I think an iPhone is an iPod first and a cell phone second. It's designed so people won't need to carry an ipod and a cell phone. As such, their first customers would be heavy iPod users who have little need for anything other than cell phone coverage. It's not quite a Blackberry killer, it's more like a Sidekick killer.
Blackberries started as portable email devices before it expanded into cellphone and organizer categories. Today it does a whole lot of stuff, but it is still an email device at heart. I mean, for email purpose many people can't even stand Pearl's Sure Type, so the chance of them abandoning their full QWERTY tactile BB keyboard for iPhone's screen keyboard is slim to none.
Those of us who can't live without push e-mail is not gonna worry about the iPhone, while those of us who can't leave home without their iPods will probably switch over. It's about priorities.
I personally might switch over because BB push e-mail is not absolutely important for me; I can afford to get my e-mails late by 30 minutes. What's very important for me is to have a full web browser on a portable device, so I don't have to lug a laptop everywhere. If I heard nothing about the iPhone, I would have bought one of those Sony UX series ultra portable laptops for the full-fledged web browser alone. See?
|