was equivalent to 3 world's-largest-eCommerce-company-which-has-actual-productses.

Anyway. The hope for the SDK was why I bought an iPod Touch, and I'm glad my technology-related hopes have come to fruition for once.

[Alastair]

Well...

"It's not as if even the cheapest freeware developer can't find £50 to spare as a one off cost..."

It's not that they can't afford it, but when you're giving the stuff away for free, why SHOULD you afford it?

[Andy]

Insanely great!

The most telling comment on the SDK is probably from Andy Ihnatko: "Apple has carefully lined up a series of white porcelain plates at the far and of a shooting gallery. Each one is labeled with a known percentage of the marketplace that “can’t” buy an iPhone for specific technical reasons. Annnd…plink! plink! plink!…they’re knocking them all down."

The enterprise features are everything detractors have been bitching about for a year now, made Apple-easy to use. In my mind the iPhone now trounces the Blackberry for enterprise use (who could see that coming?), especially considering the SDK, but I guess I'm not in a position to authoritatively comment on that.

The SDK itself is more comprehensive and more liberal than anyone expected. It's in a different league to anything else available for any other platform... Can you imagine Super Monkey Ball being ported to the Blackberry at all, let alone being that awesome and being done in two weeks by a couple of guys?

It's a good time to be an iPhone user. I'm pretty sure the smugness will be tangible for some time to come!

[jubtastic1]

w00ty

App store was a given, free apps are free though, one off fee for comercial devs seems reasonable. Didn't realize the platform was at all suitable for games but there's some cool demos on the video. SDK is way more polished than I imagined, guessing we'll see some more updates to 1.0 arcitecture before June.

Exchange support worked as advertised, only fly in that ointment is the lack of availability until June.

Looking forward to seeing what turns up in the store.

[Olaf]

Awesome!

It keeps getting better - 1st "free GPS" for my iPhone as a Christmas present from Steve Jobs, then thousands of free WebApps from Internet radio to a flashlight, and now joining the Enterprise Business World (Beware RIM) and a sophisticated SDK (I just downloaded) promising a plethera of new native iPhone apps with significant cash to ingenious and innovative developers around the world. As I've heard a morning announcer of East Tennessee's Bluegrass music station, wdvx.com, say: "Who'd have thunk it"? :)

[Robert E. Moran]

Unlock the beast

Unlock the beast, once that's done, I'll buy one.

[Anonymous Coward]

Enterprise Market ... tzzzz ...

Outlook Direct Push working on my XDA since some time and I did not even had to fork out cash for developing my own apps on it using .NET Compact Framework or cpp. Can't understand the exitement of the Apple community about running to the shops and gettings screwed. Must be somthing missing I suppose.

[Anonymous Coward]

@webster

Webster, it has become quite clear now that you really don't have a clue. I have been watching your posts over the last week or so and you seem to just spew semi relevant horse Sh*t from the top of your hat.

Most IT equipment is comprised from out sourced components, built to a specification and then assembled into a machine at a common location. (True that may well, in some situations be in China.)

Be it Apple, Sony, Dell or RIM Blackberry the outer case is simply a box for the third party components and a surface for the designers or originator's name.

I think we all agree that apple is, at this stage not a challenge or threat to the Blackberry. I think that the thinkers among us will also realize that apple could be a contender soon if that was their intention.

Webster I have to wonder if you really exist or if you are a creation of El Reg used to get the comments pages pepped up.

If you are real I think you have to question yourself and ask if you really belong here, because, as I say you really don't have a clue what your talking about.

So please, if not for yourself but for those around you, Go and get an education!

[Anonymous Coward]

Exchange

Now I very nearly want to buy one to replace the HTC/Asus/iPAQ/XDA devices of varying degrees of hideousness that I have on or under my desk, and have just the one phone for calls and email.

[Paul van der Lingen]

what happens when..

I seem to recall the CPU in the iphone is going to change when Intel bring out something suitably small, cool and quick.

Does this mean Apple will have to develop a rosetta app to translate all this current crop of new apps being developed?

[Dave Morfee]

@bws

Hmm PPC only able to do Outlook? Last time I checked it could do Outlook, IMAP, POP3

Stange I dont see Blackberry supporting anything else other than its own service.

Kimbie

[Smell My Finger]

They missed again

The whole point of BlackBerry is it doesn't use ActiveSync which is a truly horrible synchronisation tool that's been plagued with problems since the dawn of time. It's total crap.

Apple don't have any BlackBerry Enterprise Server type product which is a key technology between Exchange and BlackBerry devices - as wireless sync goes I've never seen anything better. Apple has no killer-app to topple RIM, it just has a single phone with synchronisation capabilities it had to licence. Hardly the stuff to keep RIM awake at nights. May be Apple should stop believing its own hype.

[Si]

Steve reinvents the wheel.....square

@bws - you "don't see BlackBerry supporting anything else other than its own service". Seeing that BlackBerry works with POP3 and IMAP in the consumer space and Exchange, Domino and GroupWise in the enterprise space you clearly have no clue what you're talking about.

The fact remains that, even if iPhone could do everything BlackBerry does as simply as BlackBerry does, it's still a massively expensive device with equally insane tariffing and network restrictions. If you're a business rolling out mobile email to 100, 200, 1000 users are you really going to purchase shiny expensive iPhones for them or functional cost effective BlackBerrys? Apple has a long long way to go to compete with the industry standard.

[Simon McGarry]

It's stll a consumer toy...

I think the iPhone is several steps away from being a good business device but the thing that is a total show stopper for me is that my company uses Vodafone exclusively and would never sign up to the ridiculous contracts Apple are forcing people to sign up for anyway.

When we can get 3G and all the other functions currently missing and we aren't locked into silly contracts then maybe...

[Steve Todd]

@Paul van der Lingen

Two words - Fat binary. As of 10.4 Apple allowed you to create binaries for more than one target processor. If Apple put a new CPU in the iPhone then developers set a compile time switch and produce one binary that works on both.

[Anonymous Coward]

It isn't Push email

microsofts `push` email isn't true push email, its actualy a delayed poll. You turn your phone on, it connects to the email server and asks for email and if you have some it goes here, but if not it dont reply until you get some. Basicly delayed email poll response more than push email. This also indicates that you are tied to M$ exchange and no 3rd party intergration.

THIS wont effect RIM much at all, that and a blackberry compared to a iphone(which BTW you cant change the battery on - big business no no) will win any drop test/robustness test, even the nasty perls.

That said if Apple want to write there own standard polling protocol, or indeed invest in a data-centre that for all effect constantly polls all your intergrated accounts like RIM do then at the consumer level were the iphone is realy geared towards; Well Its not realy going to compete. The iphone is a great consumer device, but not so much business oriented were upon the blackberry is more business moving towards consumer (silly perl phones etc).

Now I know there is more money per subscriber level from business customers than there is for a consumer phone comparing standard services and usage. But the iphone does tend to scew that with it being for all effect a ipod and indeed having a better browser than blackberry, it also with the contracts tends to kill of the bandwith issues by offering fixed costs. But its still firmly a consumer level device in the way its marketed, sold and packaged as a whole compared to blackberry's.

I dont see many boss's of non small companies going to accounts to go get em a few dozen company iphones that dont have consumer level replacable bateries. I'm sure somebody will have a battery that attaches to the iphone soon if not already, but ambilical corded devices are not user friendly unless you wish your phone to look like a pair of nun-chucks (maybe some wii fans might :).

Also I would of preffered to see them offer a small email-server OSX - stuff CD in and have dedicated OSX email server type offering with there `delayed poll` email system.

I would love to see some non-microsoft business email system inplace, and supported, but I dont see that soon with microsoft patents in the equation.

Why apple didn't team up with nokia and do a protocol standard to cover mobile push email and realy kick the market I dont know, beyond that they would rather go into competition with microsoft than go for a true push email system which would benifit consumers as much as business's and also make money. Until then Rogering Idjiot Managers will still be doing just fine.

But on the plus side the reg already knew this was comming by the cunning little icon selection in the bottom right, oh yeah.

[Simon]

@Paul Warne @Webster Phreaky

Paul I think you have hit the nail on the head about Phreaky.

Every single one of his comments is a bizzare attack on Apple, all the time!Phreaky demonstrates all the symptons of the "Perfect Fanboy" (Whatever his favourite OS is, who knows) Attacking an OS which isn't the same as the one he uses at every chance just to stir the *hit.

I do indeed think he is a creation of El Reg, because *no-one* can be that obsessed towards attacking an OS like he is. Not even the most hard-core "Fanboy"

So fess' up Reg!

[Ian Ferguson]

I like it

I'm generally impressed with the direction they're taking - they seem to be listening to what the public wants (including 3G if the rumours are correct, which might put a stop to some of the bitching and moaning, although I suspect the people making the most noise are bitching for the sake of bitching)

Two disappointments though; the SDK looks like it's missing two fairly critical functions; full access to Bluetooth and to the dock connector. If they were allowed, it would kick start the accessories business no end; but as this won't get Apple any money, I suspect they won't bother. Shame.

Although most people seem to moan about the App Store lock-in, I think it's a GREAT idea. Why? Take a common or garden Windows Mobile or Palm device, and try and find some useful applications for it on the internet. You will be swamped with useless calorie counters, 'hilarious' joke apps, buggy tweaks, 'fun toys' etc. The unofficial installer.app sources are going this way; by limiting and monitoring what applications are going to be allowed, we can be assured of at least some quality control.

I just hope they allow some of the great unofficial third party apps to work with the official installer. The Game Boy Advance emulator is the bee's knees.

[Steve Ives]

Tarrifs

Do any of the children here seriously think that when/if Apple rolls out Exchange support and starts selling it to the corporate world, they' won't have a set of corporate tarrifs available?

Why are there so many people on these forumes who are - apparently - qualified to run billion-dollar international companies?

Steve

[Matt Bryant]

RE: Steve Todd and Paul van der Lingen

"....Does this mean Apple will have to develop a Rosetta app...." Regardless of 10.4's fat binary, Rosetta was developed by Transitive to allow Apple to port to Intel. As has been mentioned elsewhere in the comments, most real Apple stuff was bought or licenced rather than developed (even Mac OS is just a FreeBSD clone).

As was also mentioned by Si, ActiveSync has been around for ages and is simply not competitive with BES or even BIS despite M$ have improved it massively over the years. I have tried it on the HTC and Treo devices, and both were better commercial options than the iPlonker, and both were inferior to even my old 7100v in every day use. Sorry, fanbois, but so few of you have a clue about enterprise messaging and computing it's comic! Companies spend a lot of money avoiding the licencing nightmare of staff loading possibly illegal MP3s onto company equipment, they will not welcome an MP3 player posing as a company phone just because their staff say it will let them listen to Moby.

[jai]

re: @webster

I think you have hit the nail on the head there - Webster is obviously the inbred offspring of amanfrommars and El Reg's disapointment and anger at being continually spurned from being invited to Apple press events.

[Rolf Howarth]

Too expensive... consumer toy?

I have to say the SDK looks extremely good, and the fact that the iPhone can now work with Exchange servers to fit in the enterprise is an unexpected bonus.

Is it too expensive for the enterprise? Hardly. Now it works with their corporate systems it will initially be available as a perk for senior staff, until it becomes more and more widely used (just like when the Blackberry was first introduced - in the beginning only a select few in any organisation had them).

One of the interesting details of the iPhone SDK announcement was that corporations could have their own private area in the 'app store' for their own iPhone business applications. The possibilities for the kinds of system they could build are endless.

Sure, we've had mobile computing platforms for ages, but here's one that for the first time really works (just as I've had mobile phones supposedly with web access and email for years but never used them because they were so crap). Make no mistake, this is HUGE. Why else do you think a bunch of venture capitalists just offered a $100 million fund to iPhone app developers?

[Antti]

For the consumer, these "limitations" are a blessing

A lot of the posts here are (obviously and understandably) from the developer angle. But think of it from the consumer's point of view:

1. The $99 fee ensures that only developers that have at least some degree of ambition and seriousness will bother. Less hacks producing shaite. I say that's a good thing.

2. Apple approves each application. For the consumer, this ensures decent quality and eliminates unwanted surprises. How exactly is this a bad thing?

Someone please explain why Apple's approach is shaite, coz I must be missing something.

[Chris Gibson]

Yawn

I always read the comments on iPhone articles with mixed feelings of amusement and despair. The iPhone, for me, is by far the best mobile 'phone I've ever owned. This is from a fairly long list of handsets; an ancient Ericsson, several early Nokias, later Sony Ericssons and most recently a T-Mobile Vario II. Not one of them compares to the iPhone, in my opinion, which has a User Interface and overall feature set that blows them all away. I think that the SDK sounds great, and I can't wait to see what new applications are released.

If that makes me a "fanboy", so be it. If you disagree, fair enough -- don't buy one. I just cannot understand the reaction of some readers, which is to post foaming rants at the very mention of the iPhone. Yes, it's locked. I don't like it either, but unlocking mine took about five minutes. No, it's not 3G. Personally, I find browsing the web to be quicker and easier than on the Vario II, which was 3G. No, you can't send MMS, and if you're 13 that might be a problem. Yes, it's a bit expensive... but again, if your main source of income is a newspaper round, Nokia do some great PAYG handsets within your budget.

Ultimately, I've used an iPhone, and I love it. How many of the apoplectic posters above have actually *used* an iPhone?

[David Beeston]

Will Exchange/ActiveSync be available as an upgrade

I am wondering whether early adopters, such as myself (please don't beat me up about it as it suits my needs perfectly), will be able to get ActiveSync support as an update to existing hardware?

Any guesses?

[Rolf Howarth]

@Matt Bryant

I'm not quite sure what you're saying because some of it doesn't even seem to be English, but I wanted to respond to the issue of licensing or copying existing technology.

Clearly, everything in today's world is inspired or based to some extent on something else, but so what? The important thing is the overall execution and vision of the finished product surely. Or are you saying you wouldn't watch a film because the director used an outside company to do some of the special effects and part of the storyline is similar to something someone wrote in a book somewhere?

In any case, you're doing an injustice to the developers at Apple. As a company they spend a huge amount on design and development, far more than most similar hardware companies. So Mac OS X is based on a Unix kernel? What does that have to do with anything (apart from stability and making it easy to develop for)? It's a tiny part of the overall codebase.

[Scott Mckenzie]

Ace

I too think it's great, it's what Apple has always been good at, some may call it controlling etc, but by passing all the apps you get support, reliability, guarantees that it works etc... i'm all for it!

As for the competition with RIM etc, sure Push Email may not be as good, however for your average SME not having to purchase a dedicated server to run a BIS on more than makes up for the slight quirks of Push.... i know several companies that run SBS, this does Push Email out the box, therefore no extra investment required. For a large company sure RIM is probably a better choice, but i'd imagine for the target market it's a godsend.

Now if only they'd open up the networks they work on so i could get one on Orange in the UK i'd be really chuffed!

[Giles Jones]

Webster Phreaky is a stupid Microsoft fan boy

Dear Webster Phreaky,

What kind of drugs are you on?

Have you ever used a Blackberry? they are the single most annoying piece of rubbish phone possible. Their business only exists due to push email and now that Microsoft has this feature and Apple will have very soon it means RIM's days are numbered.

The iPhone has a very well designed interface, touch screen, responsive, easy to read. A Blackberry has a small screen, no touch screen and the interface design is terrible.

Have a read of some usability issues:

http://www.optimalusability.com/post.php?postid=16

"The problem with the Blackberry is that it is a great email tool but a substandard phone. The number keys are small, you look and feel ridiculous holding the phone up to your ear, and it has very poor integration with the SIM cards that are normally used to store contacts on most mobile phones (which is especially annoying if you have 120+ numbers saved to your SIM card like I do)."

[Chad H.]

A few things

1 I think Webster is real... Its just the apple geeks at school kept beating him up for his lunch money.

2 blackberry via its blackberry prosumer service supports pop3 IMAP and oulook web access/ exchange.

[Nick Fisher]

Fat binaries

Older readers may recall that fat binaries first surfaced in Apple's 68K/PPC transition back in 1993 or so.

[Mo]

Fat binaries & FreeBSD

Mach-O Fat binaries (the sort used in Mac OS X) were a NeXT invention, and have been supported forever. The only snag is that the as-shipped system frameworks on Mac OS X didn't support any architectures besides ppc and ppc64 until Marklar came to fruition and we could buy ICBMs. Certainly, XNU on the iPhone understands fat binaries, but doesn't know how to load anything except the appropriate ARM-specific chunks of them (for the time being).

Mac OS X most certainly isn't a “a clone of FreeBSD”, though. A lot of the userspace code was _taken_ from FreeBSD (as the license permits), but it's since been modified fairly significantly to support both Apple-specific technologies, the Mach microkernel services, and, of course, bring it line with the UNIX brand compliance requirements. It's worth noting that most operating systems (Windows included) contain code (varying degrees of) that originate in one or more of the BSDs—in Apple's case it's a deliberate selling point, though.

[Blueworld]

Blackberry isn't so great

I would have thought that these additions will make the iPhone quite compelling, lack of 3g is a problem for me (I like seeing my emails as they were written, fully featured , images and everything. GPRS is just sooo painful ). But apart from the push email, any other email accounts on a blackberry are polled and pretty slow (I'd rather use IMAP) at least on T-mobile UK, the browser is a joke, the e-mails look scrappy, the interface is laughable and they have their share of blackouts which seems to be a downside of relying on one company to serve everything. And at least the one I've got (8707) doesn't seem very smart for a smartphone, it sort reminds me of an old palm for some reason, not because it looks like one but it seems similarly antiquated. I know its a pretty unfashionable thing to say on El Reg but........ If it didn't cost so much in subcriptions and had a 3g+ connection I'd buy one in shot, its just cooler isn't it? Maybe its just me............

[iannufc]

Tarred with the same brush...

Not too sure about Mr. Job's comments, but...

I have noticed on this site that there seems to be an opinion that if you own an iPhone, you are a 'Fan Boy'.

Rubbish.

I have an iPhone, and I love it, but I am not a 'Fan Boy'. I just bought it because I liked it.

Paris because people are opinionated about her as well...

[Anonymous Coward]

fan boys

I don't think owning an iphone means you are a fan boy however it does show you are a bit of a plonka and suseptable to clever marketing. or maybe thats not the case. i've got an ipod so maybe i'm a fan boy however i just use it i don't 'LOVE IT' hopefully no one died in china making it though

[Anonymous Coward]

On-device encryption?

Ok, so remote wipe and encrypted connections, but what about encryption on the device? That's going to be a requirement in a lot of environments. Not being able to carry an additional, user-replaceable battery going to be an issue, as is the vendor lock-in. And then there's cost. With a lot of vendors, if you're getting state contract pricing here in the US, you can get a Blackberry Curve for under $100, and a steep discount on the data plan for the Blackberry. They're not going to match that with the iPhone, which is going to keep it out of government, even if the encryption problem didn't. Then there's the IRS. With the extra "entertainment" features of the iPhone, claiming there's only work-related use is implausible - it's a taxable benefit. Not that it's much money, it's just a hassle.

[milan]

Do what you say

Produce workable affordable apps that don't slow the device to a crawl. Increase the native storage on the device, lower the tariff cost/upgrade what you get on the tariff and stop bricking them intentionally.

Then I'll happily buy one of the shiny things.

[Anonymous Coward]

iPhone buisness

love my iPhone and looking forward to using it "officially" for business

[Anonymous Coward]

Blackberry and the future

...and can someone please explain how a BES server is going to talk to an Exchange 2007 environment? MS only really want ActiveSync devices to talk to it (pre. Windows Mobiles no surprisingly). The days of problematic BES servers must be numbered now.

[John W. Naylor, Jr., P.E.]

Apple Got the Right Market With Their First Entry

There are 3 types of smartphone users:

1. The business user who actually benefits from the capabilities, needs to be in touch when "out of civilization". By "out of civilization", I mean unable to access their e-mail from a nearby PC, laptop, kiosk, hotel business center or other means.

2. The consumer who actually benefits from the capabilities of a smartphone, likes to be in touch all the time but also gets benefit out of its capabilities by using it as a multimedia / entertainment device.

3. The self important poser who wants people to pay attention to him and uses the device to try and get that attention. This is the individual who can't seem to take the device out of their hands and is always showing people all the cool things it can do. This user "must have" a new device every six months.

Apple quite smartly realized that the market sector with the least penetration by the existing smartphone club was the segemnent defined by 2 above. I have a Palm OS Treo and wouldn't get an iPhone. The Treo has served me well for over three years but I find I use it less and less as time goes on. Typing on a thumbpad is just not efficient and I find it more efficient to just wait till I drop "back into civilization" and can grab a PC at a hotel business center, client's office or whatever cause thumb typing is just too slow and cumbersome.

OTOH, my 18 year old son has an iPhone and for his normal communications (text messaging and 12 word e-mails) the iPhone is ideal. Comparing how it does the web with any other smartphone out there is like comparing a Porshe with the field from your local soap box derby. Apple nailed that market. Every high school kid with a part time job is saving for one if they don't have one already. One thing I notice is that most people at some point in their career reach a point where they get in the car and they don't even notice if the radio is on. These are your Crackberry users. Most everyone younger or at a lower career level .... the ones with iPods plugged into their car radio......are now buying iPhones.

Most thought that after an initial flurry the iPhone sales would crap out. But 2.32 million sales is 1st quarter 2008 alone is staggering. It would therefore seem that going after that untapped market with their first entry before jumping in and competing directly with Palm / Crackberry / PPC was a rather brilliant idea.

I once had a surgeon tell me he needs push e-mail in case he gets an important message while operating on someone....and that he would actually have his nurse take it out and read the message while he was operating. What critical message warrants not giving your full attention to the scalpel in hand I am wondering ? "Bring home milk and bread ?" ...... "My mistake, you had a gout infected toe removal scheduled this morning not a penile amputation....hope you didn't get this message too late."

Every time I see a smartphone user in a hotel lobby or lounge typing for 30 minutes on his BB, Treo or whatever I can't help laughing. Here they are all smug about how efficient they are being while 20 paces away are full size keyboards and 19" screens available for free usage in the hotel business center. I'm not saying that my Treo hasn't come in handy when such an option isn't available, but if you are using a smartphone when you have full size resources 20 paces away, or a laptop up in your room, then I'm sorry, but you're a poser.

[Paul Coen]

Exchange 2007?

Who runs Exchange 2007? Hardly anyone has upgraded. Then again, it's not really an upgrade. It's a migration. And if sites can't get a BES to work with it for a while, they're going to put off upgrading Exchange as long as possible. And historically, ActiveSync hasn't exactly been an award-winning piece of software, so I'm betting they're not in a huge hurry anyway.

[iannufc]

plonka (sic)

Such hostility. I don't see how buying something you like makes you a plonker. Can't see your logic there. Neither does it mean you're susceptible, gullible or anything. People are capable of making their own minds up.

I saw the phone, liked it, and bought it. It does what I want it to do very well, in my opinion. Sorry if that upsets you. No 3G? Don't use it. No MMS? Don't send them. No Bluetooth File Transfer? Don't use it. If you are that much of a fool to think owning an iPhone makes you susceptible to marketing, then you really are a plonka, in your own mis-spelled way. Bless.

There are people out there who are intelligent to make their own decisions based on what they think, rather than what the adverts tell you, and I am most definitely one of them.

Joke alert, because if that's the way your Anonymous Coward's mind works, then you really are a joke.

[Richard]

El Reg persona non grata?

Please, please stop with the incessant (and all too predictable) sniping at Apple for not inviting you to events such as this one. I enjoy reading The Register's output, but each and every time your stringers opine in this manner you lower yourself to the ranks of a third-rate blog, and it devalues the El Reg brand. Try and rise above the perceived snub, and bear in mind that you are good, but you're no CNN.

[Anonymous Coward]

@Giles Jones & @Paul Coen

@Giles,

You are quoting a 3.5 year old article about a device that has seen at least 4 more recent devices and multiple versions since. If you are going to slam a device at least be a little more current, have you >used< a BlackBerry or do you just read review from others and hijack their opinion?

I too like the iPhone, but would never give up my BlackBerry as a business tool. Try typing a response to a client on a iPhone "keyboard", no thanks. Not to mention the robust IT centric control of the devices in large numbers or small, diverse 3rd party apps and hardware.

@Paul, who uses Exchange 2007? Are you new? Not that I am a fan of Exchange or anything Microsoft for that matter, but there are many millions of people with Exchange 2007 mailboxes, with many hundreds of thousands (at least) BlackBerries attached to those mailboxes. One ASP in the US alone has over 200K E2007 mailboxes and over 15K BlackBerries.

@bws, BlackBerry supports: Lotus Notes/Domino, Exchange and POP mail. Point your browser to *any* search engine and read before you type.

With regard to Rates or Tarrifs, the iPhone under the current tarrifs will never move a North American company of any size to abandon BlackBerry. Most carriers will give the devices away and rates can be as low at $20+/month in the quantity that matters, i.e. over 1000 devices. Even the sub 1000 device buyers get pricing that makes iPhones far too expensive. I can't talk about non-NA carriers as I know next to nothing about their rates.

RIM has had a developers suite available for years, it's standards based and FREE. Big deal about Apple's "rich" API and massively controlled distribution method.

Note: Lotus announced support for Notes on the iPhone at Lotusphere in January, unfortunately as it was leaked early and Mr Jobs doesn't like that, subsequent publicity has waned.

For all you FUD spreaders, think first then move along.

--Pete

[Edward O'Donoghoe]

Ed, the talking Horse.

Well, who wants to be the richest man in the world next??? (What shall it profit a man..........etc.) How many cars can you drive at the one time, how many meals??? Sometimes it makes me wonder.......or is he fair dinkum ? CRIKEY....

[Anonymous Coward]

a plonker writes..

fanbois? - i'm sure there are blokes who buy whatever gadget 'stuff' magazine tells them they must have this year. just as there are girls walking about, looking like they've got their feet stuck in the amputated stumps of an elephant's leg, because 'cosmo' told them they *simply had to* have a pair of 'ugg' boots.

some people however, do actually think for themselves and sometimes products become popular because they're actually better designed than the competition. what do the 'anti-fanboi' commenters want? - that we all buy shite gadgets just to prove we're not being swayed by our peers?

as regards the iphone? --- unlock it and i'll buy one. until then i'll make do with my fuller featured [tho' uglier OS'ed] nokia E90, running on a dirt-cheap asda PAYG contract.

[Matt Bryant]

RE: Rolf Howarth

Rolf, you should read up on the nightmare of copyright to corporations. I work with sub-companies that are completely Linux through and through, but they retain and renew a few Microsoft licences just to ensure they can carry on using old M$ docs without the worry that at some point M$ will turn around and claim only M$ systems can read the old docs. It's cheaper than converting them all to PDFs, and doesn't risk data corruption during conversion. Many of these sub-companies also have policies that company equipment should not be used for non-work-related activities or storage, and very thorough systems for checking company laptops, desktops and servers for illicit material such as porn, MP3s and games. With RIM BES, we can extend this to the company handsets as well, and we can actually block all the handsets from playing or storing material such as MP3s (we're such killjoys!).

Another reason BES beats ActiveSync (at least for the customers) is that it is a real push technology - if there's no email waiting then you don't get billed for the polling you have to pay for with ActiveSync, which polls to find out if email is waiting. And if you're doing that polling via 3G then it's a data charge which is usually a higher tariff. We calculated that the average user was going to be THREE TIMES AS EXPENSIVE on Treos with ActiveSync compared to Blackberrys on BES, even taking into account the extra cost of the BES server and licences, which is probably why the operators are so happy to push ActiveSync.

And the final reason why I don't think iPlonker poses a threat to Blackberry is conformity. Many companies like standard builds - standard laptops, standard desktops, and standard company phones. This is why the iMac never made much of a dent in the business world outside of marketing departments, because the fanbois couldn't present a good enough argument to get businesses to switch. The iPhone faces the same hurdle - it will have to prove that it is better and cheaper for the business (not the fanboi) before it will be taken seriously. At the moment, ActiveSync is definitely not better, and iPhone is so ridiculously expensive that only a company looking to give employees a trendy perk might consider it, and then there are a dozen cheaper phones already available from Sony-Ericsson or Nokia that have better business capabilities and proven track records. The iPlonker has about a year to get some traction before M$ will be attacking it with a better phone OS which will probably be very closely tied to and therefore better with Exchange. I predict the iPlonker getting maybe 3% business marketshare and never beyond that amount, just like the iMac, for the simple reason that CIOs are usually not fanbois but businessmen.

[Anonymous Coward]

Likely?

On the day that iphone is available through ASDA on a PAGY basis, Hell district council will place an order for a snow plough and a gritting lorry.

[Gleb]

My Ipod Touch.

I bought it to play music. Now I want it to do other things for me. I've had a lot of devices over the years, and now it seems I've found one that I really like. Not going to care what anyone says, or make any silly predictions. But Apple is well on their way to at least outselling RIM in the near future, and if they want to broaden their market a bit - why so much negativity?

People here are saying that no way no how no company would ever move their whatever to iphone. But what if people want it? What if this company is one of those hip companies? Like biotech or parish hilton mags or something. They live for swag and phat loot. I can surely see them adopting at least some of it.

And why is everyone so polarized anyway? Love or hate? Is it so simple? I like the browser, I hate how I can't get big keyboard in email mode. Maybe with SDK it'll open up a bit. Although I'm *NOT* loving how it seems to be very very mac-only at the moment.

Oh, and another thing. When I bought my iPOD Touch I couldn't start it up without iTunes. That's Windows or MAC only,so I actually had to install windows for it. Now, mind you, there are some hacks out there to get music to and fro the device, remotely even - no cables or anything, but there are no tools to initialize it.

[elder norm]

The anti-apple fanboys here make me laugh. :-)

I am getting more and more of a kick out of the posts by anti-apple fanboys here and at other sites. They just do not get it. :-)

On the iPhone, its the software, dummy!! LOL Every time Apple has wanted to upgrade the iPhone, all they do is drop another upload into the pipeline and suddenly your iPhone is new and improved. You do not have to buy another phone cause id does not have that feature loaded or turned on.

Now its great for Nokia to sell you another phone everytime you want to increase your phones abilities, but I like the idea of a phone getting better and better ---- for free.!!!

It may be just me, but I think that this SDK and business efforts for the iPhone is going to make it super big. SUPER BIG!! Complain that cause it does not come in pink, that its a deal killer for you (but who really cares what ---you-- buy..ROTFLOL.

Now, I am not a fanboy. I critize Apple too. I feel free to praise or put down ideas as I see them. And lately, all I see is good ideas coming out of Apple (not perfect - just good) . :-)

en

[Sarah Bee]

Re: The anti-apple fanboys here make me laugh. :-)

OK, I'll let you have that one, Norm, but remember every time you 'LOL', a kitten dies.

[infektu]

pro- and anti-apple (boys, attitudes, etc.)

first of all I would have a question, if somebody could take a second I would be grateful :

is true that to access one's ipod one needs a special (windoze only?) application ? that is the gadget can't be used as a regular USB media device ? does the proprietary shrewdness go as far as having special connectors which require a bunch of (expensive) adaptors ?

myself I have an mp3/divx4 20GB HD Archos player (which doubles as half-decent videocam and USB device, of course) and the reason I'm asking is that I have a friend who asked me how to do that with his iPod ? (less the video recording part of course, just the USB mp3 player bit);

otherwise it's all very strange for me, what would anybody "get personal" when talking about an inanimate piece of electronics ? or is it that both pro- and anti- people talk threough reference by something else ? like proprietary vs. open systems, control over our day-to-day technological lives or lack thereof... ?

have fun,

infektu