“It seems a shame to run down the battery of an iPhone by making phone calls. There are so many more interesting things to do with it since July, when Apple Inc. opened up the popular smartphone to outside software developers,” Hiawatha Bray reports for The Boston Globe.
MacDailyNews Note: Road warriors, you can do whatever you like with an inexpensive external iPhone battery. More info:
• Solar-powered leather case for Apple iPhone keeps your battery charged – October 02, 2008
• Macally extends Apple iPhone and iPod battery life – September 30, 2008
• mophie ‘Juice Pack for iPhone 3G’ can more than double iPhone 3G’s usage time – August 05, 2008
• Kensington’s Mini Battery Pack and Charger for iPhone and iPod now available – July 15, 2008
• PC World Test: Apple iPhone 3G battery life beats out Samsung, HTC, LG, Motorola, Palm 3G handsets – July 14, 2008
Bray continues, “The result is a torrent of helpful little programs, or ‘apps,’ that turn the iPhone into a powerful handheld computer. At Apple’s iTunes online App Store, there are thousands to choose from, with more turning up every day. Which are the best? Depends what you’re looking for. I favor the powerful, the practical, and the cool – programs that do useful stuff and look stylish as they do it.”
MacDailyNews Take: As opposed to those who favor the feeble, impractical, and uncool apps that have no purpose and look dumpy while doing nothing? Sheesh.
Bray continues, covering some apps he favors, and then Mr. Negative returns to deliver one last misplaced jab by describing many things that you can do with iPhone “at least until the battery runs out.” Bray writes, “But you can save lots of juice by making fewer phone calls. You’ve got better things to do, anyway.”
Full article here.
Hiawatha Bray almost never fails to damn Apple with faint praise and/or backhanded compliments. After years of reading his stuff, Bray strikes us as real Dan Lyons / Michael S. Malone type; in other words, a fat-fingered proctologist’s dream.
SteveJack, MacDailyNews, January 09, 2007, the day Apple unveiled the original iPhone:
The main thing about the ‘iPhone’ is that it’s really a pocket Mac. It has email, SMS, full-featured Web browsing, and much more. But, beyond that, it is a platform that’s just sitting there waiting for Apple to sell software for it. Just imagine games with the large multi-touch display and the built-in accelerometer! Imagine all of the other software possibilities, too. Given Apple’s history with the iPod (closed to third-party developers), today I’d have to guess that they’ll keep the iPhone under tight control, too. Maybe that will change in the future… Maybe Apple named it iPhone because of all of the free publicity and buzz that name has already garnered. Maybe they want this trojan horse to slip into the market first under the guise of being the best smartphone available and they’ll exploit its capabilities as a full-fledged platform later. Perhaps it’s easier to explain and sell as a phone first. So, yeah, it can be a phone, even the very best smartphone, but it’s so much more and holds so much promise that the name “iPhone” hardly does it justice.
They could have reflected on the number one smart phone position in the USA (and soon the world). They could have talked about the iPhone being the most used smart phone or cell phone device in the Internet. Or, etc…
Are these idiots being paid to type this stuff?
For the Windows sufferers:
“A fat-fingered proctologist’s dream” because they’re all giant a$$holes.
Donkeys ‘Bray’ about things.
The iPhone is NOT a powerful handheld computer
A scientific calculator is a powerful handheld computer by the same definition.
The iPhone is a TOY, with some useful features, nothing more.
A MacBook Pro with 4GB of RAM, a 320 GB 7200 RPM hard drive, Fusion 2.0 with several operating systems running at once IS A POWERFUL HANDHELD COMPUTER!
A powerful handheld computer will run spreadsheets and copy and paste!
I close my case. Flame away if you think you need to, but I’m not drinking the cool-aid on the iPhone this time.
*Kissing the MBP a REAL computer*
Why bag on a positive article?
On the other hand, and in spite of the back-handed complement, at least somebody can see beyond the cellphone/smartphone miasma – Come on folks, it’s the world’s first real hand-held computer – Everything else is just a “smartphone”. Who gives a flying… umm, well… you know – about the incidental fact that you can make phone calls with it, that’s just an extra feature.
(And in my barely humble opinion the tired old term “smartphone” should be retired along with MP3. But that’s just my opinion.)
@ Raving Machead
If you don’t get the idea that the iPhone and touch are both powerful handheld computers by now, you’re a blathering idiot. I mean, what part of running multi-touch OS X on a small handheld device don’t you understand?
There is a very easy and simple test to figure out if a device qualifies as toy or as useful tool: check if women are buying and using it.
As we all know, women stop playing with toys in their pre-teen years. Men continue to play with toys throughout their lives; they get perfect excuse when they have their own children, and those that do not still continue (model trains, RC airplanes, gadgets, electronics, etc).
IPhone has seen very broad adoption among women. And they use it not just as a phone, but as what it really is — a handheld computer.
Raving Machead may have extremely stiff criteria that defines “powerful handheld computer”. However, it is rather inaccurate (while MBP is portable, it isn’t handheld) and beside the point.
It is clear to anyone that iPhone forever changed the handheld computing market. While you can never have notebook power in a cellphone (just like you’ll never have desktop power in a notebook), an iPhone already has more processing power than $5,000 desktop of less than ten years ago. Dont forget, we used to edit digital video on those G3 machines back then.
I strongly disagree with Raving MacHead.
i’m using my iPod Touch instead of my laptop in many cases, and mostly, it covers all of my mobile needs.
I only miss it when developing software. Other than that, it’s the best thing ever invented for mobile users.
Hiawatha Bray, sounds like a character from a Cartoon. In reality he’s a tool, who in the past has had very little good to say about Apple, so why should Mac fans have any faith in his drivel, he’s still a jerk.
“A fat-fingered proctologist’s dream” is really a stupid thing to say. It brings imagery to the mind that doesn’t enforce your point, but distracts with a really nasty image. I don’t know how long it took you to think of that, or what middle school pervert you first heard it from, but it really makes you sound worthless to stick it at the end of your article. Sick, man. Sick. You give Mac enthusiasts a bad name.
The iPhone has a more powerful CPU, has more RAM, more storage, a higher definition screen and better internet interfacing than the first iMacs.
No one had any trouble calling calling the first iMacs powerful consumer computers.
iPhone is the new Amiga.
Sound strange?
Here’s why. The reason that the Amiga was so popular before Commodore played Dracula with it, was that small, creative developers could easily put out great software. With the iPhone, Joe Coder with a great idea can EASILY compete with EA, Microsoft or Sega. This means that innovation and creativity can and will trump corporate strength.
GO IPHONE!
“As opposed to those who favor the feeble, impractical, and uncool apps that have no purpose and look dumpy while doing nothing? Sheesh.”
I’ll have you know I’m fully satisfied with my “I’m Rich” and “Fart” Apps.
Err. Wasn’t Hiawatha a girl?
Incidentally, as far as the iPhone being a powerful handheld computer, it is THE most powerful HHC. I could say that even the cheapest version comes with more RAM than any computer out there, but that’s not really the point. If you think it is powerful and multi-talented now, wait and watch for a few more months and years.
@Raving MacHead
It’s clear, sir, that you cannot differentiate between “handheld” and “portable” . . . which is odd, because it’s intuitively obvious to one and all on this site that your hand has been “holding” for most of your life.
Your masturbatory excesses have become more than a little tedious, RM. Please satisfy yourself elsewhere.
@everyone who sees the light,
As soon as someone, Apple et. al., comes out with an external keyboard for iPhone/Touch, similar to what came out for Palm devices, it’s definitely gonna be all that I need about 90% of the time to get real work done while on the go.
Any takers?
“…but it’s so much more and holds so much promise that the name ‘iPhone’ hardly does it justice.”
‘iMac’ was already taken.
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Yeah, now all we need is;
Cut/Copy/Paste
MMS
Turn-by-Turn GPS
Video Recording
Email Search
Flash Based Websites
Full screen Safari mode
App store refunds
Landscape mode throughout main applications (Including home page)
Push notification server
Voice activated commands
File Access
iWork (Office Suite)
Wireless printing through Airport Express
Bluetooth music streaming
Wireless home music access
Disk mode
Spotlight
Finder
Landscape keyboard viewing with in every app
iChat
Photo sharing
Zooming in camera
Download from iTunes Store without Wi-Fi
Enhanced iCal
Update iPhone Software from phone using Wi-Fi
Built in Dictionary Thesaurus (Made by Apple)
Battery percent icon
Ability to turn off Wi-Fi, change Wi-Fi, turn on Wi-Fi from the menu bar (along with cell signal and 3G network
Wi-Fi Syncing
Name home screen pages
Make moving icons from page to page easier
Settings songs as alert songs
Forward text messages
Select Text
Shake to shuffle
Send multiple photos in email message
PDF Viewer
Syncing of notes
Inbox in email for multiple accounts
Ability to turn off auto-completion
Junk mail filter
Java
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiawatha