OverRoll.com

So we’re only about a week away from Apple rolling out its iPhone everywhere (if, by “everywhere,” you mean only from AT&T stores) and today a nifty announcement that the phone will come equipped with a pre-loaded player to showcase YouTube videos. It won’t be complete access to all videos within YouTube, but a selected group of around 10,000 clips that have been designed to be “battery-preserving.” See Forbes’ article HERE (one of many from 6/20) -

This announcement got me thinking, as many other people of course are, about the rest of what I perceive to be the iPhone’s shortcomings. Not that I don’t think the iPhone will come with many cool features and will certainly do a lot to advance every aspect of portable media… I think it will. But at this moment there are a few things that I see as major issues with the new device. For now I’ll just highlight what is clearly the most glaring - memory.

Your new iPhone can be in either a 4 GB or 8 GB form. For a phone, that’s a lot. But this isn’t supposed to be just a phone. No one would be too excited about Apple coming out with a $599 phone, no matter how cool it looked. This device is supposed to really start to bridge the gap between portable media devices. No more iPod in your left pocket, phone in your right and blackberry in your hand. Internet access via the network, wi-fi compatibility, iTunes synchability, a large video display…these are designed to bring your devices into one. So then the $599 doesn’t sound so bad considering how much all of those other three devices cost.

But 8 GB at the most? I venture to guess that many people have at least half that in mp3s that they’ve downloaded from iTunes. Many more have spent the last few years converting their entire music collection to digital on their 30 or 60 GB iPods. Those hardcore users will not be able to combine devices. They’ll still need to carry their iPods around for a while.

Then we’ve got the movies and video clips…”Cool,” you say. A screen that knows when it’s flipped sideways and turns to widescreen. Yes, it is cool. You could actually watch a full length movie on there and not need a telescope. But how much space does a movie take up? About 750 MB to 1.25 GB on average. That’s about 8 or 9 movies if that’s all you have on your iPhone. If you have some of those songs you’ve spent years converting, you’re talking about room for maybe 2-3.

Of course, the new screen is also perfect for keeping all of your digital pictures and showing them off on the fly. You can even make slide shows set to music. But add 3-4 vacations’ worth of images at a resolution that you’ve taken them at and you’re quickly over 1 GB (which many people have on their camera currently).

Bottom line, there isn’t enough space. And this, of course, is talking about the $599 8 GB model. I’d bet that most people are going to be more fascinated with the design and less interested in consolidating devices and therefore will go with the $499 4 GB model. They will quickly realize that once the phone novelty has worn off, the issues with practicality will be a bit of a kick in the pants.

Again, don’t get me wrong. I think the iPhone will do wonders for portable devices, much like the iPod did. It will certainly help media folks from all walks of life make lots of money (AT&T and Apple in particular). I look forward to writing more about this in the future. But this one issue just seems way off for me and I just can’t get around it. For me, this is reason enough to not invest the half a thousand in a new iPhone.

….but wait…I wonder if the 30 GB iPhone will be ready by next Christmas?

Trackback This Post | Subscribe to the comments through RSS Feed