EPKPhoto's Tidbits

I guess I shouldn't keep it a secret much longer: I got an iPhone. About 2 and a half weeks ago my family and I entered an Apple Store and came out with a new AT&T family plan and 2 iPhones for my Mom and me (I can't keep all the fun to myself, you know). Since I thoroughly researched this before making the purchase, my experience has been as expected: overall positive. There are definitely some areas that need improvement, such as the calendar client and basic things like copy and paste, but all in all I'm pleased. Android sounds like it is still on track, so it will be exciting to see the ensuing competition in the next few months. In other news, I'm back at RIT taking classes, which means I have things to do…so, catch you later! PS: I wrote this on my iPhone. 🙂

Normally when I approach a technology purchase, I am able to look at the available options, weigh the benefits of each product, and make a decision that will serve my needs for an acceptable amount of time.  Now that my family's Sprint contract has expired, however, I am having difficulty deciding on the best option for a new phone.  Looking back at my past purchases, the Canon EOS 20D was an excellent buy that is still serving my photography needs today.  I have not had any regrets about my Mac Pro and MacBook Air.  The problem with the current phone market is that no device really fits all my needs.  The iPhone 3G comes mighty close.  The thing I am scared of, though, is that Google's Android platform may come closer…and be more "open," to boot.  So far I have been looking at Apple's latest iPhone and the Openmoko Neo FreeRunner.  One is slick and capable, and the other is extremely open with lots of future potential.  Phones running Android will be both!  Now if I didn't have the sticky problem of that whole 2 year contract thing, I would go for the iPhone today.

In the end, I'm predicting that Android will see some slight delays and worries over a rocky first release, I'll break down and buy an iPhone (and succumb to a 2yr AT&T contract for my family), the Android will still be 6 or so months away from its release, it will take over a year to get the platform capable enough to make me drool, and by that time our AT&T contract will be nearing expiration again, and Apple, Google, AND PALM will have fascinating options to choose from for the next great phone down the line.  Whew, that was a long sentence.  By the way, notice I did mention Palm there…I still haven't given up hope that Palm will be competitive again with a Linux-based OS one of these days.  They'll probably stay in the arena of less expensive phones, though, since they have had such great luck with the Centro.

As I parsed through my various news of the day, I ran across this cool description and video of a concept for Firefox on a mobile platform.  The post is by Aza Raskin, the Head of User Experience at Mozilla Labs.  As you saw in my last post, I'm excited to move to a more powerful pocket mobile device (like the iPhone), so I would love for Firefox to be a part of that.  Watch the video…the concept is pretty interesting.

After a couple hours of politely arguing with multiple Sprint representatives a couple weeks ago, I was able to correct an error that extended my family's Sprint wireless contract for another year.  So, our current family plan will expire on our three phones by the end of this month.  That may mean I will be in the market for a new phone shortly.  Thanks to my impeccable technology purchase timing, it just so happens that a newly revised iPhone (the iPhone 3G) will be available in just under than a month from now.  Unfortunately, that would require my family to switch from Sprint to AT&T…so we'll see what happens.