Did any of your readers actually LOOK at the images from XSKN's website that AppleInsider posted? They show an iPhone case with a cut-out top left that looks like a USB connector. This is more like one of those Made-in-China iPhone knock-offs than a real iPhone. If XSKN is actually selling iPhone cases, they are different from the website images.
The "iPhone Nano" case images on the site are identical to the iPhone case images. All of the large range of colour variations show the same iPhone screen, which happens to be one used on Apple's site. So XSKN may have advance information of an "iPhone Nano", but it won't necessarily look like a scaled-down PhotoShop of the real iPhone. If Apple has produced such a device, which I very much doubt, it would surely have found ways to shed some functionality while adding others.
"Resolution Independence" is a goal that Apple has pursued recently, but the iPhone keyboard, for example, is miniaturised enough already, so an "iPhone Nano" that has some kind of "Spaces" that switches between two screens, keyboard and display, each a landscape 320 x 240 representing half a standard iPhone portrait 480 x 320 display, for example, might compensate for the smaller size. Tilt sensors, of course, would switch between the two.
Even so, packing almost the same functionality into an even smaller device than the iPhone is hardly likely to produce very much in the way of cost savings, so if this is real, Apple will have surely developed significant ways to differentiate the "iPhone Nano" from the real thing.
I wouldn't put it past Jobs to release a second phone to get around the contract with AT&T. Being smaller, it's not the same phone and the contract wouldn't apply. However, I don't think that will happen.
The original iPhone is pretty big in one's palm. A narrower one would be easier to hold. However, does the screen size need to be the same to support the apps? I guess new apps could support both.
If this thing supports CDMA, then they could sell it unlocked and force all cell phone providers to compete among themselves for it. The iPhone Nano would be out of scope of their contract with AT&T.
And just how is my statement a false comparison? You either misread my post, or don't understand Apple's family of products.
By using iPods in your example in an attempt to disprove my statements on the iPhone nano rumor, you implied that the two are similar, which they aren't. You even grouped in the iPod touch, which is notably different from Apple's Click Wheel iPods.
Quote:
Originally Posted by iReality85
The last I checked, Apple markets the touch as an iPod, not as a watered-down iPhone, regardless of how you interpret it as such (its interface being irrelevant).
Of course they don't advertise the iPod touch as a neutered iPhone, that would be bad marketing. But everyone knows the iPod touch is a phone-less iPhone due to their identical interfaces, identical touch/gesture based controls, identical screens (and aspect ratios), and near identical enclosures. The iPod touch stands in stark contrast to the iPod nano and iPod classic (and obviously the iPod shuffle, which is its own thing - a screen-less iPod) because of the touch's far more complex (yet very intuitive) interface and far more complex (yet very intuitive) method of control: direct manipulation of onscreen elements via the touchscreen, as well as the MultiTouch gestures it allows.
"Traditional" iPods use indirect control through Click Wheels, akin to a computer mouse, so its interface is very scalable (up for the iPod classic, down for the iPod nano) because the user doesn't have to actually touch the onscreen elements, just scroll to them with the touch-sensitive Click Wheel and use the pause, play, ff, rr buttons for media control.
So interface/controls are quite relevant.
Quote:
Originally Posted by iReality85
Apple's family of iPods have not cannibalized each other to a great extent, as the classic/nano/touch cater to different crowds.
True. As I said, all iPods are under the once exploding mp3 player market, which is still growing today. Each iPod - shuffle, nano, classic, touch - targets a different part of that market. It differs from the cellular market, where dumbphone sales are stagnant thanks to over-saturation
while the only major growth segment is in smartphones. I'll get to why that's important further down (so watch for an *).
Quote:
Originally Posted by iReality85
iPods are music players, primarily, and the iPhone is a phone, primarily and should be distinguished as such, not by their interfaces. To compare them by interface is categorically incorrect, and not what Apple does (at least for the time being).
Apple doesn't have to distinguish the iPod nano's and iPod classic's interface/control scheme from the iPhone/iPod touch's interface/control scheme. People can see that with their own eyes, they're very different interfaces and require very different control schemes.
In this discussion, however, it's important to make those differences clear because they tell us the likelihood (or lack there of) of things like an iPhone nano.
Quote:
Originally Posted by iReality85
What you suggested in your original post was that a rumored "iPhone nano" would cannibalize iPhone sales, which I just don't think is true.
I didn't really make an issue of the cannibalization issue, just your comparison of iPhones and iPods. I'll say on the subject, that an iPhone nano would cannibalize iPhone sales because *since Apple would not make a dumbphone (ie, has physical number keys, a tiny little screen, no useable web browser, etc.), an iPhone nano would have to be a smaller iPhone, one that would closely resemble the full-size iPhone. iPods don't cannibalize each other much because they are very differentiated in physical size, enclosure design, price, storage capacity, you name it; the iPod touch can get away with having around the same price and storage capacity as the iPod nano because the touch is quite different in functionality and interface/control.
A slightly smaller iPhone would canabalize iPhone sales because they simply wouldn't be different enough - both would still be smartphones (because again, Apple won't go into to dumbphone market), both would look rather similar. That's why I said a smaller iPhone could replace the full-size iPhone, but not be sold alongside the current full-size iPhone.
Hope that makes sense.
Quote:
Originally Posted by iReality85
Also wobegon, you need to edit your 3rd post. Your quote is wrong, it was not me who said that...
I'm not sure why so many people think this is a fake. Having more than one phone in their lineup would be a very good thing. The iPhone 3G costs $200 to the consumer up front, plus you throw on an expensive data plan to boot. With a smaller screen (same resolution) they could still run the same apps as the 3G phone. If the screen isn't that different in physical size (it doesn't appear to be), it would likely function with the current applications just fine. The touch areas on the iPhone are pretty forgiving anyway. Most people just don't get the details like on the on/off touch controls. I see folks swipe the switch in the direction of off or on. If you inspect how it works a little closer, you will see that simply touching or swiping anywhere on the entire menu item, will trigger the switch to toggle. This even includes purposefully swiping your finger the opposite direction. These sorts of user forgiveness built into the UI would make it usable on a slightly higher density display without modification.
I'm seeing this as a very real device. With 2.5G Edge it could even come with a cheaper data plan to top off the upfront savings. This is probably the $99 iPhone that we have been hearing so much about, but it was delayed as so many things are. Some of you say why would they cannibalize the iPhone 3G? Simply put, they would sell more phones with a lower average selling price. That isn't really looked at as cannibalization, it is considered a "portfolio of products". If the price/feature gaps are correct, they can increase sells significantly, grow the revenue base of subscription kickbacks from the providers, and easily make their unit targets. Not to mention that it is that many more folks hitting the App Store, iTunes, and wanting a Mac. Better buys some more AAPL at these prices.
no acces to the app store, no need for data plans... just regular cell plans and sms plans
this will be the iphone for people that just want a phone... phone, text, that kind of functionality. might even have a better camera on allowable by the thickness of the product.
The Blackberry Bold has the same 320x480 resolution screen as the iPhone and it's half the size so it's definitely possible. Usability will be horrible though because at WWDC Apple went through a whole list of statistics about how accurately finger touches can be detected. At the current bit-depth, 44x44 pixels is considered the suggested size. If you go higher rez, you can display everything but to get accurate touches, you need to increase the hit area to 88x88 or whatever.
My bet is this: I think Apple intentionally put out fake products (at least case dimensions, etc.) to screw these companies over. At the MacBook event, Steve said "it's not funny" in regards to the leaked images. I think he wants to f them over.
If this thing supports CDMA, then they could sell it unlocked and force all cell phone providers to compete among themselves for it. The iPhone Nano would be out of scope of their contract with AT&T.
My contract with Verizon is up next month and in November I wandered in to a Verizon store and asked one of the guys there when Verizon would be getting the iPhone. I also said I was very satisfied with Verizon and wasn't going to switch to AT&T just to get the iPhone. He said wait early next year before getting a new phone as he had heard an internal rumor that Verizon was going to getting a smaller iPhone and he did use the word Nano. I don't know how much credence to give to this as usually counter people are the last to know what's going on within a company.
The Blackberry Bold has the same 320x480 resolution screen as the iPhone and it's half the size so it's definitely possible. Usability will be horrible though because at WWDC Apple went through a whole list of statistics about how accurately finger touches can be detected. At the current bit-depth, 44x44 pixels is considered the suggested size. If you go higher rez, you can display everything but to get accurate touches, you need to increase the hit area to 88x88 or whatever.
My bet is this: I think Apple intentionally put out fake products (at least case dimensions, etc.) to screw these companies over. At the MacBook event, Steve said "it's not funny" in regards to the leaked images. I think he wants to f them over.
Interesting comments but I disagree.
The bold is indeed smaller, but it's not a touch screen and I believe the statistics you quoted from WWDC more than your other arguments. Also if Apple was putting out fake product descriptions and purposely sending them to case manufacturers that would be criminal fraud unless the new product was very carefully described as "suggested" and even then ... well no company wants to purposely push that kind of nastiness on it's "ecosystem" partners.
It is a mystery why (if the nano is real) these idiots were allowed to leak for the second time though.
The main problem with the smaller screen is input as you point out. Even though you don't mention it, the keyboard would have to be different for starters and that's a big deal although I wouldn't put it past Apple to come up with a useable solution for that.
If this product is real, it has to differentiate itself from the main product or the main product (today's iPhone) has no reason to exist. Since the main barrier to iPhone adoption is the carriers themselves and the outrageous pricing of their data packages, it makes sense that the nano iPhone would address that problem and fill the niche of the lower priced *non-data* phone. So if the nano exists at all, it will likely be a phone without a data package, but probably with Wi-Fi.
Games would be conceivable, but they would have to be re-issued for the new form factor. Like the touch, it would have weather widgets etc. but they would only update in Wi-Fi areas. It would be basic phone plus iPod, and probably about a hundred bucks. In a year or so, it could easily be one of the choices of "free" phones that carriers hand out with a basic contract.
This also allows Apple to stop reducing the price of the regular iPhone and might be one of the best arguments for the nano in general. All previous cell-phones have ended up being devalued over time to the point where they sell for nothing. The existence of the nano would mean that Apple could keep the iPhone at it's current price and add new features with each revision, positioning it as the teleological goal of all phones etc. while the nano becomes the "throwaway" technology demo phone.
no acces to the app store, no need for data plans... just regular cell plans and sms plans
this will be the iphone for people that just want a phone... phone, text, that kind of functionality. might even have a better camera on allowable by the thickness of the product.
Ugh, folks, the iPhone already surpassed the "just a phone" Motorola RAZR this year to become the #1 best selling phone in the US, which the RAZR had held the title of for the past 12 consecutive quarters!
Ugh, folks, the iPhone already surpassed the "just a phone" Motorola RAZR this year to become the #1 best selling phone in the US, which the RAZR had held the title of for the past 12 consecutive quarters!
They don't need to make a "just a phone" iPhone.
I think the assumption is that it will be "just a phone" with iTunes (a significant difference), and possibly games.
Not the same thing as a RAZR or an LG chocolate or any of the other phones in that category.
I recall reading somewhere that AT&T's deal with Apple is for ALL phones they make. They even had a provision that Apple could not make any CDMA phones while on contract with AT&T.... this was never officially confirmed but I think it's unlikely for Apple to make any kind of carrier changes. They seem pretty happy with the AT&T deal.
As for the fakes -- I don't think they would put "official" fakes but try to leak some kind of fake info. They did it with the original iPhone. There was a lot of people like Kevin Rose that was convinced he got reliable tips about the iPhone before it was announced and almost all of his tips turned out to be false. It was later revealed that Apple planted these tips to continue secrecy.
Update:
Here's a great article from Wired Magazine that shows how Apple planted misinformation when the original iPhone was coming out.
Has anyone considered that the main problem with this "leak" and the iPhone nano idea is that if the screen is a different resolution or aspect ratio then all the apps will be incompatible.
That is your first mistake, some apps would be very usable on a screen with lower pixel counts. The SDK is specifically written such that views adapt to the screen width. You can see this happen in many apps by simply rotating scrolling list from vertical to horizontal. Now this does imply that the programmer coded his app correctly but it is clear that many apps will be fine.
Quote:
Any cheaper iPhone will be based on the same screen shape and I'd say size since higher dpi screen (smaller) or the chips to somehow scale everything in real time would make this "nano" more expensive. The only way out is if the whole OS and dev environment goes vector graphics.
Like vector graphics don't require computational horse power. In any event it is not a given that higher dpi will result in a higher price to Apple, it is not like Apple is pushing resolution on the current iPhone. In fact for it's screen size it is rather low resolution. Of course this goes back to what is important resolution or things like durability and readability in sun light.
I look at it this way; Apple needs a smaller device because so many believe that a small phone is the way to go. Obviously this needs to be overcomed with a visually smaller device. Once people have such a device though they may begin to realize that all the devices features would be better delivered on a larger screen device.
Heck I think that now with the 3G iPhone. Not that I want a hugely bigger IPhone just that I want the biggest sceen possible in a pocketable device. Even a quarter inch of hieght and an inch or so of length would make typing this response a bit easier. That may not sound like much but look at the number of extra pixels it puts on the screen. A very good trade off that won't grow the iPhone excessively in size.
Look, if Apple were to announce an iPhone Nano, don't you think Steve Jobs would do the Keynote at Macworld? If the announcement won't be at MacWorld, why is XSKN already shipping the skin?
Also consider how much publicity XSKN is getting. It's a great way to draw in Christmas shoppers.
As for the development issues: I can speak as a developer. I put out an app recently (Artist's Touch), was at WWDC 08, and know the SDK pretty well. While there are resizing provisions in the iPhone SDK, as there is in the Mac SDK, most apps still have to ADD code to make it work properly in that size. In the rotation from portrait to landscape, for example, a lot is done for you but you have to do a lot of things as well including (1) make sure your buttons, etc. have the proper auto-aligning attributes (springs and struts in Interface Builder), (2) Handle specific issues with animation from the different orientation. (3) Most apps completely switch to a different view when rotated so all that has to be written as well. The only thing that will work for ALL apps is to just shrink the screen and give a much higher bit depth. The problem with this is that the UiTouches mechanism in the iPhone SDK CANNOT become any more accurate. You see this in the simulator: Even when you use a mouse the iPhone still treats it as an inaccurate touch over a surface of 20 to 30 square pixels.
As for people wanting a smaller iPhone: I've never heard this from the 50 or so people I know from many different demographics. Apple's marketing calls the iPhone "the perfect size" and "fits perfectly in your hand". There is no clear need. No clear benefit. Apple doesn't do small little changes just because. If anything, I've heard people saying they had a bigger screen (for web, email, drawing, etc.).
I still think Apple's trick to smoke out leakers. Jobs was really upset last time.
That's an interesting thought process, but I think it's not a reason to dismiss the idea of a smaller product. It's not as if those apps can't be updated. I don't know if you have downloaded programs from the App store, but updates to those programs appear to flow like water.
Yep updates have worked fairly well. That addresses apps that will need updating but many will not.
Quote:
Add another model to the touch screen product line and I imagine that a lot of apps will be quickly rewired, tested and pushed out to allow another screen size. I wouldn't be surprised of most apps are either already compatible or would be updated within a month of a hypothetical iPhone nano launch.
On the other hand there are apps that won't translate well to lower red screens. Many of these will be games. In any event I don't know what the big deal is, the owner simply buys apps compatible with his hardware like computer users have been doing for years.
Quote:
Given that a new phone product is probably going to be shipped some time after its announcement, maybe it's fair to say that most apps will be checked and if necessary, updated before the launch.
This I doubt unless they intend to give developers early access to the hardware. What they may provide for is an tracking system where developers can check off compatbility with this and other coming products. Itunes could be made smart enough to offer up only those apps that are compatible with the phone plugged in.
Quote:
I don't think it's necessary to match pixel counts for apps to still work. Did you see the WWDC08 keynote presentation? I think they demonstrated how certain controls can auto-center or auto fill the available width or available height of a screen, or fill the remaining width or height. This was offered so that the screen can be rotated and the layout still remain the same.
This is a key reality in my view that many apps will not have a problem. Not to mention is the ability to get view or screen size in your code.
Quote:
The same principle can work with different resolutions too. Those controls appear to operate the exact same way the UI auto-spacing controls for regular Mac OS X, whose apps can be adapted to work on screens from VGA res to 30" computer displays without issue.
Yep. The problem apps would be those with a lot of bit mapped graphics or statically assigned UI elements. There are sure to be problem apps but for many developers of apps using Apple supplied controls and views I don't think there will be huge problems. For many apps the biggest problem would be the truncation of text labels which a 90 degree turn might address. In any event all the doom and gloom over a screen with fewer pixels is rubbish.
I don't know if you have downloaded programs from the App store, but updates to those programs appear to flow like water. ... Did you see the WWDC08 keynote presentation?
Yea I am a developer, have apps on the App Store and have attended WWDC08. Just to reiterate, the resizing thing won't work. Only smaller rez which is not a problem either but then touches become even less accurate.
Someone should make a site where we can gamble on Apple news rumors
Comments
The "iPhone Nano" case images on the site are identical to the iPhone case images. All of the large range of colour variations show the same iPhone screen, which happens to be one used on Apple's site. So XSKN may have advance information of an "iPhone Nano", but it won't necessarily look like a scaled-down PhotoShop of the real iPhone. If Apple has produced such a device, which I very much doubt, it would surely have found ways to shed some functionality while adding others.
"Resolution Independence" is a goal that Apple has pursued recently, but the iPhone keyboard, for example, is miniaturised enough already, so an "iPhone Nano" that has some kind of "Spaces" that switches between two screens, keyboard and display, each a landscape 320 x 240 representing half a standard iPhone portrait 480 x 320 display, for example, might compensate for the smaller size. Tilt sensors, of course, would switch between the two.
Even so, packing almost the same functionality into an even smaller device than the iPhone is hardly likely to produce very much in the way of cost savings, so if this is real, Apple will have surely developed significant ways to differentiate the "iPhone Nano" from the real thing.
The original iPhone is pretty big in one's palm. A narrower one would be easier to hold. However, does the screen size need to be the same to support the apps? I guess new apps could support both.
And just how is my statement a false comparison? You either misread my post, or don't understand Apple's family of products.
By using iPods in your example in an attempt to disprove my statements on the iPhone nano rumor, you implied that the two are similar, which they aren't. You even grouped in the iPod touch, which is notably different from Apple's Click Wheel iPods.
The last I checked, Apple markets the touch as an iPod, not as a watered-down iPhone, regardless of how you interpret it as such (its interface being irrelevant).
Of course they don't advertise the iPod touch as a neutered iPhone, that would be bad marketing. But everyone knows the iPod touch is a phone-less iPhone due to their identical interfaces, identical touch/gesture based controls, identical screens (and aspect ratios), and near identical enclosures. The iPod touch stands in stark contrast to the iPod nano and iPod classic (and obviously the iPod shuffle, which is its own thing - a screen-less iPod) because of the touch's far more complex (yet very intuitive) interface and far more complex (yet very intuitive) method of control: direct manipulation of onscreen elements via the touchscreen, as well as the MultiTouch gestures it allows.
"Traditional" iPods use indirect control through Click Wheels, akin to a computer mouse, so its interface is very scalable (up for the iPod classic, down for the iPod nano) because the user doesn't have to actually touch the onscreen elements, just scroll to them with the touch-sensitive Click Wheel and use the pause, play, ff, rr buttons for media control.
So interface/controls are quite relevant.
Apple's family of iPods have not cannibalized each other to a great extent, as the classic/nano/touch cater to different crowds.
True. As I said, all iPods are under the once exploding mp3 player market, which is still growing today. Each iPod - shuffle, nano, classic, touch - targets a different part of that market. It differs from the cellular market, where dumbphone sales are stagnant thanks to over-saturation
while the only major growth segment is in smartphones. I'll get to why that's important further down (so watch for an *).
iPods are music players, primarily, and the iPhone is a phone, primarily and should be distinguished as such, not by their interfaces. To compare them by interface is categorically incorrect, and not what Apple does (at least for the time being).
Apple doesn't have to distinguish the iPod nano's and iPod classic's interface/control scheme from the iPhone/iPod touch's interface/control scheme. People can see that with their own eyes, they're very different interfaces and require very different control schemes.
In this discussion, however, it's important to make those differences clear because they tell us the likelihood (or lack there of) of things like an iPhone nano.
What you suggested in your original post was that a rumored "iPhone nano" would cannibalize iPhone sales, which I just don't think is true.
I didn't really make an issue of the cannibalization issue, just your comparison of iPhones and iPods. I'll say on the subject, that an iPhone nano would cannibalize iPhone sales because *since Apple would not make a dumbphone (ie, has physical number keys, a tiny little screen, no useable web browser, etc.), an iPhone nano would have to be a smaller iPhone, one that would closely resemble the full-size iPhone. iPods don't cannibalize each other much because they are very differentiated in physical size, enclosure design, price, storage capacity, you name it; the iPod touch can get away with having around the same price and storage capacity as the iPod nano because the touch is quite different in functionality and interface/control.
A slightly smaller iPhone would canabalize iPhone sales because they simply wouldn't be different enough - both would still be smartphones (because again, Apple won't go into to dumbphone market), both would look rather similar. That's why I said a smaller iPhone could replace the full-size iPhone, but not be sold alongside the current full-size iPhone.
Hope that makes sense.
Also wobegon, you need to edit your 3rd post. Your quote is wrong, it was not me who said that...
Sorry, fixed.
I'm seeing this as a very real device. With 2.5G Edge it could even come with a cheaper data plan to top off the upfront savings. This is probably the $99 iPhone that we have been hearing so much about, but it was delayed as so many things are. Some of you say why would they cannibalize the iPhone 3G? Simply put, they would sell more phones with a lower average selling price. That isn't really looked at as cannibalization, it is considered a "portfolio of products". If the price/feature gaps are correct, they can increase sells significantly, grow the revenue base of subscription kickbacks from the providers, and easily make their unit targets. Not to mention that it is that many more folks hitting the App Store, iTunes, and wanting a Mac. Better buys some more AAPL at these prices.
this will be the iphone for people that just want a phone... phone, text, that kind of functionality. might even have a better camera on allowable by the thickness of the product.
My bet is this: I think Apple intentionally put out fake products (at least case dimensions, etc.) to screw these companies over. At the MacBook event, Steve said "it's not funny" in regards to the leaked images. I think he wants to f them over.
If this thing supports CDMA, then they could sell it unlocked and force all cell phone providers to compete among themselves for it. The iPhone Nano would be out of scope of their contract with AT&T.
My contract with Verizon is up next month and in November I wandered in to a Verizon store and asked one of the guys there when Verizon would be getting the iPhone. I also said I was very satisfied with Verizon and wasn't going to switch to AT&T just to get the iPhone. He said wait early next year before getting a new phone as he had heard an internal rumor that Verizon was going to getting a smaller iPhone and he did use the word Nano. I don't know how much credence to give to this as usually counter people are the last to know what's going on within a company.
The Blackberry Bold has the same 320x480 resolution screen as the iPhone and it's half the size so it's definitely possible. Usability will be horrible though because at WWDC Apple went through a whole list of statistics about how accurately finger touches can be detected. At the current bit-depth, 44x44 pixels is considered the suggested size. If you go higher rez, you can display everything but to get accurate touches, you need to increase the hit area to 88x88 or whatever.
My bet is this: I think Apple intentionally put out fake products (at least case dimensions, etc.) to screw these companies over. At the MacBook event, Steve said "it's not funny" in regards to the leaked images. I think he wants to f them over.
Interesting comments but I disagree.
The bold is indeed smaller, but it's not a touch screen and I believe the statistics you quoted from WWDC more than your other arguments. Also if Apple was putting out fake product descriptions and purposely sending them to case manufacturers that would be criminal fraud unless the new product was very carefully described as "suggested" and even then ... well no company wants to purposely push that kind of nastiness on it's "ecosystem" partners.
It is a mystery why (if the nano is real) these idiots were allowed to leak for the second time though.
The main problem with the smaller screen is input as you point out. Even though you don't mention it, the keyboard would have to be different for starters and that's a big deal although I wouldn't put it past Apple to come up with a useable solution for that.
If this product is real, it has to differentiate itself from the main product or the main product (today's iPhone) has no reason to exist. Since the main barrier to iPhone adoption is the carriers themselves and the outrageous pricing of their data packages, it makes sense that the nano iPhone would address that problem and fill the niche of the lower priced *non-data* phone. So if the nano exists at all, it will likely be a phone without a data package, but probably with Wi-Fi.
Games would be conceivable, but they would have to be re-issued for the new form factor. Like the touch, it would have weather widgets etc. but they would only update in Wi-Fi areas. It would be basic phone plus iPod, and probably about a hundred bucks. In a year or so, it could easily be one of the choices of "free" phones that carriers hand out with a basic contract.
This also allows Apple to stop reducing the price of the regular iPhone and might be one of the best arguments for the nano in general. All previous cell-phones have ended up being devalued over time to the point where they sell for nothing. The existence of the nano would mean that Apple could keep the iPhone at it's current price and add new features with each revision, positioning it as the teleological goal of all phones etc. while the nano becomes the "throwaway" technology demo phone.
no acces to the app store, no need for data plans... just regular cell plans and sms plans
this will be the iphone for people that just want a phone... phone, text, that kind of functionality. might even have a better camera on allowable by the thickness of the product.
Ugh, folks, the iPhone already surpassed the "just a phone" Motorola RAZR this year to become the #1 best selling phone in the US, which the RAZR had held the title of for the past 12 consecutive quarters!
They don't need to make a "just a phone" iPhone.
Ugh, folks, the iPhone already surpassed the "just a phone" Motorola RAZR this year to become the #1 best selling phone in the US, which the RAZR had held the title of for the past 12 consecutive quarters!
They don't need to make a "just a phone" iPhone.
I think the assumption is that it will be "just a phone" with iTunes (a significant difference), and possibly games.
Not the same thing as a RAZR or an LG chocolate or any of the other phones in that category.
I think the assumption is that it will be "just a phone" with iTunes (a significant difference), and possibly games.
Yeah, that worked out just great with the ROKR (which was Apple's test bed for expanding into the mobile phone market).
Not the same thing as a RAZR or an LG chocolate or any of the other phones in that category.
If Apple makes a marginally smaller iPhone (which I doubt), it will simply replace the full-size iPhone, just as the iPod nano replaced the iPod mini.
As for the fakes -- I don't think they would put "official" fakes but try to leak some kind of fake info. They did it with the original iPhone. There was a lot of people like Kevin Rose that was convinced he got reliable tips about the iPhone before it was announced and almost all of his tips turned out to be false. It was later revealed that Apple planted these tips to continue secrecy.
Update:
Here's a great article from Wired Magazine that shows how Apple planted misinformation when the original iPhone was coming out.
The Untold Story: How the iPhone Blew Up the Wireless Industry
Has anyone considered that the main problem with this "leak" and the iPhone nano idea is that if the screen is a different resolution or aspect ratio then all the apps will be incompatible.
That is your first mistake, some apps would be very usable on a screen with lower pixel counts. The SDK is specifically written such that views adapt to the screen width. You can see this happen in many apps by simply rotating scrolling list from vertical to horizontal. Now this does imply that the programmer coded his app correctly but it is clear that many apps will be fine.
Any cheaper iPhone will be based on the same screen shape and I'd say size since higher dpi screen (smaller) or the chips to somehow scale everything in real time would make this "nano" more expensive. The only way out is if the whole OS and dev environment goes vector graphics.
Like vector graphics don't require computational horse power. In any event it is not a given that higher dpi will result in a higher price to Apple, it is not like Apple is pushing resolution on the current iPhone. In fact for it's screen size it is rather low resolution. Of course this goes back to what is important resolution or things like durability and readability in sun light.
I look at it this way; Apple needs a smaller device because so many believe that a small phone is the way to go. Obviously this needs to be overcomed with a visually smaller device. Once people have such a device though they may begin to realize that all the devices features would be better delivered on a larger screen device.
Heck I think that now with the 3G iPhone. Not that I want a hugely bigger IPhone just that I want the biggest sceen possible in a pocketable device. Even a quarter inch of hieght and an inch or so of length would make typing this response a bit easier. That may not sound like much but look at the number of extra pixels it puts on the screen. A very good trade off that won't grow the iPhone excessively in size.
Dave
Also consider how much publicity XSKN is getting. It's a great way to draw in Christmas shoppers.
As for the development issues: I can speak as a developer. I put out an app recently (Artist's Touch), was at WWDC 08, and know the SDK pretty well. While there are resizing provisions in the iPhone SDK, as there is in the Mac SDK, most apps still have to ADD code to make it work properly in that size. In the rotation from portrait to landscape, for example, a lot is done for you but you have to do a lot of things as well including (1) make sure your buttons, etc. have the proper auto-aligning attributes (springs and struts in Interface Builder), (2) Handle specific issues with animation from the different orientation. (3) Most apps completely switch to a different view when rotated so all that has to be written as well. The only thing that will work for ALL apps is to just shrink the screen and give a much higher bit depth. The problem with this is that the UiTouches mechanism in the iPhone SDK CANNOT become any more accurate. You see this in the simulator: Even when you use a mouse the iPhone still treats it as an inaccurate touch over a surface of 20 to 30 square pixels.
As for people wanting a smaller iPhone: I've never heard this from the 50 or so people I know from many different demographics. Apple's marketing calls the iPhone "the perfect size" and "fits perfectly in your hand". There is no clear need. No clear benefit. Apple doesn't do small little changes just because. If anything, I've heard people saying they had a bigger screen (for web, email, drawing, etc.).
I still think Apple's trick to smoke out leakers. Jobs was really upset last time.
That's an interesting thought process, but I think it's not a reason to dismiss the idea of a smaller product. It's not as if those apps can't be updated. I don't know if you have downloaded programs from the App store, but updates to those programs appear to flow like water.
Yep updates have worked fairly well. That addresses apps that will need updating but many will not.
Add another model to the touch screen product line and I imagine that a lot of apps will be quickly rewired, tested and pushed out to allow another screen size. I wouldn't be surprised of most apps are either already compatible or would be updated within a month of a hypothetical iPhone nano launch.
On the other hand there are apps that won't translate well to lower red screens. Many of these will be games. In any event I don't know what the big deal is, the owner simply buys apps compatible with his hardware like computer users have been doing for years.
Given that a new phone product is probably going to be shipped some time after its announcement, maybe it's fair to say that most apps will be checked and if necessary, updated before the launch.
This I doubt unless they intend to give developers early access to the hardware. What they may provide for is an tracking system where developers can check off compatbility with this and other coming products. Itunes could be made smart enough to offer up only those apps that are compatible with the phone plugged in.
I don't think it's necessary to match pixel counts for apps to still work. Did you see the WWDC08 keynote presentation? I think they demonstrated how certain controls can auto-center or auto fill the available width or available height of a screen, or fill the remaining width or height. This was offered so that the screen can be rotated and the layout still remain the same.
This is a key reality in my view that many apps will not have a problem. Not to mention is the ability to get view or screen size in your code.
The same principle can work with different resolutions too. Those controls appear to operate the exact same way the UI auto-spacing controls for regular Mac OS X, whose apps can be adapted to work on screens from VGA res to 30" computer displays without issue.
Yep. The problem apps would be those with a lot of bit mapped graphics or statically assigned UI elements. There are sure to be problem apps but for many developers of apps using Apple supplied controls and views I don't think there will be huge problems. For many apps the biggest problem would be the truncation of text labels which a 90 degree turn might address. In any event all the doom and gloom over a screen with fewer pixels is rubbish.
Dave
I don't know if you have downloaded programs from the App store, but updates to those programs appear to flow like water. ... Did you see the WWDC08 keynote presentation?
Yea I am a developer, have apps on the App Store and have attended WWDC08. Just to reiterate, the resizing thing won't work. Only smaller rez which is not a problem either but then touches become even less accurate.
Someone should make a site where we can gamble on Apple news rumors