“For the better part of the past two years, there have been rumours that Apple Computer Inc. was about to launch an iPhone, a supercool device with all the same sexy features as the company’s wildly popular iPod digital music players, but with the added ability to make cellphone calls,” Mathew Ingram reports for The Globe and Mail.
Ingram reports, “Those rumours have gained substantial traction over the past few weeks. First, a Taiwanese financial newspaper said that a local firm had won a contract to make 12 million music-playing mobile phone handsets for Apple. Then, on Nov. 30, Apple filed a patent application for a combination phone and music player (the company also reportedly owns the domain iphone.org).”
“Analyst Gene Munster of brokerage firm Piper Jaffray, who said in September that Apple would likely launch an iPhone within four to six months, wrote in his latest research report that he now expects the launch to come at the annual Macworld Expo in San Francisco on Jan. 9,” Ingram reports. “The iPhone rumours have been fuelled by many things, including a seemingly unquenchable desire on the part of Apple fans to have the company’s distinctive logo plastered on everything important in their lives. But there is also a business case to be made for the company’s entry into the market.”
MacDailyNews Take: And on everything trivial in our lives, too. 
Thankfully, Apple provides logo stickers with every Mac.
Ingram continues, “Much like the digital music player market was when Apple came out with the iPod, the cellphone business is hardly a technological frontier, with billions of people owning mobile phones. At the same time, however, there is a lack of well-designed, easy to use and attractive cellphones on the market… There are also few phones that combine a cellphone and a music player with any degree of success… That means there may still be a market opportunity… One thing is for sure: If the iPhone rumours do turn out to be true, it will crank up the heat even further in what is already a hotly competitive market, and companies like Nokia, Palm, Motorola, and Research In Motion could really start to sweat.”
Full article here.
Ingram gets it. He should explain it to CNET’s Michael Kanellos who thinks today’s cell phones are “really good.”
Related articles:
Apple shares fall as CIBC sees ‘iPhone’ release delayed – December 07, 2006
Analyst expects 16GB flash-based Apple iPod video player, 4-8GB flash-based ‘iPhone’ models – December 07, 2006
CNET editor Kanellos: ‘Apple iPhone will largely fail’ – December 07, 2006
Prudential: Apple ‘iPhone’ to sport iPod click wheel; video iPod by Q2 – December 06, 2006
RUMOR: Apple’s smart phone project to feature ‘extensive integration with Mac OS X’ – December 05, 2006
Apple begins ‘iPhone’ production – December 05, 2006
Apple needs to think different about data security for ‘iPhone’ – December 05, 2006
Kevin Rose: Dual-battery Apple ‘iPhone’ coming in January; $249 for 4GB, $449 for 8GB – December 03, 2006
Apple Registers iPhone Trademark in Australia – December 02, 2002
Clicking on “iphone.org” takes one to Apple’s homepage.
iphone.org has taken you to apple’s homepage for a quite awhile… still waiting…
I need a phone controlled from my mac. I have a big keyboard that is easy to use, Apple please follow the iTunes model and make the computer do the work. No more mini menus ,tiny buttons stupid software. Keep it simple!
MDN wife . . . we’re both waiting for this
“The iPhone rumours have been fuelled by many things, including a seemingly unquenchable desire on the part of Apple fans to have the company’s distinctive logo plastered on everything important in their lives.”
That may be true to some extent, but I think Apple fans also believe Apple can produce a phone that seemlessly integrates with one app on your computer that can control everything on the phone. It seems like service providers have actually done all they can to stop such integration thus far, with a few exceptions.
“No more mini menus ,tiny buttons stupid software. Keep it simple!”
As I’ve said before, I’d love to see the iPod clickwheel turned into a rotary phone wheel. At the very least, it would be funny…
Apple doesn’t have all its eggs in one basket– they have a number of profitable products. A cell-based device only needs to pull its own weight and be slightly different than the rest of the clan. Considering Apple’s current positive regard in the world, it would probably pull more than its own weight. They really could devise another coup here if they have really good functionality that is normally expected from high end phones. Under-promise, over-deliver.
That in itself makes Apple different.
WAIT WAIT WAIT A SECOND… I thought this iPhone thing had already failed miserably.
At least thats what CNET said.
Oh… yeah. Nevermind.
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Oh wow, Apple’s going to create a white cell phone. Nokia better prepare for the massive layoffs.
In the article, it points out that Piper Jaffray claimed in September that the iPhone would be released within 4 to 6 months.
In a different MDN story today, CIBC claim that the iPhone is delayed and won’t be released before late first quarter or early second quarter 2007.
It seems that both reports suggest that it could be here in March, except one regards it as being on schedule, while the other sees it as so massively delayed that the stock price is in peril.
beep
Nokia struck first by claiming they don’t make phones, they make multimedia computers. Well let me tell you, I have access to every “multimedia computer” that Nokia has built this year and they do some amazing things that Apple could easily do 150x better.
“Steve, Steve, show us the ifart.” oohhhh, a cell phone, that hasn’t been done before, cough, gag.
Occam’s Razor sez :
“I need a phone controlled from my mac. I have a big keyboard that is easy to use, Apple please follow the iTunes model and make the computer do the work. No more mini menus ,tiny buttons stupid software. Keep it simple!”
Gonna be a pain carrying that Mac Pro in your pocket, and the battery life on it? WHEW! unless you get the “1200 lb Battery Expansion Pack And Generator” you’re going to have a really short roaming range…
Don’t pass the koolaid,
Go take some beano. It almost sounds from your post that you really zuned one in public.
Real IT guy
My 2200 lb Battery Expansion Pack And Generator is ready and waiting. Want to buy a product RED motorola, it’s a sexy lump of crap. I need to leave this complicated interface to folks who enjoy reading a fifty page instruction book. I just want a simple, simple phone that updates when it connects to my mac. A ring tone by Roger Waters would be nice too. xx
Oh koolaid,
Just in case you don’t know what zuned means. My nearest description would be hot brown butt mud. You could also call it a shart. Of course these are just your run of the mill street terms for a nasty condition brought on by aggressive overconfidence. I just think they happen to fit the bill.
nyuk nyuk nyuk
Don’t pass the koolaid:
It hasn’t been done WELL yet. In my opinion, the best cell phone/music players out there are the top-of-the-line Sony Ericsson models, K750 and up. Great GUI, easy to use, small, amazing cameras, etc.
But I just KNOW Apple can do better.
m
Occam’s Razor:
please, not Roger Waters… how about Brian Eno instead?
charlie
Brian is cool, Roger speaks for me, war is pointless, peace and harmony, talking is better than conflict, we don’t need no education!
It’s all Apple’s fault that the new MS Office 2007 Open XML file standard is not to your liking. Here’s to the fanboys…
YOU CAN READ ALL ABOUT IT HERE
In case you don’t like the truth, here’s a clip from the article:
“Citing major collaborative contributions from a dozen companies and institutions, including Novell, *****Apple*****, Intel, the British Library, and the US Library of Congress, the Ecma International standards body today approved what will now be called Ecma Open XML – formerly Microsoft’s “Office Open XML” – as an international standard for document formatting.”
Truth hurts.
It’s all Apples fault
Like we give a shit
What’s hurtful about that? It’s not the file type that’s in question, it’s the subpar support. M$: The bra with no cup.
@Occam’s Razor: Two days ago, a lot of people seemed to care (CRY).
R
I like your analogy. A hold-em-from-flopping that failed. Microsoft reminds me of a descriptive word picture someone I worked with once told me. Impotence = Kinda like shooting pool with a rope.
nyuk nyuk nyuk