iphone is kind of pissing me off

[Jim]

Shouldn't current customers have just a touch of preferential treatment over non-current customers?

The damn phone is not even offered as an upgrade on the at&t site. Hell, you can't even buy one there. And, it is only offered at the larger at&t stores. Ours is about an hour, 20 mins away.

Fuck the iphone

[Cleo]

From what I've read you are better off getting one at the Apple store.

The Apple stores by me have then in stock.

[Simon]

I'd like to see one in person too, but the AT&T store in KW is useless and the nearest Apple store location is 2 hours and 37 minutes away (120 miles).

I'm a Sprint cellular customer, so I don't get any special treatment, but the Apple site does say that current AT&T customers can just add the iPhone Data Plan with unlimited data (email and web) and Visual Voicemail for just $20 per month.

I'm also interested to see how AT&T's "no tethering" rule is going to apply for the iPhone. Evidently the "Unlimited Data" plan does not allow you to connect a notebook computer to the Internet via the iPhone.

I think I'm going to wait for version 2 of the iPhone (or at least the 1.5 upgrade).

[Jim]

The closest apple store is about the same distance. And then I have to have at&t do something so I have my contacts and same phone number. The sealed up case with the pre-installed sim card sucks ass.

Here is another thing...
I never wanted to be able to go online or check email with it unless I was using a wireless network. I have been able to go online for years and I know how bad the at&t network is. And yet, I have no choice.

Apple has pushed up the bar so I think I will wait to see what the other phone manufacturers do now.

[Cleo]

Doesn't matter if you are already with ATT.

No matter who you are with you buy the phone and then when you get home you use iTunes to activate it.
http://www.apple.com/iphone/usingiphone/activation.html

Apple/ATT says that you can not use the iPhone as a modem. Kind of sucks but then from what I've read the EDGE network is so slow that you wouldn't want to anyway. WiFi is everywhere where I live so no big deal for me but it would be nice to have decent internet speeds when I was someplace that I couldn't log into a WiF network.

The online Apple store say two weeks delivery but like Simon I'm going to wait for version 2 of the phone unless my current phone dies on my first.

[Jim]

I do blame most of this crap on Apple. I mean, how many of us would actually be using a PC if Apple allowed their operating system to be used by other companies back in the day? They still have the same mentality...it's our way or no way. If it didn't take a hammer to open the phone and get to the sim card, I don't see any reason why it couldn't be used by other providers with better networks.

[Cleo]

SIM card comes right out. No hammer needed.

But if you really have an urge to take one apart here are the pics.
http://thinksecret.com/archives/iphonetakeapart/

It's ATT that has made this the most locked down phone ever. Even SIM cards from other ATT phones do not work in this phone.

Since the phone is locked in software I'm guessing that it will not be long before someone finds a way to hack it and unlock it.

[Jim]

I did read that people are really close to unlocking it. But still, there are a few phones really close to doing what iphone does without the hassles of prying the phone open. BTW, what exactly do you do when the battery is dead. I mean really dead, not just needing a charge? Do you pry the phone open and grab your soldering iron?
http://www.htctouch.com/

[Cleo]

SIM card come right out from the top slot without having to take the phone apart at all.

Guess the same thing you do when your iPod battery dies. You either send it in to have its battery replaced or, do like I did, and got out your soldering iron and do it yourself although my newer iPods don't seem to have any battery issues.

I agree that not having the battery easily replaced seems like a drawback although batteries seems to last longer then my phones do these days so maybe it isn't a big deal. Apple's logic for making the battery this way is it allows for a more compact design not having to add bulk from battery connectors and slide out locking covers. There is more screws in it holding it together then most items have and from what I've read this things survives being dropped on concrete floors from head level.

The phone does take most ipod accessories including external batteries.

The selling point of this phone for me is its software and also how well it syncs with my laptop. The thing holding me back from buying one is ATT.

[digifan]

AT&T says iPhone activation problem largely solved
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070703/...nwkUroP.gE1vAI


and a practical idea by Google imho:

Google acquires Web-calling service GrandCentral

By Eric Auchard Tue Jul 3, 4:40 AM ET

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Google Inc. has acquired GrandCentral Communications, a start-up that lets users manage their existing phones and voice mailboxes over the Web as if they were a single account, the company said on Monday.


Financial terms were not disclosed.

Grand Central of Fremont, California is one of dozens of innovative companies that are taking advantage of Web-based software to allow consumers and businesses to make voice calls over the Internet while also working with regular phones.

GrandCentral was founded in late 2005 by Craig Walker and Vincent Paquet, who worked together while running Web-calling pioneer Dialpad Communications. Google's biggest rival, Yahoo Inc., acquired Dialpad in June 2005.

"You get a single phone number that forwards to all of your phones, giving you one number for life," Walker and Paquet said in a statement on GrandCentral's Web site confirming the deal.

EBay Inc. unit Skype, a pioneer in the Internet phone market, has signed up more than 200 million users for its free or low-cost phone services globally. Newer names in the field include venture-backed firms Jajah, Jangl, Jaxtr and Rebtel, which together have signed up millions of users in just the past year.

The idea for GrandCentral was borne out of Walker's frustration upon landing at a local airport and realizing he needed to check three voicemail mail boxes -- one for his cell phone, another for work and one for his Blackberry phone.

"If you have multiple phone numbers (e.g., home, work, cell), you get one phone number that you can set to ring all, some, or none of your phones," Wesley Chan, a Google product manager, said in a blog post on his company's Web site.

"This way, your phone number is tied to you, and not your location or job," he said.

Rather than competing directly with the likes of Vodafone Plc or China Telecom Corp. Ltd., many of these newer Web-based calling services are focused on incorporating phone-like talk features into Internet services on blogs or social network sites like MySpace or Facebook.

Konstantin Guericke, the co-founder of Silicon Valley-based business networking site LinkedIn took over as the chief executive of Web-calling service Jangl late last year.

"The way I see it, social networks and blogs are about communication and the phone hasn't been really in the mix," Guericke told Reuters following news of Google's acquisition.

GrandCentral has been holding public tests of its service for several months. Current GrandCentral customers will continue to have uninterrupted service, Google said.

However, one feature that allowed users to upload their own audio tracks to create ringtones now will be limited to licensed music, GrandCentral said on its own site.

A limited number of invitations to receive GrandCentral unified numbers will be available for users who sign up at http://www.grandcentral.com, it said.

"We think GrandCentral's technology fits well into Google's efforts to provide services that enhance the collaborative exchange of information between our users," Chan said. Google did not disclose future products plans it has in the area.

But voice-calling features will quickly be built into many popular Web sites over the next three months to a year, Guericke said. "We think there is a billion-dollar business to be built, so we have no plans to get acquired any time soon."

In the last five weeks, Jangl has seen the number of registered users of its service on sites like Facebook grow to 300,000 users from 100,000 on May 25, he said.

They pull links fast so I copied it but here is the url
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070703/...236_TOdlAE1vAI

[Jim]

You probably wouldn't drop it quite like this but the screen does break from about 6 feet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X54CdkRuSXw