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Major Hangups Over the iPod Phone
chadwick writes "It seemed like a sure thing: the iPod mobile phone. What could be more irresistible than a device combining the digital-music prowess of Apple Computer (AAPL) with the wireless expertise of Motorola (MOT)? Motorola sent its buzz machinery into overdrive in January when it leaked word that the product would debut at a cellular-industry conference in New Orleans in mid-March. Well, hold the phone. At the New Orleans confab, a frustrated Edward Zander, Motorola's chief executive, stood before a roomful of analysts and reporters and said the handset's debut would have to wait. "
At the New Orleans confab, a frustrated Edward Zander, Motorola's chief executive, stood before a roomful of analysts and reporters and said the handset's debut would have to wait. "
Showing precisely why pre-announcement of products only leads to problems, frustrations, and customer dissatisfaction.
Only announce products when they are done and ready to ship and you avoid this sort of garbage. Everybody is speculating on just what the hold-up is. It could be that the phone is not ready or that the wireless carriers are trying to extract every last cent out of somebody else's (Apple and Motorola) hard earned work. But the point is that there is now a consumer expectation and they are complaining to Apple and Motorola saying "why can't you get your $#!t together and release the product?" when it may actually be the fault of Verizon, Cingular et. al. The problem of course is that on sales of the songs themselves, Apple's profit is next to nothing. So having other companies try and muscle in on very thin margins means 1) either somebody has to take it in the shorts or 2) we all lose. Of course if the record labels would allow more access to the music for Internet delivery, it would be treated as the commodity it really is and there would be more room for profits from higher volume, but that is another post.
Oh, and it would be nice if people who are submitting articles would actually summarize the story rather than posting verbatim what the writer of the referenced article says.
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Well, what do you expect when you partner two large companies together, for a collaboration project... there's bound to be issues combining work forces on a single project. I'm not all that surprised. But, I don't think they have much to worry about, since even if mp3 phones come out with lots of storage, it's unlikely they'll have the same appeal the apple brand has.
That the mother of all software companies drove a wedge into that deal.....?
Rick B.
I visit India and other contries, and i must say that the phones and technologies people use there is WAAAY superior than what we use in US.
Synchronizing the phones with computer is standard there, and so is "SMSing" ringtones. If one person buys a ringtone from the carrier (which is around 8 cents), that ringtone can be SMSed to all the friends. There is a nominal charge for SMS also, basically its a huge market which people simply love.
What sucks here is iTunes sells whole song for 99c, and the f**** cell phone carrier sells the MIDI file for that song for 3 dollars, that expires in 3 months!!!! No wonder people use sites like 3guploads.com or PitPim to put ringtones on their phones. The carriers are simply killing the technology by locking too much stuff.
Will you dial by twirling your fingers in a circle on the rotary sensor like an old pulse dialing phone?
I could get behind that.
That's what my usb connection to my phone is for! For connecting my computer's content to my phone.
I just wanted to take a moment and praise the well-written original post in this thread.
Too bad all this chadwick guy did was copy the first two paragraphs of the linked article verbatim, without providing attribution.
Basically there are two opposing parties in any cellphone you see on the market. The first is the obvious one, the handset maker. The other is the operator (Vodafone, Sprint, etc). While it may seem like these two would normally be a happy bunch. But they aren't.
Handset makers want to stylize their phone as much as possible. Adding features and making their phone stand out from the rest of the pack. Operators want all the phones to support a certain set of basic functionality and fit into a certain form factor. They don't want to allow the handset maker's trademarks overshadow their own. On the other hand, the makers want it to be obvious to the user who the maker of that phone is.
Apple, and to a large extent Microsoft too, have very strong brands. They love branding. That's why we're talking about an iPhone and not an Apple-produced cell phone. But operators don't want that kind of power shifted into the hands of the makers.
So you get what we have here, which is the way he wants it.
Why do we always feel the need to combine all the gadgets we own into one cumbersome piece of crap that can't do any of the things it's supposed to do well? I don't want my blender to play mp3's, and I don't need a shoe-phone, thanks very much. Besides, if I want to trade my phone up every year or so, I sure as hell don't want to shell out for an mp3 player, as well.
SMS tends to be so much more popular outside the US because voice service is so much more expensive. Voice service is so cheap in the use SMS never took off. Not to mention that typeing on a cell phone sucks.
I bet that "the handset's debut would have to wait." because, at least for hard drive based ipods, a phone on vibrate is a bad thing for the relatively weak hard drives in these things. I dont have the specs handy, but the hard drive in an ipod probably is not up for the abuse of a phone vibrator built in. Killer phone: flash ipod, am/fm, cell phone. Compare international long distance phone card rates at http://www.allegrophone.com
A phone in my MP3 player? That's pretty easy to resist. I beat the living tar out of my phone. Most people do.
The ipod is pretty tough yea, but it wouldn't last a week in the chassis of my mobile phone.
Nor would I want my phone to have a net worth of $400 either.
Can we get over this fixation with phone/mp3/toaster oven/breadmakers already? Their day has come and gone. I want devices grouped by how I use and abuse them.
1.) Apple and motorola combine forces to create their own cell phone towers and wireless carrier network!
2.) All geeks transfer over to the new system, and it crashes.
3.) But with the new money, Apple and motorola make an even larger network and buy out a few carriers as well
4.) Profit!
No wonder people use sites like 3guploads.com or PitPim to put ringtones on their phones.
I think you meant bitpim.
If that really is the problem, then why deal with Verizon and Cingular at all? Release the thing in Europe, or somewhere (if some such place exists) where consumers have enough of a choice of cell phone providers that the provider can't stop the customer from doing what they like with their own phone. Once it's been out awhile, quietly try to make the public aware that the people in Europe have access to this phone iPod thing and that the only reason why Americans can't use it is because the American cell phone oligopoly doesn't like it. At that point the idea of defecting will start to look awfully attractive to the local providers...
Isn't Motorola supposed to be German anyway?
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
because it was an anti-trust lawsuit waiting to happen, never mind the DRM crap motorola was trying to shove down peoples throats
Now instead of hearing a crappy sounding ring tone you can hear the most annoying 50 cent song in CLEAR digital quality.
A person walking down the street with some white ear plugs, talking to themselves, about the mac cult taking over the world... or some such, I will assume they are just on the phone.
This signature is part of a balanced post.
The problem isnt the feature rich phone, the problem is carriers have some how got people to pay $1-4 for STUPID RINGTONES!!!! Itunes charges me $1 for a song whether its 1 min or 10 min, but a 3 second repeating ringtone costs me $2 or a 12 kbps 30 seconds clip of a song cost me $4...wtf is all I can say.
The phone companies wont let people do what we want with our phones until we stop letting them rape our wallets! $1.50 for a 32x32 pixel background image! Why cant i just send myself a custom made BG for free? Easy because stupid people pay, and they keep paying.
Change wont take long, if we all stopped buying ringtones and bullshit for our phones then change would happen pretty quick, its a broken buisness model made to screw the customers out of even more money, dont fall for it!
Yeah. Hipsters. That's what I meant.
My digital rights don't need management.
...is that nobody cares. Honestly, who's in the market for one of these phones? Phones have a short enough battery life.
Everyone's excited now, but wait until it ships.
Major carriers are blocking the phone's entry because they want to be able to force users to pay them money to do something as basic as copy songs onto the phone/player. These are economic/strategic obstacles not technical obstacles.
it seems like the headline poster owns stock in both of those companies a) market speak b) posting stock identifiers /just saying
Mabel: "Henry!"
Henry: "What, dear?
Mabel: "It's one of those calls again.
Henry: "What calls, dear?"
Mabel: "Every 20 minutes or so, the phone rings and I pick it up and I hear some of that damn rock music"
Meanwhile, somewhere 5 states away, Jason is grooving down the streets, buds in ears, with one hand on the iPod phone as he hits the controls and surfs through his really impressive Led Zep collection. Every once in a while, he presses a button and the song does not change. No idea why.
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
I knew it was a phony iPod story. Now it's time the phonys face the music.
While I'm not going to say that it's an "ad," but I do wonder why they need to put Apples stock market symbol in the commentary. The editors don't do this for other companies.
the same ringtone scam is happening worldwide, the big 5 record companies (Universal,BMG etc) are creaming their pants over the ringtone market because they want to sell the latest Gwen Stefani or fake boy band cover for 10000% markup compared to a regular cd album, and then they wonder why people rip MP3's and share them for free
if you try to rob me (the customer), i will rob your whole fncking store
works ok
The problem is, with Microsoft branding, the experience is a lot like what a cow feels at the end of the roundup. "Yeeha! Dogies. Stand still so we can brand you with the MS of the Billygates Ranch. The brandin' irons are heatin' up."
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
The Wireless services are being stupid on this. They could just add a 'iTunes Phone Access Fee' that's $5.00 to everyone who gets the phone. Then no matter how many songs they add they get their $5.00 and I think that if meant you got the phone for free most people who read the terms after they sign wouldn't care or would just want the shiny new phone.
Am I happy with my carrier?
Damn straight!
SJ: It will change the iPod as we know it.
/.: But you've already got the iPod, the iPod mini, the iPod photo...isn't that enough?
SJ: It is never enough.
/.: But...
SJ: Hold on a sec...(whips small white device out of pocket, punches hole in its screen). It's the latest device in the iPod family.
/.: What is it? A Powerbook with a 64-bit processor?
SJ: No.
/.: An iPod with a user-replaceable battery?
SJ: (Scoffs). No.
/.: What *is* it???
SJ: The iPlog. A device to revolutionize blogging as we know it.
/.: (ARGH!)
My digital rights don't need management.
I love this idea. I hope things keep going in this direction, because I like the idea of my phone doing everything. Acting as my TV remote, my car door opener, my camera, my ipod, my palm pilot, my mobile stock/email/sports scores report... As well as the ability to interface with other technology to keep me updated on things like whether my oven is on...
I read a few weeks ago about a cell phone company in Japan working on this, and despite my reservations due to privacy concerns, I really can't wait until this kind of technology becomes widely available.
I've got a Samsung Uproar cell phone that plays MP3's which is several years old (and which I don't even use any more). Seems to me combining a cell phone and MP3 player isn't exactly a novel idea... but wait, it's Apple, so that makes it special?!?
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
It was idiotic even trying to launch this thing in the USA. Carriers have a strange-hold over this market. Nokia has a range over over 100 handsets - you can buy about 6 of these on US carrier contracts, not including decent phones with WLAN and Bluetooth.
I cannot understand why Apple is sodding around with Motorola on this. They should have partnered with Nokia.
As an aside, Apple should also partner with Shazam. The best thing that an iPod/phone combo could do is recognize music from an online database and buy it for you.
It depends on the product. In this case, I think Apple is right. Motorola doesn't have much experience with releasing consumer products that people lust for... Apple does.
If you announce an iTunes / Motorola Cellphone before it is ready to hit the market, you adversely affect current sales of iPods and Moto phones. People like to have the next best thing, and they hate buying something that's outdated in a month. Consumers will usually hold off on purchasing a new device if they can get a cooler device in a few months / weeks.
This is precisely why Apple usually announces hardware and sells it the very same day. If they don't do that, they have to liquidate a load of outdated hardware. Consumers won't buy a 15 gig iPod if they know a 20 gig with more features will be on sale for the same price next month.
The only time Apple doesn't do this is when they have a future product that doesn't directly compete against what they are currently selling.
Apple has one of the best inventory records in the tech industry. Motorola should listen them.
"Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
the submitter just copied the article vertabim, usually the AAPL would have a link to the stock price
It's because the submitter (chadwick) copied the first few sentences from the BuisnessWeek Article who posts stock symbols next to referenced companies as their readership includes buisnessmen.
It is kinda sad the editors didn't take the stock symbol out, but its sadder the submitter didn't.
Why are we putting up with this kind of thing in here in the US, anyway? I mean I'm not, personally -- I don't own a cellphone. But that's because there's no way in hell I'd pay someone to cripple the device for me, just to force me to pay them more money! Why are there so many sheeple here to let them get away with it?
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
I see nothing but dark clouds in the future of cell phones in America unless we take back control from the corporations. We must divorce the hardware from the service, just like we did for wired telephone service. You should be able to buy whatever phone YOU want, with whatever feature set YOU want, and connect to whatever carrier YOU want. Verizon in particular has already shown us exactly how they want to control us.
Does anybody else not understand the question? Is this guy saying I'd rather carry two gizmos than one because, I'd have, like, more stuff?
mt
The editors also do not write the submissions, and the submitter in this case doesn't either, he just copied and pasted the first 2 paragraphs of the article.
moo.
It'll be nice to have iTunes on the cellular network, you'll be able to drive down the highway and choose your songs from the music store. The market is "Everyone Driving". That's better than sirrius until next year.
The iPod phone would cannibalize into iPod sales. Instead of buying shuffles and minis people will just use their phones.
"Who wants the $500 iPod phone when you could buy a phone and an iPod for that much?"
Anyone who doesn't want to carry two devices in their pocket all day and wants to download new music anywhere, something you can't do right now if you have a separate iPod and phone.
some info on the phone did leak out, including that it was flash based. it's not huge capacity or anything. they showed it to the press a day or two before the cancelled release and i guess from there some info came out about how many songs it can hold and whatnot. i don't remember the capacity, because they always talk about it in terms of number of songs (grr) and not MBs.
i don't think it's iPod + phone as much as a phone with a built in flash drive and some slimmed down version of the iPod's software. it has some of the iPod's interface as well as the ability to play iTMS songs... and it can sync with iTunes.
"Showing precisely why pre-announcement of products only leads to problems, frustrations, and customer dissatisfaction.
Only announce products when they are done and ready to ship and you avoid this sort of garbage."
Well there goes ThinkSecret's business model.
So exactly how stupid do you have to be to not notice that this is in the APPLE section? You know, the place where APPLE stuff is talked about?
'Standards' in computing only impress those who are impressed by things like 'standards'.
A key issue might be how the music is distributed. Maybe Apple just wants to continue having users download the songs via the computer. Perhaps the phone companies want the ability to download songs via the phone as well, to increase airtime charges. I think the telcos have been trying to push these relitively premium services. Maybe $10 additioanl to have the ability to download songs.
Of course if songs are bought through the phone and computer, this leads to which devices the songs can be used on. If the phones are harddrive based this decision might be very important. If flash based, then maybe not so much.
In any case, I would still like to see a phone the size and form of a standard iPod with Bluetooth headset and all data entry done via a computer. Since I am sure this is not on the way, I probably will just get a Razr.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Ya know, that occurred to me, but think about it this way:
I have a flash-based mp3 player that will player for 13 hours off a single AAA battery. Cellphone LI batteries are much beefier. I bet the additional battery drain from playing MP3s will be almost undetectable.
I can't believe that people pay $3 a ringtone to begin with! I just find a nice MP3, and upload it. Simple, no headaches, and a real selection, not the last 10 rap songs to come out.
SJ: It will change the iPod as we know it.
SJ: It is never enough.
SJ: Hold on a sec...(whips small white device out of pocket, attaches 103-key USB keyboard ). It's the latest device in the iPod family.
SJ: No.
SJ: (Scoffs). No.
SJ: The iPlog. A device to revolutionize blogging as we know it.
My digital rights don't need management.
I've seen a lot of mobile phones - I'm in the UK - and they've been prevalent for over a decade now. One of the things that amazes me about them is this: 1 - Motorola can't make good ones. 2 - That doesn't seem to stop people buying Motorola phones. I always warn people not to buy Motorola - they are always buggy and frequently crash completely (i.e. lock-up and require rebooting.) Yet they always buy them, and regret it a few months down the line. I think it has something to do with the form-factor - people couldn't get enough of the star-tac and that was awful. I'm not surprised that they're having problems with the phone - I bet it'll be a dog once it's released as well.
I just returned from visiting India and dude, SMS is cheap over there. The rates are 0.5/2/5 rupees for local/national/international messages. That translates to 1.2/4.5/11 cents. Voice-calls are reasonable too - around 4.5 cents a minute and all incoming calls are free.
I am quite amazed at how cell phones have proliferated there (esp. after hearing about how low the land line density was in the past years).
It took me all of 15 minutes to sign up and be active with one of the providers on a pre-paid plan - no locked (GSM) phones which allows very easy switching between carriers!!!!!
DIAL MY JUKEBOX. One way would be for U.S. carriers to follow the model that has been established in Europe. There, carriers such as Vodafone (VOD ), Orange, and O2 have set up their own digital-music stores, letting customers download music tracks over the cellular network to their phones. Carriers get a slice of the $2.80 customers pay per song. Wireless players also could offer customers subscription services, with access to thousands of songs for a flat monthly fee of $15 or $20. I was just thinking, how often have you had times when you're trying to remember a song or talk about a song among friends and told them you've gotta listen to this. Wouldn't it just be great that you can online to a music store, browse and download it to listen or play it for your friends?
HD Trailers
That is just ignorant.
Cellular service in asia and europe for voice and SMS is cheaper than in the US.
The problem is that in the US, SMS is MORE EXPENSIVE than voice calls. Where in the rest of the world, it is cheaper. one SMS message in the US is more expensive than 1 minute of voice. Pathetic.
The cellular providers are killing off the technology by locking down the phone's features and forcing a pay per use pricing system on every feature of your phone. It is utter insulting and will eventually die out (but only after all the providers consolidate and screw us another way)
Your ignorance is infinitely greater than you realize.
Dude, how can you call giving that many blowjobs 'free'?
Being frustrated because the company you relied on isn't coming through sucks, huh?
Reminds me of back when you bastards were too inept to produce faster G4s for Apple and they got egg all over their faces when they had to downgrade the Power Mac line with slower CPUs.
It seems their biggest problem is getting a wireless carrier to support it. So how soon until Steve Jobs just buys a wireless carrier? That's an impulse buy, right? :)
RP
When customers buy songs from Apple's iTunes music store, they pay 99 a tune. But Apple only gets about 4 of that, after paying the record company and others, says researcher Strategy Analytics. Apple says iTunes is only a breakeven business.
Seems like the 39 cent margin estimate may be off by an order of magnitude.
What I'm trying to figure out is why one of these European or Asian cellular providers doesn't come over here and start releasing these awesome phones and wonderful service. Think of all the people that would flock to these companies to get cheap ring tones, cheap text messages, and the coolest phones ever. I imagine that in part it is the infrastructure, the fact they don't have any cell towers. I thought that the providers "shared" their towers with each other....for a fee of course. Beyond that, anything else that prevents them from coming over here?
And with Bluetooth or WiFi, just sync your tunes from your desktop. There only needs to be one repository for your music, not many--and having iTunes on a phone seems a bit self defeating in that scenario. As for downloading, I rather download at home--when I'm not on the go. When I'm 'mobile' I rather be listening to my tunes than buying, surfing for tunes, etc... And a watered down iTunes is just another QT player. Though only having 48MB, I like the player capability on my Sony Ericsson for my MP3s, the i/f is simple, bluetooth syncing is simple and it just does the job--and I still have 1 week battery life! Explains why Sony's shifting away from the PDA and ipod biz (those sales was a factor too).
[1] Motorola says it's working out ways for carriers to profit from digital music, and it expects to launch the phone with that support this summer.
[2] Verizon and others typically subsidize the phones they sell to customers, often charging $200 less for handsets at retail than what they pay Motorola and others
1- Set on vibrate
2- Insert into anus
3- Wait for phone call from Steve Jobs
If apple gets right down to it and doesn't let motorolla spoil the "simplicity" of the interface, the other carriers will have no way stand up to this partnership. People still buy 500$ ipods, like photo ipods. If the product is really good people won't hesitate spending money on it. With most cellphones , interface is at best rather difficult, besides dialing the number. So compared on ease of use most cellphones suck compared to how iPod compares to all other music players.
.. Look at ngage however, device integration has to be careful, because you might just destroy image of your company.
I for one would be worried to drop iPod phone, because i do drop my other cells regularly. My guess ipod won't be used as headset but rather with handsfree device of some kind, which would be welcomed, i drop my cell so many times.
would they be working then on iPod shuffle based phone? Because that would look more logical, but less unique way.
Suppose iPod may well integrate sudden motion sensor to park harddrive??? That would make ipod phone durable and usable alternative.
Motorolla cells have best reception of all cellphones, so I hope they make killer iPod phone.
my 22c
Cell phones and mp3 players aren't exactly a match made in heaven. One is used to talk to people, the other is used to AVOID talking to people. :)
So ya, imho, stick to your iPod (or, if you're *really* cool, iRiver) for music, and whatever you prefer for a cell phone.
I have a MP3 player, I have a mobile phone. I don't need a product which costs twice as much ans is twice as easy for a pick pocket to get
I like muppets.
1. Networks (Own the towers, numbers of these are limited by government licenses).
2. Operators (Buy capacity on the networks, subsidize the cost of phones tied to their contracts).
3. Phone manufacturers.
4. Stores.
1&2 may be the same company.
European phone manufacturers are of course already in the US, e.g. Nokia. Not sure about the operators, but if not, it's probably due to being locked out by the existing networks.
If they throw in the dog bark translator I'll buy two! No, make that three!
When is the useless feature creep in cell phones going to stop, and the research on actually making the batteries last longer going to start?
BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
Back during the tech boom companies tried to do the convergence thing and it did not work. I just dont see the need for your mobile phone to play music. What use is your phone if the battery is dead from playing music when you need to make a call.
This seems a bit absurd. What's the point of such a device? How about a PSP with 802.11g and mobile phone capability? Then you can play video games, listen to mp3s, watch movies AND make phone calls? Maybe even store some names/numbers and have a calender! Maybe it could even run NetBSD, like my toaster! :D
I mean, who wants a cell phone that on which you can't ever easily replace the battery? Now that's *GREAT* engineering!
shop.envescent.com - Computer hardware and more.
want to know the secret ringtone (sprint pcs) files are setup like Content-Type: audio/MIDI Content-Name: #ringtone name Content-Version: #number Content-Vendor: #vendor name Content-URL: http://#servername/path/filename.midi Content-Size: #size in bytes of file as long as the file is named *.gcd and is served as text/x-pcs-gcd you are good to go
Any person using FTFY or editing my postings agrees to a US$50.00 charge
" Motorola and Apple would let customers put any digital tune they already own on their phones for free."
"Verizon, Cingular, and other wireless operators want customers to pay to put music on phones. They think getting a full song should be like getting a ring tone, snippets for which customers now pay from 99 to $3."
So the mobile carriers are screwing us, because they think they can force us to pay the phone company to put music we already own onto phones that we own. They have absolutely nothing to do with this transaction, except that they can force the phone maker to skip the feature. They don't even have the usual fake cartel argument that this transaction between you, the phone and the copyright holder somehow competes "unfairly" with anything they're trying to sell. No, it's just greed and monopoly, pure and simple.
The carriers are also stopping Palm from putting Bluetooth and WiFi support either into the phones, or in the SDIO slot specs. Because that could somehow allow unlimited use of your phone with your network, which conflicts with their plans to make you pay for every bit transacted. These people are standing in the way of the entire telecom future, as if the RBOCs stood at the gates of the Internet in 1990, forcing PC makers to cripple motherboards to pay the RBOCs for every bit transacted, over a modem or otherwise. The sooner they're destroyed, the better.
--
make install -not war
I can't believe people use ringtones at all, much less pay for them. They're damned annoying. I just use a nice, non-annoying "ring" that came with my phone. Simple, no headaches, and no annoying everyone else around me when my phone rings.
Maybe I'm just a luddite, since my aging Motorola v60i does everything I need it to do (and in fact does stuff that I don't need it to do, like browse the web or send text messages). My requirements for a phone:
- Flips open. I've had my share of non-flip phones, and I'll never go back.
- Makes and answers phone calls.
- At least decent reception (most of this is the carrier, not the phone)
- Decent battery life (it should last at least a few days on standby).
- GSM, for convenience (so I can carry the phone with me to other GSM providers as I choose).
- Vibrate mode.
That's it. I don't need no stinkin' color screens, polyphonic ring tones, screensavers, backgrounds, games, PIMs, bluetooth, cameras, mp3 players, or whatever else. My friends make fun of me for sticking with the old v60i, but I haven't found anything yet compelling enough to upgrade. More importantly, my v60i has never crashed or locked up, while their fancy smart phones have all locked up on them more than once. So long as the v60i continues to work, I'll continue to use it.http://msn.com.com/2100-1009_22-5634315.html?part= msn&tag=feed_2514&subj=ns_5634315
n g+movies/2100-1026_3-5615685.html?part=msn-cnet&su bj=ns_3-5615685&tag=tg_news
s /2100-1028_3-5634670.html?part=msn-cnet&tag=feed_2 501&subj=ns_5634670
"Commentary--Evidence is a slippery commodity, especially when it comes in digital form."
[New methods eyed for buying movies]
http://msn-cnet.com.com/New+methods+eyed+for+buyi
"Want to get rid of that old DVD box set of "The Best of Barnaby Jones?" Peerflix has the site for you."
[Feds get set for Net rules]
http://msn-cnet.com.com/Feds+get+set+for+Net+rule
"WASHINGTON--The Federal Election Commission has begun the perilous process of including political blogs and Web sites in campaign finance rules that were created long before the Internet became such a powerful political tool."
People wanting MP3 playback and advanced telephony in a package that doesn't sacrifice one for the other needn't worry. This product will surely exist in a highly marketable form within the next year and if it's no thanks to Apple, then that's all the better for consumers because you won't have to deal with iTMS copy protection and you won't have to install special software to copy music to your MP3 phone.
We've heard from all the major manufacturers where next-generation MP3 phones are concerned except Nokia, who just so happens to have a publicly announced contract with Loudeye. Loudeye, in turn, has signed a deal to provide a music store to O2. Read the press releases these companies have put out in the past few months and connect the dots here, people! The fact that the most powerful mobile phone manufacturer in the world isn't saying much probably means that it's coming to the party with sleeves full of aces!
Samsung is already on its second generation hard drive MP3 phone. The first was an unmitigated disaster and the second's not too bad! You can bet that the third will be a winner.
The world will move forward without Apple and Motorola.
~Someday, I hope to be an aspiring author.
Promote the iTunes phone through Virgin Mobile, make it a pay-as-you go phone. A lot of people don't really need a cell phone all that often, so make it OK for occasional phone use and mostly an iPod... Plus Virgin really needs a bluetooth phone in the lineup.
By going with Virgin and the Pay-as-you go phone, they simultaneously promote the concept of pay-as-you-go instead of expensive fixed monthly fees, and show people they do not have to get everything through the phone provider.
Only problem of course is that Virgin is also a huge media company with its own online store....
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Mobile phone and iPod is the most retarded mix ever. It would better if they made the iPod Photo to display short movies. Think of an idea here? MUSIC VIDEOS!
In America, you spam computers In Soviet Russia, computers spam you!
Less space than a Nomad - no support for Ogg Vorbis. Lame!
Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
A device combining the digital music prowess of Apple, the user interface design of Apple, the build quality of Apple, and the wireless expertise of Nokia.
Frankly, Motorola's user interface is a hideous piece of crap that doesn't seem to have improved since the 80s: menus that SHOUT AT YOU, and a phone book that still can't cope with people having more than one phone number (duh!). No matter how good the RAZR looks, it's the same craptastic software on it, and that's why I'm not gonna touch it.
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
But they look HOT! Great design team, poor execution.
Free Mac Mini Yeah, it's
"You don't have to go to India to get a fair deal. I am on Fido in Canada using a SE T610 I got for $25. It has the most recent firmware, BT is active, I can use .midi files that I make myself as ringtones."
Well it's not like all of the USA is like that either. I have an MP3 ringtone I made. I put it on my phone by simply uploading it to my site and using my phone to download it. (no bluetooth on this phone.)
Maybe that'll change one day, but I don't find it all that likely. Cingular would really like me to pay by the KB.
"Derp de derp."
In the year 2000 cell phones will do everything but make phone calls.
Taco?
Sounds like a rehashing of the iPod release. Will people ever learn?
See data comparing mobile downloads and iTMS here.
Let's get our heads out of the sand, now shall we?
Pay for the version you play at home, pay for the version you play in your car, pay for the version you play on your cellphone...
Pay $3.00 to move something you already own from one device to another.
Nah, no need for regulation here. Obviously the market is working perfectly.
"This is precisely why Apple usually announces hardware and sells it the very same day. If they don't do that, they have to liquidate a load of outdated hardware. Consumers won't buy a 15 gig iPod if they know a 20 gig with more features will be on sale for the same price next month."
The Osborne.
This is absolutely rediculous. The PHONE companies want to be major players in the digital music scene? I'd really like some of what they are smoking. What in the world should make them think people would want to listen to music from their phones. I don't have the numbers, but I seem to remember that the Nokia Music phone or whatever it was called, was/is a total flop and didn't take off like the phone companies expected. ;x
Now, the hottest (IMO) music player teams up with motorola to create a phone, and these guys think they have a foot in the door to selling music? How about sticking to your bread and butter and sell phone service, make it work right the first time, and give us what we want. You heard me cellbells. How about a decent network and fair pricing before you decide to dabble in online music. Also, why would I buy music over a slow unstable connection on a cell phone, when I can sit down and get what I want from my pc in an eigth of the time. Granted, maybe I'm out somewhere and I want to hear a certain song NOW. I could see having iTunes on my phone being a convenience, but using my phone as my music player plugged into my stereo isn't going to happen. What if I'm having a party? Everytime the phone rings, I have to tell the whole party 'oops, sorry bob's calling, you're going to have to stop dancing for a minute.'
Sillyness. Stick to putting up towers and raping people for crappy service. Let the RIAA focus on raping people for music. There's plenty of assholes out there for everyone.
It seems like these cell companies have forgotten it's not about what they want. It's about what the customer wants. Sell the phones at a profit instead of a loss. If people want it, they will buy it. If not, they won't. But don't strip your customers of options that they may want, because you'd like to expand your market into unrelated areas.
At any rate, Business 2.0 had a concept design of an "ipod" phone, that if this is what they are making, I'll be first in line to buy one. I already have an iPod, but if I had a phone that looked like it too. It'd be in my pocket faster than your wallet on the subway.
And this has what, exactly, with putting an MP3 player into a cell phone?
I smell a cut-and-paste troll...
I mean, yeah the phones and the service is cheaper, and everybody uses SMS service, but when I was complaining to my brother about some issue where Cingular screwed up my bill, his response was that my annoyance was nothing compared to the problems he's had with his Indian cellphone provider, and his stories aren's anywhere near the horror stories of some of his friends (one friend had someone pickpocket his phone and then put it back as soon as they discovered what company it was). And, while he would like to go elsewhere, the company he has is the only one in his area that has phones that can be hooked up to a computer to double as a modem.
Point is, while we like to look at other countries and say how great their service is, there are tradeoffs and the people who live there and actually have to use it may not see things the same way as an outsider looking in does.
Eagles may soar, but weasles don't get sucked into jet engines...
Major Hangups Over the iPod Phone
Worst.. pun... ever.
(well someone had to say it... and at 200+ posts it was looking dangerously like they wouldn't)
Dealing with lawyers would be a lot less tedious if they all looked like Casey Novak.
Some bugs with the actual software of the phone...
Physical defects and horrible design.
Nickel-and-diming by Motorola/Nextel: Want to use a cradle? Better get a different power supply, since the one that comes with the phone will be rejected. Service issues: Nextel has got to be the only vell provider with 100% reception in the middle of a freaking corn field (Illinois Math and Sci Academy, Aurora, IL) and 0% reception in the middle of a bustling metropolis. (Chicago, IL).
"Synchronizing the phones with computer is standard there, and so is "SMSing" ringtones. If one person buys a ringtone from the carrier (which is around 8 cents), that ringtone can be SMSed to all the friends. There is a nominal charge for SMS also, basically its a huge market which people simply love."
You mean MMSing. Unless you like monophonic ringtones.
"Synchronizing the phones with computer is standard there."
Funny, my T-Mobile branded Nokia 3650 doesn't seem to have any trouble talking to my computer.
At first glance, I thought the title of this submission was "Major humps iPod phone". My first thought was, Man, the military always gets to fuck with the cool shit first!
I don't moderate anymore. Karma penalty for 90% fair mods? Can I mod that unfair?
I've had the Nokia 7610 for about half a year now. All of my ringtones are MP3's that I own that I downloaded to my phone (with some simple editting on cooledit pro). I paid for none of them and I can store thousands on my 512 megs of memory. I don't see what Verizon and Cingular are so worried about. Those of us that want to get free ring tones can already do so. Personally I'd love to see this phone come out, it's what I'm waiting for in the next generation of phones.
AMEN!
Also don't forget that the carriers (including cingular, Sprint, and Verison) ALL modify firmware in your phone to disable features which would otherwise allow you to put BG images and ringtones into your phone. _EVERY_ phone that does not allow the user to modify the BG image without paying has been modified in firmware to disable that feature. It is a scam. There are almost NO phones which allow you to modify the firmware without having special programer cables and software. This has all been because of modified firmware installed into the phone.
Your ignorance is infinitely greater than you realize.
and I hope the deal falls through. Motorola's "wireless expertise" has been on a gradual downslide for the last few years. In fact, they haven't made a really good phone (relative to the technology of the time) since the StarTAC. Each progressive generation of Motorola phones has gotten worse, and their current batch is pathetic. Hopefully Apple and Motorola won't be able to strike a deal on this, and the field will be left open for a better phone manufacturer to move in.
I wasn't aware they had any expertise, at least in the cell phone division. Their 2-way radios are about the most indestructable you can get (but Icom and Kenwood still have more features). Their chips are still great for many applications. The cable division, well, they bought that, but their modems are better than most. But the Cell division? Nothing but crap. I have a junk Mot phone for work, a Nok phone for personal use. I carry both around with me all day, mostly because the Mot phone won't work in many areas the Nokia phone will. The charger is this tiny little 3 contact connector that needs to be scraped off every few weeks with a sharp knife and rubbing alcohol (an eraser is much too big to reach them), and I have a very tough time hearing the speaker.
But, I do like the idea of an I-pod phone. Imagine putting numbers on the jog dial so you can actually dial a phone number again!
"Well, good luck finding a judge that doesn't run a bestiality site."
And I hope someone here, who lives in the U.S. and has bought a few phones on plans and for full price, what is the deal with mobile carriers in the U.S.?
I live in Australia, for those don't already know, and if I have a mobile phone I want to use then all I have to do is put my SIM card in it.
I used to own a Nokia 8210 I bought on a plan two year from B - carrier is Optus.
It was stolen - right after a I bought a nice shell for it with a stylish white dragon on black background, buggrit - and while I was going through the motions of waiting for the insurance to process so I could get a new one, my Mum bought me a Nokia 7650 for my birthday.
All I did was stick my replacement SIM - sent very quickly by B - into the 7650 and started using it straight after it's first charge.
I didn't have to talk to the phone company about having a different phone, unless I wanted to turn on various services that the phone supports, and I still use the 7650 today.
From the various stories I've read here on /. I'm getting the impression that your mobile phone carriers are dictating what features customers can have on their own phones, regardless of whether or not the feature has anything to do with the mobile service.
How the hell does Verizon or Cingular dictate to Apple and Motorola that they can't let the owner of the phone directly transfer music onto the phone from their iPod or personal computer?
When did the telephone carriers suddenly become the judges of how phone companies construct their devices?
If you want to sell a mobile phone, or other comms device, don't you just build a device that conforms to the FCC specs and then sell it?
Why does Verizon have any say over how your phone works, other than asking you not to put a device on the network which might interfer with it?
His name is Robert Paulsen...
What I'm trying to figure out is why one of these European or Asian cellular providers doesn't come over here and start releasing these awesome phones and wonderful service.
Even if you're content to use GSM(*), you can't just bring any random foreign phone into the US and start using it. The European mobile phone frequency bands are 900 and 1800 MHz; in the US, they're 800 and 1900 MHz.
(* = There are many technical reasons why you might prefer CDMA, which is what Sprint and Verizon use. Soft handoffs is one: dropped calls are less likely because your phone can talk to multiple towers at once. Better privacy is another: using a radio receiver to eavesdrop on a CDMA call is next to impossible.)
Visual IRC: Fast. Powerful. Free.
The page rank friendly linking? 'digital music' to his website of ringtones?
/. does!
/. part of the cure, or part of the problem?)
WTF? take off the advert right now! If I search for digital music I don't want nextel ringtones coming up, yet this articles publication implies that
This article is a copy/paste *with* link spam!
WARNING: LINK SPAM IN ARTICLE. kthxbye (is
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
I completely agree! Specialization of labor works well, why not specialization of gadget duty. But then again, how are we going to carry all that?
I have a cell phone, PDA, keys, wallet, and if I add an iPod, my contact lense rewetting drops, my chap stick, or who knows whatever i might need, that piles up to a butt load of stuff. Being a typical male, i have it scattered across the eleven total pockets among my cargo pants and jacket. That gets annoying if i need to change pants or my jacket.
So does that mean we are all headed toward purses?
Too bad fido coverage is ridiculously bad. And we're still being f'd over on cell stuff. Rogers pay as you go (if you have to use it for long distance at all) is 66 cents per minute. That's 35 times as much (as in 3500%) as it costs me on my landline. And the time "expires" in a month... My cell phone stays home not even charged, unless I'm going for a weekend trip somewhere (once or twice a year). People find cable companies or telcos bad, but this is the ultimate rip-off.
Why not just have the phone be able to plug in to a shuffle, or something. phones do NOT need to play MP3s, as far as I'm concerned. It'd be stupid - you are listening to a song then all of a sudden the phone rings and your song ends and you're thrown in to a conversation. the iPod is great. Cell phones are great. But maybe Apple should just design a cell phone, rather than designing a music player cell phone. Apple reinvented the personal computer, the portable music player, and now they have to re-invent the cell phone.
Well, Siemens will support acc in their new *75 range of mobile phones. I think that this can be seen as iPod phone ;-) i75 ;-)
One insider says that even if Cingular and Verizon, the two largest wireless players, won't sell the Motorola-Apple phone, smaller rivals, such as T-Mobile, may peddle it to gain ground on the industry leaders. The US cell phone market really confuses me, why couldn't you go to a store and buy the phone without the blessing/subscription plan/lock-in of a carrier, and then just pop your current SIM-card into the new phone? Why do you have to buy your phones through a carrier? Are there no stores which just sell phones without subscription plans? Can't you move your SIM-card to any phone you want?
One insider says that even if Cingular and Verizon, the two largest wireless players, won't sell the Motorola-Apple phone, smaller rivals, such as T-Mobile, may peddle it to gain ground on the industry leaders.
The US cell phone market really confuses me, why couldn't you go to a store and buy the phone without the blessing/subscription plan/lock-in of a carrier, and then just pop your current SIM-card into the new phone? Why do you have to buy your phones through a carrier?
Are there no stores which just sell phones without subscription plans?
Can't you move your SIM-card to any phone you want?
You pretty much lost me with your first source, downhillbattle.org, which lost all credibility (with me, anyway) after the iPod battery hoax/fiasco.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
a phone with itunes - whoda thunk it. I have seen quite a few of these phone integrated devices , the PDA/Phones... Can you turn the device on without actually activating the phone? if not it becomes a paperweight while you are on the aeroplane. as for the music playing phone - there are many phones out there with either hardware or software Mp3 players built in...though I would rather use my axim x50v I do not see the attraction of itunes .... sheep are cute , sheep are cute , sheep are soft and curly....
...I obey the laws of physics....
I purchased an E398 a few months back, and it's the worst phone I ever had:
;-)
- takes longer to boot than my XP desktop
- flaky power/headset connectors, my phone sometimes doesn't charge during the night, and half the time I have to disconnect the headphones to have a conversation
- volume is too low, without headphone or hands-free I have trouble hearing what my correspondents say
- screen illegible in bright sunlight
- phone makes all king of noises, especially at boot, even in silent mode, so I do look like one of those obnoxious idiots
- the USB synch software doesn't work, I tried on 4 different PCs. And got no support.
- typing SMSs with their "assist" feature is actually slower than without it
- the phone is incredibly sluggish, kind of always looses the first key typed when it's in sleep mode, and for some reason I can't wrap my brain around that
- I'm still waiting for the bigger RAM cards that were promised for January
On a brighter note, the UI is nice (though slow), there are nice "classic phone" ringtones, the unit is solidly built.
I'm thinking of junking it, though.
Mmmmm, actually feels good to vent my frustrations
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
This is the fourth time you've posted these same links.
What is wrong with you? Are you one of those people that thinks that repeating something over and over again makes it true? Wipe the froth from your mouth and breath through your nose for a bit.
I really hope I don't have to see another duplicate post of yours as I read further down.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
I'll vouch for what Nano says, although I did go the BT route. I have a T610 and I use T-Mobile. Downloaded the midi to the computer and uploaded to the phone. It took maybe 2 minutes (other than the time spent looking for the midi, which was maybe 10 minutes.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
I think he means that because the carriers are used to making a hefty margin on that $3 ringtone, they're expecting at least as high a margin on an actual "real" song.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
Yeah, but that is Pay as you go. Those plans are the cash cow of any mobile provider.
This phone was designed with your mind in mind.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
They've come. Have your heard of T-Mobile? That's the mobile branch of Deutsch Telekom (German). Doesn't DoCoMo provide some sort of services to American careers? DoCoMo is mobile branch of NTT (Japanese).
I don't know how they operate in the US. I'm living in Europe. But from what I can gather, their practices seem to be adjusted to the American market.
Significantly missing is Vodafone... They are all over the world, but I don't see their presence in the US.
I'm sure the delays are due to software or hardware issues on Moto's part. Their platform is insanely awful, and no amount of insanely great from Apple is going to be enough to bring it back to just mediocre. Come on guys, why does everything having to do with the contact list get exponentially slower with each entry over a dozen? Why do your cameras suck so bad? More to the point, why couldn't Apple found a less horrible cell phone maker to join up with, like Nokia or LG?
I can do all those things and more on my US phone.(cingular) We have the same abilities here, it's just that few use them. (and some providers lock things so that you are forced to buy from them.... looking at you verison!)
Free Mac Mini Yeah, it's
And I'm sure this won't be moderated up due to how late I'm posting, but I've never been more dis-satisfied with a piece of hardware than with my and my wife's v600's. They've got stability issues that rank right up there with windows 95/98. (I was on my fourth phone in less than a year...Now I'm using a Nokia with _no_ issues.)
Svelte is good, features are good, but they're worthless without stability.
"Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus."
What department is this story from? Or is the headline enough of a groaner?
It was a samsung I got through sprint. There was talk about streaming mp3's, but the reality was that the RealPlayer interface you were bound to was the only way to put music on it.
Still... the phone worked great. I had it from about 2000-2002.
What's the big deal anyways. Windows Mobile phones have been able to play music for a while now. I don't get why anybody cares whether you have an iPod or any of the other 200 mp3 players on the market. Yeah, it has the cool spinner wheel, and a buttload of space, but it can't possibly be that much better than any other product.
Who could be interested? Oh yeah, the billion or so people who own both a cell phone and an iPod, that's who.
3 cents a KB? Ouch. On my Orange World Access plan, I pay £10 for 10MB and 80p per meg (very roughly 0.08p per KB) afterwards. On my O2 phone, I get 1meg free and around £2 per meg and 500 mins free WAP - but I use my Orange phone for internet access mainly for obvious reasons ;) Also on both my phone plans, I get 500 free text message (O2) and 3,000 free texts (Orange). Picture messaging is around 20p but I never use picture messaging anyway. And I'm not that happy with either of the networks unlike you ;)
The article claims that Apple can't get the carriers to accept an iTunes phone because the song downloads don't go over the airwaves. If that's the problem, then why can I go out and get a Microsoft PocketPC/Smartphone and download songs by syncing. Does this article say anything true or interesting?
The product is not the problem. The distributors are the problem.
For some reason, the distributors, who are effectively screwing consumers out of metric tons of money by playing up to teenagers and charging usurious prices, don't like the idea of losing all that money. Corporate pirates are like that, sometimes.
What I'm trying to figure out is why one of these European or Asian cellular providers doesn't come over here and start releasing these awesome phones and wonderful service.
They're already here. T-Mobile is a German company. But their pricing structure is just like all the American companies'. Why would they offer cheaper service when they can make more money offering the same crappy service that Americans are used to, and willingly buy?
There's no point to a company breaking ranks and offering better phones and cheaper service. There wouldn't be enough customers who care about such things to make it worth it. Americans want phones (and everything else) cheap, and don't care much about quality, service, or features.
Of that "billion," how many are satisified with the battery life of either device?
I thought the delay was because Steve Jobs wanted to charge $0.99 per call?
==This post is for humor only.==
"Buy a full price CDMA phone, and you can have whatever CDMA carrier you want service it."
This is neither easy or always true. Many carriers prohibit trying to do this.
"Can I use my old cellular phone purchased from another company?
No, the phones we sell have been programmed to work on our network and are compatible with the digital technology Northcoast PCS is using.
Other phones do not have the software required to properly work on our network."
Yeah, so, they still suck like the rest of them.