Apple 2.0 Article on iPhone Misses the Mark

Philip Elmer-DeWitt has an article up on the Apple 2.0 blog titled "The iPhones Secret Blindspot." Problem is, the article completely misses the mark on a lot of issues, while not really explaining why their argument is important.

The gist of the article is that the iPhone doesn't have any built in social networking features (ala the WiFi sharing of the Zune), which Elmer-DeWitt see's as Steve Jobs not understanding the end user.

Before taking some of the article to task, I'll offer two points that I thought were right on the mark. Number one, "There would be an official Apple iPhone wiki that all iPhone owners are immediately subscribed to for communal sorting-out of issues." I'll agree with this. However, a help button or something that just brings up a wiki site in Safari would address this, which can easily be a software update. Number two, "There would be official Apple iPhone support forums that are directly accessible from the phone." Again, I'll agree with this, but this as well can be fixed with a software update. Both of these points are arguable though, as any web user can look online at Apple.com or any of the plethora of other web sites out there that would give them help. They can ever use, get this, the iPhones built in web browser!

Okay, now, on to the article as a whole. Elmer-DeWitt goes over the arguments about AJAX and non-third party applications. Sure, this might be a sticking point, in the future, but since this is an legit OS running on the phone, public pressure can change this. However, developers do have a very solid point with this.

His main point though is when he mentions an article that Sweedish blogger Peter S. Magnusson wrote entitled iPhone's Missing Killer App: Social Networking. Magnusson says "Steve Jobs doesn't understand the new end user." He doesn't? Interesting. Please share more of this view. So, Magnusson does, "...Jobs does not understand the 21st century computer usage paradigm. In this century, people don’t send memos to each other. And that’s what email is - electronic memos. Today, people chat; they blog; they share multimedia like pictures, video, and audio; they flame each other on forums; they link with each other in intricate webs; they swap effortlessly between different electronic personae and avatars; they listen to internet radio; they vote on this that and the other; they argue on wiki discussion groups." What do I say to this? WEAK!

First off, people as a whole don't chat, blog, share pictures, video, audio, post on forums, link to web sites, listen to internet radio, and argue on wiki groups. This is a very broad based statement to apply against all internet users. The fact is, most people don't do this. Most people use the internet to browse web sites and send e-mail. Youth, and trendy interneters like us, do the stuff he posts about, but most people don't. The majority of people have not yet caught on to this aspect of the web.

Second off, these things simply have not proven themselves yet. No one knows how to make money off online videos. Wiki are still a mystery to most people. Most people do not know how to create a web site (nor do they find the need too). A lot of people don't know that there is even internet radio. Common users just don't utilize the web for this stuff. To the average users you've got e-mail, web, and mail AOL IM, and I don't think I'm being broad based here.

Third, the majority of the social networking stuff that's "lacking" on the iPhone can easily be accessed from Safari, the built in web browser. Post to message boards, check. Blog, check. Share pictures, check. Watch video, check (heck, YouTube is built in for crying out loud, but he doesn't mention that). It's there, why? Because it's on the same place it's always been, the internet, and the tool most people utilize to explore the internet is the web browser, period.

Elmer-DeWitt mentions that "For my money, it's more important that Jobs fix the things that keep the iPhone from replacing corporate Treos and BlackBerrys." The problem is, this isn't the target audience. The iPhone isn't a Treo, of a Blackberry, it's a Razor or Chocolate that atually delivers. It's a phone that regular people want, and it's made to give it to them, not IT departments. The Treo and BlackBerry had several generations to grow into what they are now, and to compare a consumer based product to a business based product is unfair. When Apple markets the iPhone Pro, or whatever, at the business market, go ahead and compare them, but for now you should be comparing this against the Sidekick, Cholocate, and plethora of Nokia media phones out there.

Social Networking is in its infancy, and to make a product centered around one is risky, too risky for even Apple. It's probably right on the money that this will be how people use the net soon. And by this I mean social networking based web usage, but for now that's simply not the case. You've got a whole generation of people out there between 5 and 20 who know the internet as Facebook and Myspace. When those people are in middle management a product like what Magnusson describes will be right on the money. But for now, it's just too soon for that.

-Steve