The QWERTY soft keyboard looks to be a non-starter in portrait orientation, but a T9+ is definitely doable, and QWERTY in landscape mode is doable.
Wow. You actually see Apple implementing T9? Honestly, I don't. I think they find something like that almost repugnant and off the table. may as well put in a phone button pad.
Huh? That makes zero sense. The iPod can do more than nano can, well at least it used to be more obvious. That doesn't stop the nano from being the worlds most popular mp3 player. In it's current incarnation, even if the iPhone was available in every country in the world, not carrier locked and contract- free it still wouldn't have a hope of being the worlds number one phone, simply because of it's price. The iPhone nano is absolutely going to sell more units than the iPhone because of its smaller cost, and when Apple leaves WiFi / Internet out in its first incarnation that alone will get many people looking towards the iPhone, and those who can't afford one will still get the nano because it will be the coolest regular phone on the planet.
iPhone nano is coming, that much is certain.
I never said it wasn't coming. I just said it wasn't coming soon. And I stand by that statement.
And you missed my point about the iPhone being a multi-purpose device. The iPhone wouldn't be what it is if it didn't have the iPod component of it or if it didn't have the internet component of it. Crippling a device that already has a lot of room to grow would be a stupid idea, especially when that could cannibalize iPod Touch sales. Also, Apple is not a cell phone company. The only reason Apple is making a phone is because they realize that going towards the future, phones could be replacing MP3 players entirely, and that phones are also becoming more and more the connection between the home computer and the mobile world. Apple would never make a cell phone that was solely a cell phone. If they made an iPhone nano, it would pretty much have to have all of the capability the current iPhone has. But making the iPhone physically smaller would be very tricky in two regards: getting all of the components to fit inside a tiny box, and also getting the UI to work.
I never said it wasn't coming. I just said it wasn't coming soon. And I stand by that statement.
And you missed my point about the iPhone being a multi-purpose device. The iPhone wouldn't be what it is if it didn't have the iPod component of it or if it didn't have the internet component of it. Crippling a device that already has a lot of room to grow would be a stupid idea, especially when that could cannibalize iPod Touch sales. Also, Apple is not a cell phone company. The only reason Apple is making a phone is because they realize that going towards the future, phones could be replacing MP3 players entirely, and that phones are also becoming more and more the connection between the home computer and the mobile world. Apple would never make a cell phone that was solely a cell phone. If they made an iPhone nano, it would pretty much have to have all of the capability the current iPhone has. But making the iPhone physically smaller would be very tricky in two regards: getting all of the components to fit inside a tiny box, and also getting the UI to work.
I don't see an iPhone nano in 2008.
Interesting. And Apple isn't cellphone company? Weird, I though they made a cellphone.
Wow. You actually see Apple implementing T9? Honestly, I don't. I think they find something like that almost repugnant and off the table. may as well put in a phone button pad.
yes, I definitely agree with Outsider on this one. T9? Forget about it. That technology is too flawed. Think about proper nouns like the name of a restaurant, they require you to tap it out old school style. This isn't the only flaw to T9. And multi-touch is what makes typing on a screen such a breeze. Apple is going to move toward showing what their new technologies can bring to the table. QWERTY in landscape.
As for whether there is any money to be made in the "iPhone nano" market, I would venture an educated guess at saying there is plenty of money to be made there. Apple is making a killing off the touch and iPhone. If something along these lines came in at around $250 (4 Gb model) they'll be more than okay. (Just think, they justified the 4GB iPhone for $299 last summer. Bigger screen, wi-fi antenna, bigger battery for bigger screen etc etc). Time will tell. I wouldn't be surprised if this was right around the corner too.
Interesting. And Apple isn't cellphone company? Weird, I though they made a cellphone.
You let me know when Apple makes a plain and simple cell phone. The thing that defines the iPhone is that it's not just a cell phone. It's a mobile computer in a way. It's an iPod. It's Smartphone/PDA. Apple would not be in the cell phone business if it weren't for the fact that the iPhone is not JUST a cell phone.
Wow. You actually see Apple implementing T9? Honestly, I don't. I think they find something like that almost repugnant and off the table. may as well put in a phone button pad.
Well, T9 repels me too. But if you think about it, there are probably as many T9 users as there are personal computer (desktop & laptop) QWERTY keyboard users because the world cell phone market is going to be 1 billion units in 2008. Some large percentage of that are active T9 users.
After spending a month in Southeast Asia (Vietnam), virtually everyone 60 years and younger are experienced with T9 and SMS. QWERTY phones were very few and far between. In fact, I think I saw more iPhones than I did QWERTY phones. (Not a sensical statement considering the iPhone has a QWERTY, but you get my point.) As I recall from my trips to Sweden and Italy before that, T9 is also the prevailing method for text entry in phones there. I do not think Africa and Asia will be any different.
That experience is leading me to believe that T9 will be with us forever, just like QWERTY keyboards will. Part of that belief also stems from human issues involving how wide a mobile should be, er, how wide a telephone or mobile telephone is perceived to be. 2.4" wide is too wide because and a device about 2" wide or a little bit less is psychologicaly considered a phone because that's been the way it is for a very long time now. There are many comments from many people that placing a 2.5" wide device next to one's ears makes one feel like a dork. There are also other cultural issues driving the size of mobiles smaller and cheaper as well, but won't get into that.
It's really in the USA where 2.5" wide devices with QWERTY has taken off. I really think it stems from a couple of things. It's RIM / Palm business dominated devices bleeding into the consumer market, and PCs with email is the dominant electronic communication device. The USA has tremendous penetration with PCs and email, while almost everywhere else in the world, people have no computers and the cell phone is basically the most used computing device.
So in the USA, there are factors that make QWERTY much more popular. Just saw a TV commercial for cell phone service and the 3 phones in the commercial were all QWERTY phones! SMS and MMS are very limited (160 characters on Verizon and whatever the MMS limit is). It's used yes, but here in the USA, I think the ideal is really email and the marketing train is heading that way. So phones with QWERTY thumb boards abound here.
Will the rest of the world start using QWERTY thumb boards? Well, only the affluent, the geeks, and the connected. I think it's going to be less than 10% for a long while. Maybe in 5 years there would be more penetration, but not the near future.
Back to the iPhone nano. Yes T9, but a T9+. Apple wouldn't be implementing T9 straight. It would be an Apple T9, and who knows what that would be like. It's not hopeless as you think though. QWERTY in lanscape orientation should be implemented in all text fields (with simple auto-rotation switching between T9-portrait and QWERTY-landscape). Apple still needs to do this for the current iPhone software let alone a new version. The way text is entered in iPhone Safari text fields definitely needs refinement.
Not to mention pop-up buttons too. The rolodex clock is... inappropriate for Safari. Now pop-up pie menus, that would be a very very interesting thing for a touch interface.
Browsing on anything smaller than the current iPhone wouldn't be a very enjoyable experience IME. The current iPhone form factor is as small as it can get and still have a decent browsing experience.
Well, the proposal is a 3 to 3.2" 480x320 screen. You're losing nothing in pixels. The screen size would go down about 25%, so some things have to be changed. I would hazard a guess that Safari on this screen would be much better than competing phones which would be on the order of 2.5" 320x240. A 3" screen would be 40+% bigger!
And it shouldn't be the same experience as the current iPhone (or vice versa). The current iPhone should be better, it has to be as it is also more expensive.
To further the case, the LG Prada, LG Viewty, HTC Touch, HTC Tilt, Samsung F700, Sony P1, Nokia N95-3, Palm Treo, Blackberry Curve, they all have screens 3" diag or less. In 2007, a 3" screen on a cell phone would be considered an "enormous" screen. It is by no means a small screen. Safari on a 3" will be better compared to them.
Quote:
While it would be nice for Apple to have a cheaper entry level phone, its difficult to come up with one that has the enough features to even justify paying for. The phone Ireland showed is nice looking but who would pay for phone and mp3 player when most carriers give those away?
It's already been said that an iPhone "nano" shouldn't be like in the first post from Ireland, but should have all the same exact features as the current iPhone as has been said multiple times already. You are getting everything the current iPhone has, but in a smaller package. (Of course the current iPhone would be updated to have more features if an iPhone nano came into being )
If they made an iPhone nano, it would pretty much have to have all of the capability the current iPhone has. But making the iPhone physically smaller would be very tricky in two regards: getting all of the components to fit inside a tiny box, and also getting the UI to work.
Well, for the former, I think that is a no brainer. For an iPhone nano with a 4x2 inch planform form factor, it'll need to be 0.63 inches thick to match the volume of the current iPhone. The rest is rearranging. In addition, a lot of components in 2008 will be half the size of components in 2007. 8 GB of flash storage? Half the size. A newer ARM SoC? Half the size. So, it probably is more on the order of 0.55 inches.
For the latter, certain parts of the UI will need changes. This will involve some work, but its UI work. A Cocoa SDK with an Interface Builder module for iPhone nano could make it quick work.
yes, I definitely agree with Outsider on this one. T9? Forget about it. That technology is too flawed. Think about proper nouns like the name of a restaurant, they require you to tap it out old school style. This isn't the only flaw to T9.
Most of which are fixed in the followup to T9.... XT9. Been available on at least Sony Ericsson phones for a while now.
However, I think Apple won't use that as they're too myopically American.
Everyone I know makes use of T9. I think the fact that QWERTY keyboards are more commonly preferred here in the states probabaly adds to no one wanting T9 here.
I'm still alive with the 3" to 3.2" screen! It wasn't that big of a prediction anyways.
Anyways, these capacitance screens are not for the iPhone obviously, as Apple would never ship a non-symmetrical device like these. Maybe just screen prototypes.
Comments
The QWERTY soft keyboard looks to be a non-starter in portrait orientation, but a T9+ is definitely doable, and QWERTY in landscape mode is doable.
Wow. You actually see Apple implementing T9? Honestly, I don't. I think they find something like that almost repugnant and off the table. may as well put in a phone button pad.
Huh? That makes zero sense. The iPod can do more than nano can, well at least it used to be more obvious. That doesn't stop the nano from being the worlds most popular mp3 player. In it's current incarnation, even if the iPhone was available in every country in the world, not carrier locked and contract- free it still wouldn't have a hope of being the worlds number one phone, simply because of it's price. The iPhone nano is absolutely going to sell more units than the iPhone because of its smaller cost, and when Apple leaves WiFi / Internet out in its first incarnation that alone will get many people looking towards the iPhone, and those who can't afford one will still get the nano because it will be the coolest regular phone on the planet.
iPhone nano is coming, that much is certain.
I never said it wasn't coming. I just said it wasn't coming soon. And I stand by that statement.
And you missed my point about the iPhone being a multi-purpose device. The iPhone wouldn't be what it is if it didn't have the iPod component of it or if it didn't have the internet component of it. Crippling a device that already has a lot of room to grow would be a stupid idea, especially when that could cannibalize iPod Touch sales. Also, Apple is not a cell phone company. The only reason Apple is making a phone is because they realize that going towards the future, phones could be replacing MP3 players entirely, and that phones are also becoming more and more the connection between the home computer and the mobile world. Apple would never make a cell phone that was solely a cell phone. If they made an iPhone nano, it would pretty much have to have all of the capability the current iPhone has. But making the iPhone physically smaller would be very tricky in two regards: getting all of the components to fit inside a tiny box, and also getting the UI to work.
I don't see an iPhone nano in 2008.
I never said it wasn't coming. I just said it wasn't coming soon. And I stand by that statement.
And you missed my point about the iPhone being a multi-purpose device. The iPhone wouldn't be what it is if it didn't have the iPod component of it or if it didn't have the internet component of it. Crippling a device that already has a lot of room to grow would be a stupid idea, especially when that could cannibalize iPod Touch sales. Also, Apple is not a cell phone company. The only reason Apple is making a phone is because they realize that going towards the future, phones could be replacing MP3 players entirely, and that phones are also becoming more and more the connection between the home computer and the mobile world. Apple would never make a cell phone that was solely a cell phone. If they made an iPhone nano, it would pretty much have to have all of the capability the current iPhone has. But making the iPhone physically smaller would be very tricky in two regards: getting all of the components to fit inside a tiny box, and also getting the UI to work.
I don't see an iPhone nano in 2008.
Interesting. And Apple isn't cellphone company? Weird, I though they made a cellphone.
Wow. You actually see Apple implementing T9? Honestly, I don't. I think they find something like that almost repugnant and off the table. may as well put in a phone button pad.
yes, I definitely agree with Outsider on this one. T9? Forget about it. That technology is too flawed. Think about proper nouns like the name of a restaurant, they require you to tap it out old school style. This isn't the only flaw to T9. And multi-touch is what makes typing on a screen such a breeze. Apple is going to move toward showing what their new technologies can bring to the table. QWERTY in landscape.
As for whether there is any money to be made in the "iPhone nano" market, I would venture an educated guess at saying there is plenty of money to be made there. Apple is making a killing off the touch and iPhone. If something along these lines came in at around $250 (4 Gb model) they'll be more than okay. (Just think, they justified the 4GB iPhone for $299 last summer. Bigger screen, wi-fi antenna, bigger battery for bigger screen etc etc). Time will tell. I wouldn't be surprised if this was right around the corner too.
Interesting. And Apple isn't cellphone company? Weird, I though they made a cellphone.
You let me know when Apple makes a plain and simple cell phone. The thing that defines the iPhone is that it's not just a cell phone. It's a mobile computer in a way. It's an iPod. It's Smartphone/PDA. Apple would not be in the cell phone business if it weren't for the fact that the iPhone is not JUST a cell phone.
Wow. You actually see Apple implementing T9? Honestly, I don't. I think they find something like that almost repugnant and off the table. may as well put in a phone button pad.
Well, T9 repels me too. But if you think about it, there are probably as many T9 users as there are personal computer (desktop & laptop) QWERTY keyboard users because the world cell phone market is going to be 1 billion units in 2008. Some large percentage of that are active T9 users.
After spending a month in Southeast Asia (Vietnam), virtually everyone 60 years and younger are experienced with T9 and SMS. QWERTY phones were very few and far between. In fact, I think I saw more iPhones than I did QWERTY phones. (Not a sensical statement considering the iPhone has a QWERTY, but you get my point.) As I recall from my trips to Sweden and Italy before that, T9 is also the prevailing method for text entry in phones there. I do not think Africa and Asia will be any different.
That experience is leading me to believe that T9 will be with us forever, just like QWERTY keyboards will. Part of that belief also stems from human issues involving how wide a mobile should be, er, how wide a telephone or mobile telephone is perceived to be. 2.4" wide is too wide because and a device about 2" wide or a little bit less is psychologicaly considered a phone because that's been the way it is for a very long time now. There are many comments from many people that placing a 2.5" wide device next to one's ears makes one feel like a dork. There are also other cultural issues driving the size of mobiles smaller and cheaper as well, but won't get into that.
It's really in the USA where 2.5" wide devices with QWERTY has taken off. I really think it stems from a couple of things. It's RIM / Palm business dominated devices bleeding into the consumer market, and PCs with email is the dominant electronic communication device. The USA has tremendous penetration with PCs and email, while almost everywhere else in the world, people have no computers and the cell phone is basically the most used computing device.
So in the USA, there are factors that make QWERTY much more popular. Just saw a TV commercial for cell phone service and the 3 phones in the commercial were all QWERTY phones! SMS and MMS are very limited (160 characters on Verizon and whatever the MMS limit is). It's used yes, but here in the USA, I think the ideal is really email and the marketing train is heading that way. So phones with QWERTY thumb boards abound here.
Will the rest of the world start using QWERTY thumb boards? Well, only the affluent, the geeks, and the connected. I think it's going to be less than 10% for a long while. Maybe in 5 years there would be more penetration, but not the near future.
Back to the iPhone nano. Yes T9, but a T9+. Apple wouldn't be implementing T9 straight. It would be an Apple T9, and who knows what that would be like. It's not hopeless as you think though. QWERTY in lanscape orientation should be implemented in all text fields (with simple auto-rotation switching between T9-portrait and QWERTY-landscape). Apple still needs to do this for the current iPhone software let alone a new version. The way text is entered in iPhone Safari text fields definitely needs refinement.
Not to mention pop-up buttons too. The rolodex clock is... inappropriate for Safari. Now pop-up pie menus, that would be a very very interesting thing for a touch interface.
Browsing on anything smaller than the current iPhone wouldn't be a very enjoyable experience IME. The current iPhone form factor is as small as it can get and still have a decent browsing experience.
Well, the proposal is a 3 to 3.2" 480x320 screen. You're losing nothing in pixels. The screen size would go down about 25%, so some things have to be changed. I would hazard a guess that Safari on this screen would be much better than competing phones which would be on the order of 2.5" 320x240. A 3" screen would be 40+% bigger!
And it shouldn't be the same experience as the current iPhone (or vice versa). The current iPhone should be better, it has to be as it is also more expensive.
To further the case, the LG Prada, LG Viewty, HTC Touch, HTC Tilt, Samsung F700, Sony P1, Nokia N95-3, Palm Treo, Blackberry Curve, they all have screens 3" diag or less. In 2007, a 3" screen on a cell phone would be considered an "enormous" screen. It is by no means a small screen. Safari on a 3" will be better compared to them.
While it would be nice for Apple to have a cheaper entry level phone, its difficult to come up with one that has the enough features to even justify paying for. The phone Ireland showed is nice looking but who would pay for phone and mp3 player when most carriers give those away?
It's already been said that an iPhone "nano" shouldn't be like in the first post from Ireland, but should have all the same exact features as the current iPhone as has been said multiple times already. You are getting everything the current iPhone has, but in a smaller package. (Of course the current iPhone would be updated to have more features if an iPhone nano came into being
If they made an iPhone nano, it would pretty much have to have all of the capability the current iPhone has. But making the iPhone physically smaller would be very tricky in two regards: getting all of the components to fit inside a tiny box, and also getting the UI to work.
Well, for the former, I think that is a no brainer. For an iPhone nano with a 4x2 inch planform form factor, it'll need to be 0.63 inches thick to match the volume of the current iPhone. The rest is rearranging. In addition, a lot of components in 2008 will be half the size of components in 2007. 8 GB of flash storage? Half the size. A newer ARM SoC? Half the size. So, it probably is more on the order of 0.55 inches.
For the latter, certain parts of the UI will need changes. This will involve some work, but its UI work. A Cocoa SDK with an Interface Builder module for iPhone nano could make it quick work.
I don't see an iPhone nano in 2008.
That's a possibility.
yes, I definitely agree with Outsider on this one. T9? Forget about it. That technology is too flawed. Think about proper nouns like the name of a restaurant, they require you to tap it out old school style. This isn't the only flaw to T9.
Most of which are fixed in the followup to T9.... XT9. Been available on at least Sony Ericsson phones for a while now.
However, I think Apple won't use that as they're too myopically American.
http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/bac...s-touchscreen/
Anyways, these capacitance screens are not for the iPhone obviously, as Apple would never ship a non-symmetrical device like these. Maybe just screen prototypes.