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No iPhone SDK Means No iPhone Killer Apps

Posted by kdawson on from the dang-no-photoshop dept.

iPhoneLover/Hater writes "Gizmodo is running an article analyzing the potential failure of the iPhone as a truly revolutionary platform. The reason: no SDK to harness the true power of Mac OS X and the frameworks contained in Apple's smart cell. From the article: 'According to Apple, "no software developer kit is required for the iPhone." However, the truth is that the lack of an SDK means that there won't be a killer application for the iPhone. It also means the iPhone's potential as an amazing computing and communication platform will never be realized. And because of this and no matter how Apple tries to sell it, the iPhone won't make a revolution happen.'"

4 of 657 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Unless... by Cereal+Box · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Well, the problem with making AJAX the iPhone "SDK" is that the iPhone is 2.5G. Oops. Those neat-o AJAX apps won't be too much fun on a GPRS connection that is about as fast as a 56K modem (and in my experience, you get a burst of data, then nothing, then a burst, then nothing, ad infinitum).

  2. Re:No killer app? by Matt+Perry · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Who's to say that Apple can't/won't write that killer app?
    You might be right but other people might be able to see something that Apple can't. The article brings up the Mac as a point of comparison. MacPaint was neat but Photoshop was one of the apps that made the Mac a must-have platform, and Photoshop didn't come from Apple.
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  3. Re:No killer app? by magarity · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The killer app is the phone
     
    No, the phone has already been invented. The iPhone needs a killer app to keep from being a phone with an "up to 5 hours" battery, in which I (and probably a lot of people) have no interest. An SDK would let some clever person who doesn't work at Apple come up with something even the clever people there haven't thought of. Everything shown on the Apple site for the iPhone's software abilities (web browser, calculator, notes, clock, etc) are already done by other phones on the market now. So maybe the iPhone does those tasks in a more user friendly way; so what? Not enough to get many people to switch to such an expensive device. No, the killer app for the iPhone has yet to appear.

  4. Re:It's just a phone... by Tickletaint · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Oh please, that's such a meaningless cliché. If you saw an opportunity to make money (or otherwise advance your own interests) by fomenting rebellion against the status quo, why wouldn't you? Why wouldn't any company? In fact, it happens all the fucking time.

    There are some people who appear to believe corporate interests are always and necessarily opposed to social responsibility. This is bullshit, and these people do damage to their own purported cause by setting up this false dichotomy.

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