“Apple Computer and Motorola could soon show us the mobile phone they are developing to play music purchased from Apple’s iTunes online music store. ‘We’ve said we have something coming on this in the first half of 2005 and we’re definitely on schedule for that. Hopefully you’ll be able to see more about it soon,’ says Eddy Cue, vice president in charge of applications at Apple,” Arik Hesseldahl reports for Forbes.
“If the phone is as far along as Cue suggests, then Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs would be likely to announce it during his annual keynote speech at MacWorld Expo, scheduled for Jan. 11, 2005 in San Francisco,” Hesseldahl reports. “‘What we’ve talked about is a something that is valuable for the mass market,’ Cue says. ‘It has to be a phone in the middle-tier of the market, not a $500-tier phone. It has to be very seamless to use. And we’re very happy with the results.'”
“The direct PC connection would likely bypass wireless data networks owned by large wireless carriers such as Verizon Wireless… Cingular Wireless… and SBC Communications. Consumers wouldn’t be required to pay network fees to download music,” Hesseldahl reports. “That fact has raised concerns among some industry observers that carriers, eager to convince consumers to boost their usage of expensive data networks, might object to phones that don’t need a network connection to download music. Those carriers, who are generally very picky about the phones they sell in their retail stores and what features they support, can easily veto a feature they don’t like.”
Full article here.
crikey, they beat me to it!!! Looks like a fun product…
Charlie
http://www.InGratia.org
thats exactally why i bought an ipod, so that i could listen to music on my cell phone
There are lots of PDA phones that bypass carrier networks already. Big deal.
I think the appeal of this feature will have less to do with being able to listen to songs on your cellphone, but having the ability to customize your ring tones with thousands of possibilities. downloadable ring tones is having a great deal of success right now and is proving to be quite profitable since many view this as a way of personalizing their phones through unique ring tones. However, since downloading ring tones is quite expensive, a low-cost feature like this is sure to be popular.
am I the only person who thinks this is completely stupid? I will fall out of my chair and watch the rest of the keynote on the floor if Steve announces something this ridiculous. They have better things to do than devleop hardware that requires cell phone carriers to work fully – so the moron Joe Customer can blame Apple’s crappy iPhone for not working, when really it’s Sprint’s crap-ass infrastructure that causes the problems…..
Well if Apple uses a quad band GSM phone, where all you need is a SIM card, then you can get decent coverage over the bulk of the cities.
Sprint may suck then again they don’t use GSM service either. Cingular, and T-mobile boh use GSM coverage in the states.
I don’t think it will be Apple branded phone… Apple will just provide iTunes/AAC/Fairplay integration. As long as that aspect is sound (pun intended), Apple will still come out smelling like a rose. If the phone service sucks, I think people will still blame the phone carrier… or maybe Motorola.
I, too, think this is a stupid idea.
ok, if its just ringtones we’re talking about, thats one thing… but, if its full songs downloaded onto a cell phone, then I see a couple of potential problems….
1) … How much storage capacity does a cell phone have, for things like games, videos, music…and what not ?
2)… I cant imagine anyone having the desire to listen to their favorite music on a cell phone… unless they figure a way to put some hi-fidelity speakers inside the phone…
Besides…..
Music is a very personal choice.. for everyone…
One persons “music”…. is another persons “garbage”….
Its bad enuff to go to a theater to watch the latest blockbuster, and have to put up with someones cell phone ringing … I wouldnt want to have to put up with having to listen to someone else’s “music” too !!
What I cannot understand is what is in this for Apple apart from getting more people to use iTunes and, all being well, iTMS – There is no hardware sales. Unless ….
“I cant imagine anyone having the desire to listen to their favorite music on a cell phone… unless they figure a way to put some hi-fidelity speakers inside the phone…”
Have you ever considered… ummm… earbuds? No different those that come with the iPod. My current work phone, a Nokia 5100 has a radio tuner with headphones that doesn’t disturb anyone while I listen.
What I cannot understand is what is in this for Apple apart from getting more people to use iTunes and, all being well, iTMS – There is no hardware sales. Unless ….
It’s an additional way of securing AAC/Fairplay as the de-facto standard against WMA.
This isn’t dumb. The ringtone market alone is between $1 and $3.3 Billion.
Some phones advertise high quality songs for ringtones, so apparently there is somewhat of a demand for that…and I don’t think memory capacity is going to be too much of a problem since some phone companies have already considered hard drive memory. Others have implemented different types of removable memory cards which could be used to store music. There is also the possibility that, like the iPod photo, a compressed version is what is actually transferred to the phone instead of the full version.
I think that if this happens, it is a step in the right direction for many reasons including expanding the reach of Apple’s software and brand recognition. However, I also completely agree with mac dood about how irritating it is to be forced to listen to someone’s “garbage”, which will become an increasingly larger problem as people will want to start sharing their songs with others (which is, without exception, always be done while in a restaurant or theater and never in the privacy of one’s own home). However, since this is already a nuisance that I don’t see going away anytime soon, then I guess it might as well be Apple that sells the songs.
Fortunately, mac dood, you’re missing the point. You wouldn’t play the music through your cell phone speakers; you’d use headphones. Hopefully wireless Bluetooth earbuds. So nobody else would hear your foot-stompin’ bluegrass.
And as for how much storage a cell phone has, well, it has as much as its manufacturer builds into it. So when Apple releases a cell phone, don’t you think it would have at least as large a hard disk as a low-end iPod?
Regarding ring tones, I hate them. Everybody should either set their cell phones to vibrate, or they should throw them in the trash. How annoying. And people should learn to talk quietly in public places, on cell phones or not. That said, ring tones, for some inexplicable reason, are BIG BUSINESS. Last time I checked, the ring-tone download business was bigger than the iPod business. I’m sure this has changed by now, but still, that shocked me.
I’d buy one… if it retained the ipod mini’s looks, maybe a little longer with a number pad…
and if it had bluetooth.
I have never paid for a ringtone… I just bluetooth them.
iTMS exclusivity+Apple sell phone.. more halo effect of course
also the iTunes Phone Store is gonna sell ringtones which are very profitable
Maybe an Apple branded phone, built by Moto, with a (numbered) click wheel replacing buttons. Welcome back… wait for it…THE DIAL!!
I think an iPhone with a flashdrive (2-4 gigs) and scroll wheet (+ numeric pad) that can sync with your address book, email, calendar, and store music would be pretty cool.
In 10 years 50% of all cellphones will have the same musicplaying capacity as a iPod of today.
Who cares. Another stupid phone that’ll end up in land fills and poison the ground water.
Thanks Moto for the most obnoxious invention of the 20th Century – The Cell Phone.
I can’t predict what the phone will be like, but I can predict the reaction to it:
http://www.applematters.com/weblog.php?id=P217