Reuters asked me to write a column about the Apple iPhone 3G S that was ‘not just a review’. Which is fine with me, because the new hardware is hardly the story at WWDC 09.
Apple iPhone 3G S - now with voice control
What’s becoming clear is that the iPhone isn’t just a physical product – it’s a platform, a launch pad for an enthused community of developers with cheap, instant access to an audience of 40million iPhone and iPod Touch users.
While Nokia, Google and Palm are doing their best to promote their own mobile platforms, and stoke software development, it’s Apple that has all the momentum:
“Apple’s biggest rivals are preparing to release smartphones that are arguably technically superior to the iPhone. Nokia’s N97 will be released in the UK on June 19th – the same day as the iPhone 3G S – while Palm’s Pre has just hit the US market. Both iPhone rivals feature their own application download stores – but neither has the iPhone’s momentum. And without a vibrant community of developers, a smartphone is little more than a complicated way to make phonecalls.
The iPhone is changing the shape of the mobile phone market. The technical specification of a handset is no longer the key selling point – the hardware is now just a platform, and it’s the software that’s built upon it that really counts.
Until rival platforms develop a critical mass of users and developers, Apple can continue to turn small changes to the iPhone into great leaps towards global domination.”
You can read the full piece over at Reuters.com
You can also read my hands-on review of the iPhone at Stuff.tv
Or check out the video of my first impressions of the iPhone 3G S
