More on the iTunes Cell Phone

andyring writes "According to PC Magazine, a Motorola exec demoed the rumored iTunes cell phone. According to the article, the phone syncs with a computer and the iTunes Music Store like an iPod does, and incorporates the iPod interface for navigating and playing digital music." We've mentioned this before.

Comments

Salling Clicker

[Raynach]

There's a nifty little utility called the Salling Clicker that lets you take control of your Bluetooth-enabled Mac with any Bluetooth enabled cell phone. Not exactly like playing music from your cell phone, but navigating your Apple with your cell phone, including iTunes.

I used it just recently with the car stereo I installed. ;)

Will it sell well?

[anime_nerd]

I think that people who already shelled out cash for an I-pod aren't going to rush out and buy this now. It's going to be a toy for the rich. Plus, quite frankly, most people want to be able to download free music to their MP3 player, and this sounds like it can only use I-Tunes store. I doubt that it will be popular.

Re:Will it sell well?

[savagedome]

I think that people who already shelled out cash for an I-pod aren't going to rush out and buy this now

Cell phone is even more a 'style' thing for people than an mp3 player. Take a look at how many accessories are available for a cell phone that you and I and most of /.ers would think as asinine. The colorful antenna where the phone antenna goes bling bling when a call is received or even face plates for your phone. People love to decorate the cell phone so that they can whip it out and use it in public to be a little more flashy.

I am convinced that Apple is going to design one heck of a cell phone as far as style is considered.

And one more thing. Ringtones is already a multi-billion dollar industry. Now imagine iTunes providing tunes for ringtones. Yeah.

Buy AAPL. There is more juice left in that stock.

Re:Will it sell well?

[2nd Post!]

I think it will.

If IBM, Alpine, and Pioneer think there is a market for car adapters for the iPod (to transform your car into an iPod sound system) why wouldn't the same market want a phone that can play all their AACs and MP3s after synching with iTunes?

It's not like the phone market is stagnant! People get new phones every few years, some of them at least.

Back to "dialing" the phone?

[PornMaster]

I can't help but to think that the idea of using a clickwheel to "dial" the phone like in the days before many Slashdotters were born is kind of funny. Even if it's not the preferred dialing method, someone's gotta do a dialing hack for it. :)

User Interface?

[grahamsz]

It sounds like the ipod UI will be used for playing music, but does that mean a different UI will be used for placing phonecalls.

I'd say that was very-motorola to have an inconsistent user interface... tho to be fair i haven't used one of their phones since the early 90s.

Re:Worst of both worlds

[SoCalChris]

Not to mention that I generally regard cell phones as being disposable, but keep something like an ipod for several years.

Two years from now, I'm not going to want to have to get rid of my ipod so that that I can get the newest model phone.

Personally, I would preffer that device makers stick to making one thing work well instead of converging several items into one bulky and mediocre performing item.

Motorola code quality - poor, very poor.

[zerofoo]

Uggh, I can't take any more featureitis from Motorola. My last two motorola phones had all kinds of software problems:

T720 Phones that would ring and hang when you answer them.

(T720) Black-screen hang during charging that requires a reboot.

V710 phones that would crash during MP3 playback and require pulling the battery off of the phone to stop playback.

Hey motorola, how about STABLE phones first - then gee whiz features?

-ted

When will we see the Apple logo on a phone?

[Dr. Spork]

The cell phone market is very sensitive to "cool" - Nokia really rode that wave for a while and it took them far.

The tech company most assossiated with style and hipness is Apple. If they made an iPod mini with a number pad, speaker and mic, which can be used to purchase whatever song you feel like hearing on your car trip or subway ride, there would be long lines of buyers - and a lot of spontaneous/impulse song purchases from iTunes (if the price was reasonable). There are lots of people with disposable income for whom this sort of instant gratification would quickly become irresistable.

Now sure, they could contract Motorolla to make a phone with similar specs, but the Apple logo itself would sell lots of units. Could this be their devious plan? Should it be?

cool, but

[Cow007]

Where are the pics?

I've heard...

[Performaman]

From someone with a relaative who is working with Apple (and I'm not kidding) that there will be some kind of bluetooth watch to interface with the new iPod, as well as BT headphones.