Fully Equipped

I got an e-mail over the weekend from a reader who read my earlier post, "Does the iPhone need a real keyboard?"

Ed writes:

What I would like to see is a portable keyboard for the iPhone and iPod Touch. This would be very helpful in meetings and/or traveling.

For what's essentially a minicomputer, a compact external keyboard would seem like a simple and logical accessory and would be especially appealing to those who haven't mastered--or aren't comfortable--typing on the iPhone's virtual keyboard, as good as it is. Travel-friendly, fold-up keyboards are available for the old Palm Pilots and Treos, but a quick search on Google reveals precious little on iPhone keyboards.

The $100 BTKeyMini is still in limbo.

(Credit: MacAlly)

Way back in January 2008, Macworld wrote up some notes from the now-defunct Macworld Expo under the headline, "A Bluetooth keyboard for the iPhone?" The article referenced the small MacAlly BTKeyMini Bluetooth keyboard ($100). At the time, MacAlly reps claimed that when the BTKeyMini arrived in March of 2008, it would be compatible with the iPhone. But alas, Apple has never provided Bluetooth keyboard drivers for the iPhone and the BTKeyMini has never shipped. A note on the Web site AValive, which sells the BTKeyMini, says:

The BTKey Mini for the Apple iPhone will not ship until Apple updates the iPhone to accept Bluetooth input. No date has been given as of yet. THE iPhone 3.0 UPDATE DOES NOT SUPPORT THIS PRODUCT.

Of course, the lack of Apple support hasn't stopped hackers from getting Bluetooth keyboards to work with the iPhone. Back in January of this year, Ars Technica had a report on the Bluetooth keyboard hacking efforts of iPhone expert Ralf Ackermann. And more recently, in March of this year, a couple engineers at Perceptive Development managed to connect an infrared keyboard to an iPhone using a 1,200-baud modem via the headphone port. iPhone Central called it, "One of the most unnecessarily complicated hacks in iPhone history." Ars Technica described it as "clever," partially because it didn't require a jailbroken iPhone.

So, there you have it, Ed. Yes, it would be nice if there was an external keyboard option for the iPhone--wireless or wired--but it looks like you're going to have to wait for Apple to decide it's ready to supply the drivers for it. ... Read more

Now that the iPhone 3G S is officially behind us, let me be the first--or at least one of the first--to announce the countdown to the next new iPhone. If history is any indication, it should show up right around this time next year.

Interestingly, even though the 3G S is technically Apple's third-generation iPhone, some tech pundits were expecting the iPhone 3G S to be called the iPhone 4G. But you could also argue that the iPhone 3G S is more like the iPhone 3.5G, which doesn't have the greatest ring.

There's also a chance that in between the iPhone 3G S and iPhone 4G (or whatever it's called), we might see a totally new branch of iPhone, something akin to an iPhone Mini or Lite.

I'm not sure Apple needs to answer to the smaller form factor of the Palm Pre, but there are some people out there who think the iPhone's just a tad too big. And there are some people who want a physical keyboard, but don't count on Apple slipping in a slide-out keyboard anytime soon.

Gizmodo and other blogs posted this concept art for the iPhone 4G before Apple announced the 3G S.

(Credit: Rodolphe Desmare)

All that said, I do think next year's iPhone will feature a new design that also includes a new screen. Some mock-ups floating around have suggested the aluminum unibody design of the new MacBooks. That's possible, but so are a host of other innovative industrial designs.

The point is, the next go-round, it's probably not enough to just stick with upgraded internal components. Some significant cosmetic changes will be required to differentiate the generations and more easily entice upgrades by existing iPod owners. And I'm not talking matte vs. shiny finish.

Ultimately, however, it's what's inside that counts and consumers are always wanting faster, more powerful smartphones with more memory that somehow manage to be more energy-efficient and offer better battery life. There's already talk of the next iPhone having a dual-core processor and better graphics chips that can deliver higher video resolutions and better still images when taking pictures (read Brooke Crothers' story on new ARM chips here).

The question is whether Apple can continue to increase battery life at the same time. In fact, one big reason a lot of people are interested in upgrading from the 3G to the 3G S is because of the improved battery life.

Beyond the hardware, there are still features concerns to address (everybody has their wishlist) and more importantly, carrier and pricing plan issues. Someday, some other carrier, perhaps Verizon, which is preparing to build out a 4G network, will get the iPhone. And someone, maybe Apple, will declare that iPhone the iPhone 4G. Or maybe it'll just be the 3G V. All I know is that come this time next year, we'll most likely be seeing a new iPhone. And it will be here before you know it.

Comments? Aside from a carrier choice, what are looking for in a true 4G iPhone?

The iPhone's new video capture and sharing may be a double-edged sword for YouTube.

(Credit: Apple)

With the introduction of the the new iPhone 3G S, one of the features iPhone aficionados are most excited about is the addition of video recording. Never mind that this feature has been available in a lot of other cell phones for a while; the point is, it's finally here, and that's a good thing, especially when Apple has taken the pocket camcorder concept to a whole new level with the integration of some basic onboard editing tools, geotagging, and, most importantly, a wireless distribution system that allows you to easily share your iPhone clips via e-mail, MMS, or by uploading them directly to YouTube (and MobileMe) with a touch of a button (see Apple's demo).

On the surface, this would appear to be excellent news for YouTube and should rather frighten Flip Video, which has seen its YouTube-friendly pocket camcorders take a nice chunk of the camcorder market (recent sales figures indicate that digital pocket models like the Flip, the Creative Vado HD, and the Kodak Zx1, have captured over 25 percent of the camcorder market in the U.S.). ... Read more

I usually follow a simple rule when it comes to consumer electronics: I avoid buying any first-generation products. That doesn't mean I haven't ever done it, but I tend to wait for generation two or three before I plunk down my dough, particularly when it comes to heavily hyped stuff.

As I've written before, I'm a prime candidate to buy the Palm Pre. I'm a Sprint customer who has a contract conveniently expiring in June and I have a phone (the Mogul) that's on its last legs. Ideally, the Pre would cost $50 less and not have a mail-in rebate, but at least Sprint didn't price the thing at a pure $299, as I'm sure it would have preferred to do. Pricing aside, the biggest hurdle I'm facing is the fact that the Palm Pre is a first-gen phone--and platform--and I'm really not a first-gen guy.

By contrast, the iPhone will be on its third generation and its platform is already fairly mature. We'll find out exactly how the new third-generation iPhone specs out at next week's WWDC event, but it's safe to assume that many of the small, nagging kinks that were found in earlier editions of the iPhone will have been ironed out. I don't expect it to be perfect (no phone ever will be, because there's always something better around the corner), but I feel pretty good about getting a lot more iPhone for my $199 than those who purchased the original non-3G model (which was originally $599--with contract!) or even the iPhone 3G.

Sometimes, of course, a brand new product can come along that's so far ahead of the pack that even the introductory version is too tempting to avoid. ... Read more

The other day, as I sat waiting for Jeff Bezos to appear in an auditorium to announce the new Kindle DX, I was surrounded by iPhones. Literally. Two people to my right, two people in front of me, and three people in back of me were all tapping out IMs or e-mails on their iPhones. What struck me was how awkward most of these people looked, tapping away with a single finger, laboring to type sentences just a few lines long.

Now I know some people can type quickly using the iPhone's virtual keyboard. A week earlier I'd witnessed a woman, her iPhone sitting on a table, taping with two fingers at a highly elevated rate (the rat-tat-tat of her typing on the table was quite noisy, which drew onlookers). But there are still a lot of people out there who just can't get used to typing on the iPhone. And many a BlackBerry user has told me she will never be able to switch to the iPhone because she needs a physical keyboard.

My wife is a case in point. She lives on her Blackberry and can type emails with astonishing speed. When she was required recently to get a "personal" cell phone separate from her work cell phone, she opted to get the exact same BlackBerry Curve on AT&T that she used for work--even though she could have gotten the iPhone for the same price (at least in terms of hardware costs). She's a BlackBerry user through and through, even after a couple of her BlackBerries broke (more on that in a minute).

I wouldn't be the first to suggest that Apple make a slider version of the iPhone that would incorporate a physical keyboard. On a lot of levels, it would make a lot of sense. Apple could do a so-called consumer version of the iPhone, as well as a model that had a slightly more corporate bent to take on BlackBerry directly in that market. (The BlackBerry Curve did outsell the iPhone last quarter).

However, the iPhone's virtual keyboard is tied into an overarching Apple design philosophy for the device, and chances are very slim Apple will alter the iPhone hardware beyond a few small tweaks. From a software standpoint, where the biggest changes will come, one of the key additions in iPhone 3.0 OS is native support for a landscape (horizontal) virtual keyboard, which would allow you to go to a more ergonomic two-thumbed approach and should make the overall typing experience significantly better. True, that functionality has been available for a while--but only through third-party apps that only a small minority of users download.

The rumored Motorola Android phone looks a lot like my dream iPhone.

(Credit: The Boy Genius Report )

Will having a native landscape mode for the virtual keyboard satisfy BlackBerry keyboard aficionados? Probably not. As good as Apple's virtual keyboard might be for a virtual keyboard you'll still have millions of people who only feel comfortable with a physical keyboard.

Personally, I'm partial to hard keyboards and I initially liked the slide-out keyboard on my Sprint Mogul, though I still miss the feel of the Blackberry keyboard on my ancient, e-mail-only BlackBerry 857. However, there is one big strike against physical keyboards: because you have moving parts involved, they tend to be plagued by mechanical failures over time. My Mogul keyboard is on the fritz, and some days I want to throw the phone against the wall (my contract is up in June, which is when I will replace it). Fellow editor John Falcone, who got his Mogul at around the same time I did, is also having problem with his keyboard, which leads me to believe many physical keyboards simply have a limited lifespan. In the case of the Mogul, which is made by HTC, the problem may involve the sliding mechanism and the connection between the keyboard and the phone's motherboard--not necessarily the keys themselves.

Blackberry keyboards tend to be pretty durable. But my wife's scroll wheel on two her older Blackberries died from heavy use. Apparently, this problem was widespread because in future devices Blackberry moved to a trackball in the Curve. But it, too, can develop problems over time as dust and dirt from your fingers clog things up--just like with a computer trackball.

Clearly, by going with a virtual keyboard--and a pure touch interface--Apple and AT&T have managed to avoid customer-service headaches related to the breakdown of broken parts associated with physical keyboards, navigational joysticks, trackballs, or scroll wheels. When an iPhone gets screwed up, it tends to involve a bum battery, some form of mysterious internal glitch that causes intermittent freezes/shutdowns or battery drains--or someone just dropping the phone. At least those are the problems I hear about.

But even as I point out the downsides to physical keyboards, I'd still opt for an iPhone with a slide-out "hard" keyboard if given the choice. That's part of the reason why I'll take a long look at the Palm Pre when it comes out around the same time the third-generation iPhone does (both are expected to arrive in June) and anything new and interesting BlackBerry has on tap.

What do you guys think? Any iPhone owners still struggling with the keyboard? Or is it just fine the way it is and will only get better with a native landscape mode?

Sprint's service plans for the Pre appear to be very similar to those of the iPhone, which means it's highly likely Sprint will release the Pre at $199 ($299 would be suicide). Sprint has already announced that individual Pre plans will come in three flavors: you'll pay $69.99 per month for 450 minutes, $89.99 per month for 900 minutes, or $99.99 per month for unlimited talk, with each plan including unlimited data. Meanwhile, the iPhone's base plan currently starts at $69.99 with 450 minutes and unlimited data. AT&T's 900-minute plan goes for $89.99. Where you save with Sprint is if you go with the unlimited plan, which currently costs $30 more with AT&T. (None of these prices includes taxes, of course).

Personally, that doesn't sound all that enticing. As I wrote recently, I'm a Sprint customer who owns a Windows Mobile phone (the Mogul) and has a two-year contract that expires in June. I should also point out that my current service plan (with unlimited data) is about $15 less than what a new plan with the Pre would cost me.

Call me crazy, but I actually like Sprint and would prefer not to switch because I think it's a better carrier than people give it credit for (and there's no great love out there for AT&T). I also appreciate that I don't have to worry--at least not yet--about restrictions on tethering (using my Mogul as a modem) or streaming my Slingbox to the phone using Sprint's 3G (and soon 4G) network.

But facts are facts and numbers are numbers. Why would I buy a first-gen Pre over a third-gen iPhone with a huge, mature App Store if their prices and cost of ownership were identical outside the "unlimited" plan? I don't hate AT&T that much (my wife actually has a BlackBerry Curve from AT&T) and while I've been a loyal Sprint subscriber for more than 10 years, I'm not that loyal.

Nobody is. Which is why Sprint will get some switchers during the period (through 2009) that it has an exclusive on the Pre. There are still hardcore Palm fans out there and lots of iPhone haters. But at $199, I don't think you're looking at game-changing numbers, especially if AT&T counters by lowering the price on the 16GB iPhone--or lowering the price for its unlimited plan.

The Pre at $149.99 may not be a game changer for Sprint either. But at least $149.99 gives it a fighting chance.

What do you think?

I recently trashed the third-generation Shuffle in a blog post, saying it was "a disaster."

Well, I meant it. A buttonless, tiny, entry-level MP3 with special "VoiceOver" features just seems so unnecessary. But then a reader made an interesting point to me. What if the lead got buried in Apple's Shuffle announcement?

Is Apple's small talk really a precursor to big interface changes across its entire line?

(Credit: Apple)

While everyone was harping about how the thing's really small (I say too small), requires an adapter for you to use your own headphones, and has a voice-over feature that doesn't seem to really add much (we know what our favorite songs are, right?), the real story may be that Apple's getting ready to launch all this voice stuff across its whole line of mobile products.

The reader, Charles, who e-mailed me, asks this question: "Would you have thought to design in 'voice report,' plus device-decentralized 'hard controls,' into an $80 music-player appliance?"

No. So, why do you do it?

"Well," he goes on, "if you were testing consumer acceptance of a new product module...you'd probably do well not just to tweak, but educate, your adopter audience on the sensory essentials of your new interface. Technology is best delivered in metered morsels to be digested."

I agree--and I suspect this voice-over introduction is part of a companywide shift for Apple into the voice arena and a new user interface mode. But think in these terms: instead of it being a one-way street from machine to man (or woman), the more advanced version will go both ways. You'll be able to talk to your device--whether an iPod Classic, iPod Touch, iPhone, or even the rumored Apple Netbook, a device that allegedly has a touch screen and perhaps minimal hard controls--and it will talk back to you. Of course, many mobile phones have voice recognition features today, but Apple's version--for better or worse--will take voice control to a whole new level.

Charles notes that Apple usually has pretty good reasons for its design decisions and that Steve Jobs said early on that iPods were about "navigating content." So while this first implementation may look a little contrived and gimmicky, if Apple can really pull off a user interface paradigm shift, we may really want to buy an overpriced adapter and a whole new set of voice-over-compatible headphones to take advantage of this fantastic new interface.

I'm not sure why, but some analysts seemed a little surprised about Amazon.com's announcement on Wednesday that it would begin offering Amazon e-books on the iPhone and iPod Touch, and move beyond the confines of the Kindle.

First of all, the company had effectively confirmed off-Kindle reading access in February, so it shouldn't have surprised anyone. Second, anybody who knows anything knows that it's all about the razor blades (the e-books) and not the razor (the Kindle).

Like the game console world, the real profits aren't in the hardware but rather the software. Yes, the Kindle 2's hot now, but to reach a larger audience, Amazon will eventually have to reduce the price for the reader and shrink its margins.

By contrast, the margins on e-books should remain pretty beefy, and you can imagine all the cost savings involved when you don't have to deal with warehousing and shipping physical books. It's a great business model.

The bestsellers list in Apple's App Store.

(Credit: Apple)

But there's just one problem. While Amazon might be able to find a market for $9.99 books on the Kindle, the iPhone-iPod Touch world is a very different place. Very few people are willing to pay that kind of money for any sort of application, let alone an e-book.

In the Apple application world, the sweet spot for selling anything seems to be less than $4.99--and more like $.99 or $1.99. Sure, you're going to get some bestselling series with almost cult-like followings (read: "Harry Potter" and "Twilight"), but the vast majority of books being "sold" on the iPhone are very cheap--and rightly so because the overall iPhone-reading experience doesn't justify you spending $10 (or even $5) on an e-book. (See Nicole Lee's in-depth piece on comparing the Kindle 2 reading experience to that of the iPhone's).

Of course, the Kindle app isn't the first way to read e-books on the iPhone--there are already dozens of paid and free reader applications (and books-as-apps) available on the App Store. And taking a look at the list of top paid (nonfree) book or reader apps will give you an idea of how pricing works.

Books in the "Twilight" series, and one app called "50 Great Books for 10 Bucks," are the only ones in the top 20 that have a $9.99 price tag. Arguably, the perfect book for Apple's smartphone, "iPhone: The Missing Manual" (written by The New York Times' David Pogue), sells for $4.99. But it took a big hit in sales when the publisher tested a $9.99 price point.

... Read more

updated 2/20/09

I know, I know. This is a column about cutting-edge electronics. So, apologies to gadget-heads as I take a brief sojourn into the land of self-publishing, which has become a lot more high-tech than a lot of people realize.

The reason I'm here is that I have a book. A novel. Knife Music. Contrary to what you might think based on my day job, it's not a cyber-thriller, though it is a mystery/thriller with a medical/legal slant.

Its short history is this: I worked on it for several years, acquired a high-powered agent, had some brushes with major publishers, then, crickets. Way back when, say, a dozen years ago, a single editor could acquire a book, but today a whole board is usually required to sign off on a project, especially when a big advance is involved. Worse yet, the traditional book-publishing business has fallen on hard times, with layoffs and news that vaunted old publishers such as Houghton Mifflin have literally put the freeze on acquisitions. In short, it's ugly out there, particularly for new fiction writers.

I could have tried to go for a small publisher, but I was told mine was "a bigger book" with more commercial aspirations and prestigious small publishers were interested in more literary tomes. I also learned that many small publishers were being wiped out by the "self-publishing revolution," a movement that's not so unlike the "citizen journalism" or bloggers' revolt of recent years that's had a major impact on mainstream media, including this publication. The basic premise is anyone can become a small publisher. You call the shots. You retain the rights to your book. And you take home a bigger royalty than you'd normally get from a traditional publisher--if you sell any books.