By SteveJack
As I fully expected, the Apple iPhone hit pieces have begun. These articles will attempt to spread Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt (FUD) for the next six months leading up to Apple’s first shipment of iPhones and well beyond that date.
If you thought that iPod and iTunes was subject to FUD, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet, my friends. You’ll have to look to the Mac to find a threat of such magnitude that inspired such a FUD campaign. The reason for such a campaign against iPhone? Money. Lots and lots of money and the fear of losing a good portion of it to Apple.
You can call me conspiratorial. You can call me a crackpot. Call me whatever you like, but I will be proven right soon enough.
You will see articles that go way beyond legitimate reviews that will attempt to call into question every aspect of Apple’s iPhone, attacking everything from battery life, the type of battery, fingerprints on the screen, its Mac OS X operating system, and the type of network technology the first iPhone will employ (quad-band GSM) while failing to mention that Jobs stated that Apple plans 3G iPhones in the future. These articles will harp on the prices Apple plans to charge for the iPhone. They’ll claim the soft keyboard is difficult to use. They’ll make up even more things and they’ll find quotes from people who are supposedly not impressed with the device. I guarantee it.
Apple’s target of selling 10 million iPhones, or 1% of the total market, in the first year is too low, far too conservative. Apple’s iPhone user interface (UI) is far too advanced and too well-protected by patents (granted and under review) to be ripped off successfully. It will change the mobile device market in radical ways. I am, if anything, understating the havoc iPhone will cause.
The other phone makers, the other mobile device makers, and the other makers of so-called “smartphone” software understand the massive threat Apple’s iPhone poses. They have no recourse but to start up the FUD campaign, desperately hoping to slow Apple’s assault on the market. There is so much money at stake that things will get very nasty, very quickly.
The chits will be called in and the articles will get written. It’s already started.
So, keep this in mind whenever you read about Apple’s iPhone and you see an article slanted against the iPhone: the real Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt is being felt by all of the companies that Apple just humiliated yesterday. They are very scared and rightfully so.
SteveJack is a long-time Macintosh user, web designer, multimedia producer and a regular contributor to the MacDailyNews Opinion section.
Related articles:
FUD Alert: Analyst – I am pretty skeptical Apple’s iPhone can succeed – January 11, 2007
eWeek: Apple iPhone fallout: ‘They must be crying in Nokia-ville and other telephony towns today’ – January 10, 2007
The only thing really wrong with Apple’s iPhone is its name – January 09, 2007
Is Apple building ‘The Device?’ [revisited] – January 09, 2007
Apple debuts iPhone: touchscreen mobile phone + widescreen iPod + Internet communicator – January 09, 2007
@ Isaih
He said the Zune would suck and it sucks.
It hardly took a prophet to come to that conclusion.
In one of the MSM interviews Phil Schiller or somebody says it’s a stripped down (subset) of OSX, not the full monti. And it’s not open to ouside development because a bad app could take down the whole cell network, concession to Cingular.
I like stevejack’s examples.
If he didn’t have examples he would be just another rabid mac looney. But he has examples!
Hint to MDN: articles like this sound defensive, scared, and weak. Mac users have nothing to be so defensive about.
It’s funny how much Steve Jack/MDN hates the likes of Enderle and Cringley. Even though they are on opposite sides they both do the exact same thing. There is always a middle ground, MDN can rarely seem to find it.
Source link?
Hint to MDN: articles like this sound defensive, scared, and weak. Mac users have nothing to be so defensive about.
——————-
Overly defensive people have a lack of self confidence. That’s not an opinion, it’s a fact.
Check out the always-reliable-and-entertaining Daniel Eran’s latest Roughly Drafted blog- “Macworld: Ten Myths of the Apple iPhone”
This is his summary of the top ten iPhone FUD myths he expects to see.
http://www.roughlydrafted.com/RD/RDM.Tech.Q1.07/4DD0941D-9097-4FAE-A3BB-29DA5CA07199.html
Myth Three: The iPhone should be sold unlocked, not tied to Cingular service.
“Shortly before the iPhone’s release, Dean Hall, a seven year software engineer for Motorola, explained in an email the limited usability of an unlocked phone: “When a phone is unlocked it loses its privileges on a provider’s data network. An unlocked phone can make GSM calls and send basic SMS. No MMS, no Internet, no iTS. Apple would either have to reverse engineer a method to gain access to the data network (unlikely as most data networks require SSL-level security to access) or it would have to offer something different.” – “But as Hall points out, even if Apple were to sell the iPhone unlocked (or users were able to unlock it without authorization), the unit would only be able to make basic calls. It couldn’t do remote web, push IMAP, visual voicemail, and various other services that are key features of the device.”
“Myth Five: The iPhone is just a phone with features lots of other phones already have.
This will be popular among the Thurrott crowd, who like to downplay innovation by saying something vaguely similar has already been done.
Yes, the iPhone is a phone, but you’d have to be a complete moron with zero vision to look at it and say “it’s been done before.” Key features are not only shockingly well presented, but will be difficult to even copy.
•The multitouch screen isn’t innovative because it’s a touch screen; it’s new because it offers a finger gesture system that just makes sense and is intuitive.
•Visual voicemail is obvious in retrospect, but nobody in the last half decade of phone development at Palm or Microsoft thought to fix the problem.
•Ever use an existing phone’s web browser? Apple has demonstrated the difference between a placeholder product and a well executed one that actually works.”
It’s not just about the “reviews” of the iPhone. Suddenly, the Washington Post — the paper of record where the feds live and work — has taken an interest in the stock backdating scandal.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/10/AR2007011002605.html?nav=rss_print/asection
The cell phone providers and manufacturers are vastly more active in the halls of power than Apple. When those chits are called in, I suspect you’ll see the SEC ignoring just about every other of the 200 or so companies it is investigating and focusing a lot more attention on Steve Jobs.
The telecommunications industry is a global behemoth that intentionally cripples its products to protect a predatory pricing and business model. Steve Jobs has just called them out. They’re not going to just sit back and take it.
You know what’s really funny is that <b>this opinion piece is FUD.<b>
Really it is…
So far, the overall consensus and reviews for the iPhone have been nothing but spectacular. And yet, Steve Jack is creating fear, uncertainty and doubt about the fact that there will be FUD pieces..
Give it a rest buddy and go back redesign your website. It is god awful.
Pfft! He’s covering his butt. He’s written this piece so it gives him the legitimacy to question that might be seen to being criticial of the iPhone.
FUD is not about criticisms. If someone says the iPhone is a piece of shit, that’s not FUD. FUD is more subtle.
FUD is based more on hearsay and guessing.
“These articles will harp on the prices Apple plans to charge for the iPhone. They’ll claim the soft keyboard is difficult to use. They’ll make up even more things and they’ll find quotes from people who are supposedly not impressed with the device.”
Saying the keyboard is difficult to use is not FUD. That’s a valid criticism. Criticizing cost is not FUD.
FUD is suggesting that the phone will be unusable at the end of its two-year contract; FUD is saying because it’s OS X it won’t work properly with Windows; FUD is saying a because they’re popular, they’ll get viruses; etc etc
The secret of FUD is it realies on things that sound believable but are harder to verify.
SteveJack is right, there will be lots of FUD. But we have to be careful that we don’t treat every article that makes a criticism as FUD, and flame the writers with our flame-throwers on incinerate.
And I’m with a couple of other readers here, worrying that SteveJack’s piece is putting him in a position to flame anyone who criticizes the iPhone.
Steve Jobs did a masterful job of explaining iPhone. Three revolutionary devices rolled into one. Why the magic touch screen versus having dozens of buttons. Justification on price. The “lineup” of the leading “dumb looking” smart phones next to the sleek iPhone. This is a case where all the FUD in the world will only give iPhone more positive publicity when it is actually released. More people will be aware of iPhone when it is released.
More people were aware of the Zune release because of all the negative pre-release reviews and commentary. Some might call that FUD. However, Zune lived up to those negative expectations. It is probable that iPhone will live up to our positive expectations. Think about it… If the best the FUDsters can do is complain about battery life (which exceeds comparable devices), price (which matches the best of the less capable devices on the market today), quad-band GSM (when there is a good reason for starting with this worldwide standard), fingerprints (have a hanky handy), and Mac OS X (what’s the complaint there?), then it must be something special indeed.
I’d be more concerned if no one cared, which is the norm when a typical smart phone is released.
@ Dave
“Yes, the iPhone is a phone, but you’d have to be a complete moron with zero vision to look at it and say “it’s been done before.”
hear hear!!!
It’s been done before.
-m
MDN, for your sake and Steve Jack’s, pull this opinion piece. It’s embarassing for the both of you!
It’s STILL only got one button?
You know what? A FUD campaign does not concern me. I’m going to buy the Apple Phone (whatever it’s final name turns out to be) and that is the most I can do.
I learned a long time ago that when you try to tell people how great the Mac is and that it will be far less difficult to use than a PC, I am often met with eyeballs rolling up and the acusation of being a “cultist”. Whatever.
I bought the first iPod (5GB, $400) and never regretted it. I’d buy the iPhone today if it were on sale. And really, that’s enough for any one person to do. Let the Steve worry about FUD.
Hey Dave,
Unlocked phones can access other services than just voice and SMS!
Sorry – in Australia the practice of locked phones (i.e. tied to a specific network) is only relatively new (i.e. to the rest of the world where it has been practice from day one!)
You can still purchase unlocked phones from independent vendors and they do NOT have issues with sending MMS, accessing data networks etc.
I reckon that Motorola guy is just making excuses for the fact that handset makers have capitulated to the Networks and as a result they have assisted the networks in restricting consumer choice by locking them to their service.
Don’t get me wrong, this has been a good thing for consumers in some ways, and has driven the growth of the industry. If people had to pay FULL price for the freedom of unlocked phones, Apple wouldn’t be eyeing 1% of a billion unit market at the moment. But the time has come for a change in the model.
I’m hoping that Apple eventually do move beyond the Cingular deal.
My guess is they will work with Cingular to refine new services and products and a NEW way for device vendors (eg Apple, Nokia etc) to deal with the networks, i.e. the networks no longer have FINAL say on hardware features.
This also gives Apple time to have a stable network environment (i.e. they only have to factor in ONE network vendors requirements for now) to refine and develop their skills as telecommunications handset designers/manufacturers.
Then after two years I’d bet Apple will be saying to all the networks, OK you want our handsets, we do it OUR way!
This will be Jobs’ end game plan. To do to the telephony industry what he did to the PC and music industry, that is REDEFINE it.
Remember Jobs said in the Keynote, the iPod didn’t just change how we listened to music, it changed the whole music industry?!
But just like the iPod/iTunes was Mac only until it was refined through a few versions and then thrown open to Windows users, my money is on Jobs/Apple doing the same in the mobile phone space, Cingular only so Apple can learn the trade, then it’s open season for all on Apple’s own terms.
My 2 cents,
Luke
Its not all FUD, some is just justified and forward pushing critique. Without it we’ll never see next generation iPhone, that could be ok for me too! And that should have:
– 3G HSDPA or alternative
– GPS inside
– sliding qwerty keyboard for proper text input or other method to write documents snappier
– extra memory slot and external hard drive support (is it here allready?)
– external audio&video; input&output;
– support for 3rd party applications
– support for two SIM phone cards
Year 2009?
FUD is the crap going on over Cisco sueing Apple. You’d think it spells the end of the Apple producing a phone.
So what if Cisco wins and Apple has to rename it? Apple sticks will plummet? The world will end? Hardly. It’s just a name.
The FUD is the beatup of that story, trying to cause doubts about whether the iPhone wil come to be.
Now that’s FUD.
Well said, LukeinOz
Yu’re absolutely right – I read “comments” from (I’m guessing competitors typing furious from Vegas) where they ignore the actual specs and make up things with statements like – no bluetooth or wifi … or they make inane statements like – how is apple going to make money because unlike .mac, people will be broke after $599 … yea, I know, that makes no sense but hey, that’s Apple’s competition … or they ask Rob Glasser for a quote – wouldn’t that be like asking Donald TRump a question on hair care?
Or they go on and on about “missing features’ as if the iphone was a bridge or a sculpture in granite and once it’s done, that’s it – hello … it’s a LONG time between now and June – they could add almost anything – it’s almost all in the software – that is the only downside to having to wait – pinheads who spent $9,000 on rims for their 1998 Buick Regal complaining that no one will spend $600 for an ipod, pda, phone a mini-nano mac … as if … where is that damn pre order page?
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I gotta say that the Treo is a better phone. I can place a call to a contact out of a list of thousands in three seconds with one hand. The iPhone will involve a long scroll with far more attention required for the animated UI.
But the new widescreen video iPod may very well get me over to iPhone, where it’s all together in one device.
There are moments when advancements are undeniable and folks desire to play them down become very transparent. I can recall some saying of the 1984 Macintosh, “It doesn’t do anything you can’t do with a CLI. Why waste processor cycles on useless graphics.” The biggest thing for Apple is the iPhone will be in Cingular stores, not just Apple Stores where folk who are shopping will get to see it for themselves – and with this phone – seeing is believing.
Wait till the stripped-down version of OS X ends up in many different devices, including appliances.
Man, you ain’t seen nothing yet! The FUDs will come like a glacial avalanche.
iPhone? I want one now no matter what FUDs are out there. It really looks very slick. I might end up having a harem of impressed dates in the process. LOL!
I don’t doubt SteveJack will be proved correct. But the list of articles he includes are all positive. Examples, Steve. I know you don’t want to feed the trolls, but hey, there is validity to many above postings about the dearth of negativity regarding the iPhone. Indeed, it should be remembered that Wall Street and the tech reporting industry were in shock upon the product introduction, and at a complete loss to come up with said FUD negativity. Which is why AAPL skyrocketed upon the news and breaking the historic pattern of losing value following the keynote, as it has for the past couple of years or more. Sure there are glaring areas for growth and improvement. But as presented the iPhone doesn’t suck, and as folks seriously consider it’s features and usage the value only becomes more reasonable.
Sure, the negative FUD articles will come. I’m sure examples already exist. But they aren’t linked to in the editorial above. Maybe next time? Oh right, don’t feed the trolls.