“The new iPhones look like the old iPhones. They sound like the old iPhones. They do the same things as the old iPhones. Just slightly better, more colorfully, and less expensively than the old iPhones,” Matt Buchanan writes for The New Yorker. “This might seem disappointing: even Apple’s phones are boring now. But this is an ideal state of affairs.”
“The original iPhone, released in June, 2007, gave birth to the modern smartphone era: browsing restaurant menus on a sidewalk, watching a movie on a bus, tweeting from the subway and posting photos of a newborn to Facebook the second it opens its eyes,” Buchanan writes. “What we can do now, six years later, has not fundamentally changed since then. It’s easier or faster—forty times faster, according to Apple—or higher resolution, or all of the above. To wit, the iPhone 5S has few genuinely new features, and those that it does have are nearly invisible. In order of importance, they are: a built-in fingerprint scanner to replace passwords, faster chips, a higher-quality camera, and a gold body. The iPhone 5C is essentially the exact same as the current iPhone 5, but shoved into a brightly colored plastic, rather than aluminum, shell and sold for a hundred dollars less than before.”
Buchanan writes, “For the next few years, advances in smartphones and tablets will continue to be subtle and iterative, driven by the twin processes of simplification and connection. The advanced Touch ID fingerprint sensor built into the 5S’s home button, while a seemingly basic technology (it replaces your password with your thumbprint in a handful of very specific applications) is a perfectly representative feature. Today, it’s merely a convenience, since putting your thumb where it goes a hundred times a day anyway is less annoying than typing in a password. But it’s also a step closer to the day when we no longer have to remember or store dozens of passwords—a fundamental reinvention of the way we approach identity and computer security on a daily, even hourly, basis. It breaks down one of the barriers between humans and our machines.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Apple’s revolutionary iPhone.
The finger print scanning home button is a really cool and really important advancement. Not to be underestimated. Sure such sensors have existed for some time, but they are probably nothing compared to Apple’s implementation.
I think you are right, when Apple implements such technology it’s usually because it has big things planned rather than the opposition who are trying to amuse onlookers with pointless buffoonery like most of Samsung’s ‘innovations’ . This isn’t going to be just a phone entry thing it’s going to open up all sorts of Authorisation processes for paying, memberships, and confirmations that will of course need third party dialogue to make happen. I do wonder if the iWatch might exploit this more fully in the first generation as its form factor is more ideal for its true potential. We shall see.
Just one idea: Touch your home button on your iPhone to unlock any of dozens of locks for which you now have keys; car, front door to your house, etc.
And with iBeacon, scan the item’s bar code and touch the home button to authorize purchase of an item in a store. Your attached bank account is automatically debited, and the item’s security strip is deactivated, which let’s you take it out of the store without alerting the store clerk. Said clerk no longer scans anything, nor collects any money, but merely monitors the exit.
Agreed. It’s one thing to have a sensor on your laptop to act as a more secure password, but it’s quite another how Apple implementing it. Touch ID will eventually replace passwords in iOS and apps, so that you not only have a more secure method for logging into everything from the iPhone itself to bank accounts, but it makes it almost impossible to hack.
“They do the same things as the old iPhones. Just slightly better”….. Really? Slightly better? – what a shallow take! sorry these things are amazingly better each time! ahhh in many many ways!
A side note – even though iPhone cameras now are seemingly light-years ahead of the original iPhone camera, I took some great sunset photos with my original iPhone, because, as the saying goes, the best camera you can have is the one you have with you. I’d never have gotten the photos I took without my iPhone.
Thanks
There’s really a limitation to what hardware advancements can be put into a smartphone at this point. The big changes are going to come from software.
Until Apple develops a totally new form factor (some kind of wearable device), I don’t think iPhones, Galaxys, HTCs, etc. are going to be that much different. Sure, little bits here and there, but mostly the same sizes, same rectangular form, thickness, etc.
“The new iPhones look like the old iPhones.’
It’s hard to improve upon perfection.
I just now watched the Apple iPhone keynote on Apple TV. I can’t believe the analysts and I viewed the same keynote.
I had a similar reaction.
I agree and after I watched it this morning, the only issue I had was that Tim chose to end the release with a video about the colors in the new iPhone 5C. Really, was that what he got out of this iPhone 5S revolutionary jump to a 64 bit, low light photographing, bio-identifocation rocking game playing beast of an iOS device? Tim thought the color was the high point for everyone to remember.
Give me an ad of a new mother and the great grand parents who are another country sharing pictures and video of her new born baby sleeping in a lightly light crib in the evening while the older child is playing that game in the other room. That is the heart tugging ad to share! Not the colors.
But the 5C is the eye catching, volume sales device, particularly for international markets. Remember, the keynote was replayed in China and a few other countries today. The 5C is what is going to be the big iPhone in China, not the 5S.
Disagreed. It’s all about cachet there. They will gobble up the 5S.
What was Elvis Costello doing at a iPhone event?
He sang & played his guitar. Didn’t you watch?
I’m not going to say anything about the 4″ screen as I’ve said enough about that subject already.
But would it kill Apple to incorporate a notification light around the redesigned home button? The number of times I’ve missed messages, calls, emails, etc due to not hearing system alerts and ringtones is beyond silly.
A blue light could mean missed call, green light missed SMS or a red light could mean incoming email. Or a single hued light will do.
It could kill! Ever hear of the Red ring o death!?
So you want some kind of 5″ Jornada…
Step up to the current times, and get MS off your mind.
you could always enable “led flash for alerts” under accessibility preferences.
I’ve wanted this from day 1.
See, that’s good creative thinking there.
Now I will say that I applaud the fingerprint scanner. And I love that 64-bit chip.
But something like a notification light (which can be turned on and off) would be a real consumer pleaser.
And I’ll say it…the 4″ screen needs to be bigger. 4.5″…maybe even 4.7″. I think it’s silly that they upgraded the chip and made the phones so much better with graphics but keep you stuck with the small screen.
I think many people have this belief that if it didn’t originate in Cupertino, then it’s 2nd rate. But for some things, like screen size and keyboard layout (why is the delete button above the return button again?), other parties have come up with better ideas.
Apple is still King IMO but they are losing their lead.
I want to apologize for my mistake. I predicted that the excitement over yesterday’s announcements would run it course in 48 hours then back to the doldrums. Well, the excitement never happened at all. Investors in the company leaving in droves to express their revulsion at another Tim Cook failed attempt to kick start the stalled out company. Tweak the phone, issue a cheap plastic one that isn’t cheap? What was he thinking? EXIT sign is flashing for this guy and it couldn’t come a moment too soon.
Dude, who’s payroll are you on? You’re fucking relentless with your pointless whining.
@ Morrison:
Utter rubbish. Phones will stay the same until we learn telepathy, so get used to that.
Prices gradually go down, quality and speed go up. It’s a mature market.
Apple is the most valuable co. on the planet, wtf do you want?
IF there is a ‘new’ thing, Apple will be the ones to either invent it, or perfect it and make it USABLE.
And, of course, you never follow up, never engage, never defend your nonsensical posts.
I buy Apple not because of their stock but because of their products. They can control their products, but they can’t control stupidity of analysts’ or investors’ thoughts!
Why all this complaining. Also with Steve at the rudder the upgrade cycle went 3>3s, 4>4s and then not much more than speed upgrade to the “s”-version. This IS MUCH more than a “simple” such upgrade. 4 bit architecture, significant energy boost in regards to standby, talk time, etc, finger print scanning, M7 chip, most significant iOS upgrade, better camera, new LED-flash AND a new iPhone model!!! The only disappointment really was that just about everything had been disclosed beforehand. Had it not the event would have meant GREAT news for media and the public. During Jobs they were able to plug the leaks. They now have huge forces against them and it wouldn’t surprise me if Samdung, Google do everything in their powers to facilitate the leakings so to take the wind out of Apples events. Doing that no event will come across as revolutionary, innovative or whatever name you choose to call it.
Apple is laying a solid ground for SERVICES with its fingerprint technology, the M7 and iOS7 and it will show, The smartphone as such cannot be expected to change that much, now it’s all about SERVICES and have hardware to support them and an OS to make it simple for the ordinary man to hook up with them!
Correction: 64-bit (!) architecture. And also – which I forgot to mention. This was an iPhone/iOS -event and Apple delivered on that!
Haha…You know T. Cook ain’t going nowhere.
On the other hand, Jay, please go somewhere.
Apple aren’t going to do what you want. So either get over it, or go buy a Samdung phablet.
I was following the presentation on MDN yesterday. As soon as the fingerprint thing was announced I called my broker. I have been adding AAPL since mid 2010. I wanted to make it an even 1000 shares and had 40 to go. The stock had dropped $14 and I told him to place the order. He asked if I was sure. He said all his other clients that had called were shorting Apple. I said what do they know, China Mobile will be coming on board tomorrow. Well at this moment I am feeling rather stupid. Looks like we are headed for sub $450 again. Apple needs a bigger phone. Not for me, but for many folks.
The stock drop yesterday and today is par for the course over the years. Analcysts and Wall Street almost always sell AAPL off after such announcements.
Are pockets getting bigger. Why would I want a iPad sized phone?
You might be ahead of the game and proven right in the long term – but it does little good to be so far ahead that no other investors are close to agreeing with you. The stock price is dictated by what other investors think, and it could take days, weeks, or the whole sales quarter before they realize Apple knew was right all along and start buying.
Momentum is way more important than buying low. In fact, buy low usually stupid, because the low price shows downward momentum, and odds are against a sudden reversal the moment you buy. Odds are better if you wait until there’s at least some sign of upward momentum, then wait a bit longer for the the upward momentum to build up, then buy.
C’mon, get real! The stock might have fallen in the past, but four serial downgrades at the same time isn’t exactly par for the course. This stock is being sliced and diced with Tim Cook as the fatty pork chop. Apple is already down over $200 from its last year’s highs. Does it really have to go all the way down to $400 again to wake shareholders from their dirt nap?
I realize Apple isn’t going to stay down very long and they will definitely sell a lot of iPhones by the end of the year. I’m only pointing out how Apple stock is being seriously bitch-slapped by Wall Street. It isn’t quite right to just sit back and enjoy the facial pain with a smile.
I bought AAPL for the first time in 1999. At first I listened to people like you saying the EXACT same things about the company for the EXACT same reasons. I sold some of my early purchased stock based on those inane warnings. Waking up was when I stopped listening to naysaying. The shares I still own from 1999 were bought at a split-adjusted $6/share. It is actually quite right, indeed, to sit back and smile.
The blatant manipulation of Apple stock that’s been going on for a year now is illegal, but it’s one thing to know it, and another to be able to prove it in a court of law.
The stock trashers were licking their chops, waiting for Steve Jobs to pass away, and then they took the unfortunate iMaps misstep and started the ball rolling downhill.
The SEC doesn’t care, because the present administration has it in for Apple. No one disses the Prezzy and gets by with it.
There is no real reason the stock should be where it’s at. Amazon and Google receive all sorts of good will from the street, while Apple has to cure cancer in order to get even the slightest nod.
The fact is that Apple makes the very best products in their category, and somehow that’s not good enough. That’s like telling Michael Phelps that though he won the race, he still didn’t swim fast enough.
There has NEVER been anything ‘mundane’ about an iPhone.
What’s mundane is the idiocy of Wall Street analcysts, cattle and wolves. Have fun eating one another while Apple continues to THRIVE, despite your worst efforts.
The 5s will probably be the last phone I buy for many years. From the 3GS to the 4s, the 5s should be will probably be satisfactory/sufficient long after the next “upgrade” is available.
Great for me. In two years I’ll move to a BYOP carrier and save some bucks. But Apple, to keep that cash horde, is going to need to change its strategy or come up with some other “breakthrough” product.
I’ve loved the 27 years I’ve been using Apple computers but I just surfed the web on a Windows 8 machine and my envy of its snappiness vs Safari’s frequent beach ball is painful to this fan boy.