I hope they ditch the dock...or at least provide some options.

On another note...I'm sad to see them drop the 'puter moniker from their name. I miss my rainbow fruit computer company. They were once in bed with Adobe, now they're in cahoots with Cingular :(

Is there a formal process to become a ludditte? ;)

Just watched the whole keynote stream (no lag whatsoever, very impressed) and the iPhone is just great.

I don't know if it's really in my budget, but i have to remind myself that a cell phone + a camera + an iPod will probably run more than 500-600 dollars anyway...and this device seems to do everything effortlessly...unlike my current cell phone :mad:

I'd buy the iPhone, but hell no if it'll ONLY WORK WITH CINGULAR.

I mean, I don't care if I lose visual voicemail.

iphone is very cool. It's the coolest phone I've ever seen. No keypad, it's brilliant.

Touch screen is probably coming to their computer pretty soon.

This was the first keynote that had me on the edge of my seat, I'll say that.

Sure, I’ll bet you 12 pints that there will be no lawsuit.

I think there is no chance Apple would blatantly use the name unless they were very close to signing an agreement with Cisco.

Reactions to Cisco’s "iPhone" were vehemently negative, along the lines of "get off the stage". I think their business strategists see them better served by getting a few million than by hanging tooth-and-nail onto to a trademark that is unlikely to be positive for their company.

12 pints. Do we have a bet?
Public and judicial posturing doesn’t count. Only a lawsuit reaching actual court deliberations.

The Beatles on iTunes?
 

Apple's lawyers will indeed be busy, but more likely due to the dropping of `Computer' from their name. This increases further the chances that they could be confused with the recording label Apple (the one that owns The Beatles' stuff) -- such a move is prohibited by the "agreement" reached between the two companies.

However, there may be a happy resolution:

- in the UK at least, ALL digital downlaods now count towards the chart. In the past, a song became inelligible two weeks after production of physical media versions were stopped.

- this means that old tracks (like The Beatles' stuff) can now re-enter the charts based on digital downloads alone.

- iTunes is a hugely popular, and thus influential, music download service.

- putting The Beatles' music on iTunes would likely result in a return to the charts for the fab four (and plenty of money for Apple Recordings).

- such a move would require a new "agreement" between the two Apples.

- Does playing a Beatles' track on the iPhone suggest such a move?


And if this does become true, you heard it here first!

.
One thing is for sure:
The cell phone in Casino Royale, and the apps running on it, look hopelessly 20th century. :D

Sidelining the marketing moguls
 

You realize what this means, of course?!

It means that music lovers to an even great degree will decide the hit charts of all the music categories, significantly decreasing the influence of marketing moguls.

And that is catastrophe for record companies that have always done their utmost to set the agenda for the show.

:)

I only have one concern with the iPhone, should I buy it now or wait for a competitor to rip it off and make it better? I can only assume it only works with itunes for transfering data and audio/video. I can also assume they will heavily support DRM?

I mean the phone itself is pretty sweet, but I would want the freedom of not having to deal with DRM. I have never supported it in the first place.

No iLife 07? Most unusual. Coming soon, I'm sure.

I suppose it's possible that it will coincide with Leopard. I'm keenly disappointed that there was no update on Leopard's status. Although it would not surprise me if that's a subset of it running on the iPhone.


Edit - On the other hand, the new Airport Extreme, with it's ability to share multiple usb drives and printers, makes me very happy. The fact that my new MacBook will support 802.11n doesn't suck either.

Yes, I believe mid-2007 will see a special "One more thing" event that will feature nothing but software upgrades such as Leopard, iLife 07, FinalCut Studio, and iWork Office. I think Steve wanted all the time at Macworld to demo the iPhone because it represents the early adoption toward their coming tablets that we may well see in early 2008. Till then, PCers can continue to crow about having a tablet available to them exclusively.

That said, I still hold to my prediction that the MacTab will be a solid plate of plastic with all peripherals connected wirelessly in some shape or form. I think optic fiber will be the next "Firewire" and will require no physical hookup. For those wishing to input, they can use any myriad of new keyboards with Bluetooth, or they can choose to use the onscreen multitouch screen keyboard. With multitouch, you can press the command keys and regular keys at the same time. We see it on the iPhone, the larger computer version will be available in the near future.

You mean the way that competitors have made products that are better than iPods?

Supporting DRM is not the same as forcing you to use DRM'd files.
You are completely free to put non-DRM'd files (e.g. MP3's) on your iPod.
There is no reason to expect the iPhone to differ from previous iPods in this regard.

Yes Hayne, there are some protable audio players that use and take micro SD cards and maybe aren't better than ipods but have a different approach which I like better. If the iphone had great third party support (ie, linux and open source apps) and I could toss any music or video/movie I wanted on there in a very easy fashion it would be great. However, I am going to guess you are limited to itunes until someone comes up with a plug in or extension for the open source stuff out there.

I am a big supporter of the open source media players and their respective formats. I just wish some commercial player would support them.

A hacker’s efforts toward open source...
 

Perhaps my good compatriot Jon Lech Johansen may be inspired to come up with something.

After all, he has made significant contributions to "opening up" various Apple formats before. I quote Wikipedia.

“On March 18, 2005, Travis Watkins and Cody Brocious, along with Johansen, wrote PyMusique, a Python based program which allows the download of purchased files from the iTunes Music Store without DRM encryption. This was possible because Apple Computer's iTunes software adds the DRM to the music file after the music file is downloaded. On March 22, Apple released a patch for the iTunes Music Store blocking the use of his PyMusique program. The same day, an update to PyMusique was released, circumventing the new patch.

September, 2005, Johansen announced the release of SharpMusique 1.0, an alternative to the default iTunes program. The program allows Linux and Windows users to buy songs from the iTunes music store without copy protection.

In October 2006, Johansen and DoubleTwist Ventures announced they had reverse engineered Apple Computer's DRM for iTunes, called FairPlay.”

Worth noting is that DVD-John, which he is better known as, has never sought to gain illegal economic advantage through these efforts. That is why he defeated the recording industry in court cases here in Norway.

Interesting, I also hope that it supports some of those real nice open source lossless formats like FLAC and OGG. I know you can load and install Linux on your ipod and it does support those formats and many more, but at the same time I mean you are kind of destroying the product you buy.

There has been much talk about a complete drag n drop all in one device in the making for some time now. The major problem is that no one majorly (financially) wants to back it because they fear they will lose money to the open source community.

Anyways, before I turn this into a rant, I am very impressed with the iphone but certain aspects may turn me off of it, just like other apple products. I love the ipod but don't own one because of a few things I do not like about them. I am currently building a C2D PC at the moment, just waiting for a few of my old parts to sell before I go buy new ones and my current PC (amd 64) is going to become a pure linux media box with myth tv and I want to buy a nano for it for my music on the go.

I have to say I'm very surprised about two things in the iPhone:

1) GSM...I'm quite surprised it's not 3G (but then maybe the numbers say that you can get GSM coverage just about anywhere but 3G is still way behind??)

2) Locked to one carrier...I wonder if it has to do with network subsidies keeping the price of the phone down.

...actually three things...

3) 2 megapixel camera?? I've just been using the (3G) Nokia N73 with a brilliant 3.2 megapixel camera. Takes great shots. I'd still rather have the iPhone, but still... not very cutting edge there either! By the time we can get this thing in most parts of the world, competitors will probably have 4 megapixel cameras in them with optical zooms!

dammit...four things... whats the battery life? I've seent he references to audio playback 16hours, but what's the standby time?

Speaking of battery life... just read it's non-replaceable??? That's ridiculous for a $600 phone.

<Analogous to>
New Porsche owner: What do you mean I can't do my own tune-ups! That's ridiculous for a $100,000 car.
</Analogous to>

I'm quite sure that there will be a way for you to send in your iPhone for a battery replacement when it is required - but by that time most people who can afford to pay $600 for their phone will have upgraded to iPhone II or iPhone III.