We know the world is getting warmer and we know that we're responsible for most of that warming, although not all of it.
No, actually we don't know that. There are some theories that suggest that, but it seems that the better and better the models get, the less impact it looks like we have. We most definitely don't know we're responsible for "most if that warming."
Are you really so crippled in vision that you can't see the potential of multitouch interfaces?
I guess I am, Pink. I've never wanted to click on two things at once on my desktop and I'm not inclined to want to do so on a phone. How is mutlitouch really useful on a phone? Really? Seriously, when I was driving through Texas and New Mexico, I was checking my email and the weather forecasts as I drove down the highway (don't worry, no traffic out there)... and I always had a hand on the steering wheel. What is mutlitouch going to get me? And why aren't people clamoring for it on the desktop?
Income inequality does not drive crime. Is there more crime in the U.S. because Bill Gates has as much money as he does? No. The story made the silly, alarmist insinuation that because some rating of income inequality in the U.S. is closer to Brazil's that we are destined to share all Brazil's problems. Nonsense.
If everyone had their basic needs met, I don't think income inequality would matter as much.
Now you're getting closer. It's about having their basic meeds net. If everyone was earning the equivalent of $100,000/yr, it wouldn't matter if 5% of the population were earning $10 billion/yr. It's not the inequality that's the problem, it's the lack of wealth on the low side of the income spectrum. The high salaries or bonuses of CEOs, etc. are a popular target these days, but they are not the problem: The problem isn't that some people are making too much, the problem is that some people aren't earning enough. We aren't going to reduce crime by making sure CEOs are paid less.
But as long as some people are desperare and feel they are being screwed, and they can find an easy target in a rich person, there will be crime.
That's crazy. I admit I don't have any hard evidence, but I'm pretty darned sure that most crime is poor people on poor people, not poor on rich. Sure, it happens, but the majority of crime, it seems, is poor people committing crimes against other poor people.
do touchscreen like Apple does it. Apple has bought fingerworks in 2005, which has patented multitouch - and made keyboards out of them. Jobs demonstrated multitouch in the demo when he shrunk and expanded a picture with the "pinch" - this is obviously multitouch and the old touchsensor tech can't do this.
No, you're right. I can do this on the Treo's apparently obsolete single-touch touchscreen with just a single finger rather than two. I guess that's progress, right?
I am also a mobile application developer (J2ME, Palm (not very strong on that one)).
Me too. To-date, Palm is the most stable mobile OS I've used or developed for. Not that it's the most advanced, but I do find it the most stable. And that's something people like to have in a phone.
The answer is that no, the Treo does not have an accelerometer. It does not have a proximity sensor. It does not have an ambient light sensor as the iphone does. Hence it does not switch to landscape mode when you tilt it (actually, it doesn't even have landscape mode as the screen is smaller and square). It does not turn off the screen automatically when it's close to your face when you're speaking. It also does not adjust its brightness based on the ambient light (apple is not the first to do this - my w810i does it too, but your treo doesn't).
Please tell me why I care about an accelerometer? Proximity sensor? No, Treo doesn't have one. So? Mine is configured to automatically turn off the screen after a few seconds of using the phone. Same result: My screen is off when I'm talking. Landscape mode? Well, like you said, the screen is square so it's a moot point. Adjust brightness based on ambient light? I guess that's kind of cool and marginally useful, but nothing earth-shattering. I've never changed my Treo's screen brightness (even though I can) and that's never been a problem.
However, the PalmOS based Treos are doomed, especially in the face of the iphone which also threatens the Windows mobile ones.
Maybe. People have been predicting the end of Palm and PalmOS for years. But it just keeps on working. Which is probably why it's still with us. As a developer I prefer the PalmOS because when I write an app for it, it just works. I like it as a user for the same reason.
What the GP post probably meant is: Can you connect the vast number of accessories that Apple has enabled through the doc connector to the Treo? External speakers? FM transmitters? The Treo is a USB slave device, which means you can only use that USB port to connect it to a computer - you can't connect an accessory that way. The treo doesn't even ship with a cradle. The iphone does (apparently).
Why do I want a cradle? All day it's in my belt case and at night I plug it in and set it on the nightstand next to the bed where it serves as my alarm clock. During the day, if I want to connect to the computer, that's what Bluetooth is for.
As for your other points, I'll agree there are some media-specific things that the iPhone was specifically designed to do. Great if you want a media device first, a phone second, and Internet connectivity last.
No. Blazer is a baby browser.
It works.
Can blazer run in the background while you do something else?
Technically, nothing on a Palm can. But jumping on GP's citation of Blazer and acting like that's the limit of what a Palm-based browser can do is not very honest.
Can it view PDFs?
Sure, I don't do it that often really. But I loaded my Treo full of PDFs I thought I might need sometime. Turns out, I've never actually needed them. But they're there if I want them.
Can it run Ajax ("web 2.0") sites? The answer to all of these, as you well know, is no.
Can iPhone? Do we know? And do we care? What exactly are you trying to do with your web browser on a phone that requires this stuff? Really, have you actually used Internet browsing on a phone? It's not very useful for the things you're describing, and that has nothing to do with the iPhone or the Treo. It has to do with the screen size, period. There might be some extreme geeks that might want to spend the day squinting at a web page on their little screen when a normal person will use a 17" monitor; but for most people, you use a web browser on a phone to quickly check a stock quote, the weather forecast, maybe read some news that was targeted for
That's a straw man, we're talking about why you "really don't see what all the fuss about the iPhone is." and you think the phone is over hyped. Those are reasons why people are excited about it over a Treo et. al. Apple's Integration of the two is a huge part of that.
Putting 8 gigs of memory in any device is no big deal. Were the Treo trying to be an MP3 player, it'd have more memory. But even though the Treo isn't trying to be an MP3 player, it can be one--and these days you can buy a 4GB SD card which puts the Treo at the same memory size as the 4GB iPhone. So without batting an eye, there is nothing technologically interesting about the iPhone over the Treo except the high-end model has 8GB (and my Treo can effectively have 12GB if I want to get 3 cards... how expandable is the iPhone?). Now if you want to make the argument that the GUI of the iPhone is better, well, that's something we won't really know until they start selling them and it's also ultimately a matter of opinion. Some people like bells and whistles, some people like simplicity. I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of things the iPhone does can ultimately be done on the Treo with fewer clicks based on the iPhone demo video I saw--they were doing zooms and stuff by moving two fingers in opposite directions while I could do the same thing on my Treo with a single hand with a single click. There just wasn't anything I saw the iPhone do that made me think, "Awesome!" because I'd done it all before on my Treo. Sure the iPhone looks pretty, no-one's denying that. But things like zooming in by moving two fingers in opposite directions strikes me as a whistle that'd probably slow me down rather than make my experience easier.
Anyway, it takes something a little more technologically innovative to get me excited about a product. I don't doubt they'll succeed at selling a good number of these things, but my point is that it's most definitely not the earth-shattering innovative next generation smart phone. It's essentially a Treo with a bit more emphasis on the media side than the phone side. But there's nothing really new about anything they've done.
Just because you select your self out of the market doesn't mean it's not interesting to anyone else.
I never said it won't be interesting to someone else. I'm sure it will be. I'm sure they'll sell quite a few. My musings are over the undue excitement about the technological aspects of this device. It's not doing anything that hasn't already been done by a Treo for years. I wouldn't be surprised to see a lot of brainless wonders on CNN reporting on this new fangled device; but I've always thought that Slashdot was more of a geek site where people have some understanding of the technology involved. And feature and technology-wise, there really isn't anything new here that warrants so much excitement.
Like I said, if someone really loves the iPod/Mac interface, sure, I can see why they'd be excited about that. But all the hype this product is getting is completely out of proportion with the advances it offers. It's a smart phone by Apple that does about the same thing as Palm's been offering for years. Forgive me if I'm not acting like this is some big deal.
To be clear, nobody (not even Steve Jobs) cares why you don't want it. You asked why someone would.
Maybe you were replying to someone else. I never asked why anyone would want one (though I did ask why someone would want 8GB on a phone). Talk about a strawman.
Try adding 8 gig of memory to your Treo. That's right, it will only take 2.
Why would I need 8 gigs of memory on my phone? I mean, really? Yeah, if you are using your phone as an MP3 player or a movie player, perhaps. But if you use your phone as a phone, why do you need 8 gigs? I have a 512MB SD card in my phone and I don't think it's even 10% full.
You understand that your Treo *could* be used as an MP3 player but you choose to use an iPod instead. I won't quarrel with you over that, there are a lot of very good reasons many people spend hundreds of dollars on iPod's to do something their phone already does, and they put up with fumbling with an extra device to do it.
As soon as the iPhone or Treo has the same size and weight as an iPod Nano and I can comfortably strap it to my left arm when I'm biking, you might have a point. Until then, you're under the mistaken impression that everyone wants a single device for everything. I don't. I don't want a phone as small as an iPod Nano and I don't want an MP3 as large as a phone.
Certain things are meant to be done in certain places. You don't take a dump while sitting on a high-chair and you don't use a toilet to boost a child to eating level.
I have a Treo and I've used it to browse the Internet and download email sometimes. When? Well, not often. Because most of the time I want to do these things, I'm at my computer anyway. Sometimes if I'm at Blockbuster and I see a movie that looks interesting, I'll browse to IMDB and get more information/reviews. A week ago I was driving through Texas and New Mexico towards Colorado and I was checking the weather along my route every half an hour via the NWS website--looking at NEXRAD radar graphics at cities along my routes. Since I was on the road for two days, I was checking my business email every so often to make sure there was nothing that required my immediate attention. And more than once, I've been at an airport waiting for a flight and while I didn't feel like taking out my laptop, I checked and responded to a few emails before I got on the plane and disappeared into those several hours of communication void.
The point being... Regardless of how neat the interface is, few people will use any phone-sized device for extensive browsing or emailing on a regular basis. They are great features when you're away from your computer--especially for extended periods of times--or when, like I said, you're "out in the wild" and just need to check some information real quick. But using a cell phone to browse the Internet? It's just not comfortable on a screen that size. And I don't hold that against the iPhone or Treo--it's just reality.
Your Treo has accelerometers and a proximity sensor?
No, and my use of the phone has not been hindered in any way. I have yet to think to myself, "Damn, if I just had an acceleratometer and a proximity sensor in my phone." I have wished for a GPS inside it, but I guess the iPhone doesn't have that, either.
It has a Dock Connector?
A dock connector? It docks to my ear just fine, docks to the Internet just fine, and docks to my computer via Bluetooth just fine. What else do you want me to dock my phone to?
It has a full web browser (not some shrunken down "baby browser")?
Any web browser that runs on a screen that is the size of the Treo or the iPhone is going to be "shrunken down." My Treo has a web browser that works just fine. I'll admit that the "see the web page and then zoom in on certain sections" is kind of cool looking, but I'm going to bet in real life it's not going to be very useful. You're still going to have to scroll left and right to read stories that don't fit on the screen. If you zoom out enough for them to fit on the screen, you're going to have text so small you can't read it. There's no way to get around the realities of a friggin' small screen.
It has a touchscreen interface?
Uh, yes. And a keypad interace, too, whichever I feel like using.
It has a virtual keyboard so you don't have to press 7 four times to get an S?
As I said, it has both a virtual keyboard if you want to use the touchscreen or a real QWERTY-style keypad with real keys if I want to use that. So, yes.
It syncs with iTunes?
No, it doesn't. So? I already said I don't use my phone as an MP3 player. My iPod Nano is perfect for when I go out bike riding. It attaches securely and almost weightlessly to my left arm. I wouldn't want to attach either an iPhone or a Treo to my arm when I'm biking.
How many people are going to post ignorant "My phone does all this" claims without thinking it through? No, your phone does NOT do all this.
Looks like the only thing you were able to find that my phone doesn't do is sync to iTunes. I guess if syncing your phone to iTunes is important to you, buy the iPhone. Valid point--about the only one I see in your message.
And speaking of ignorant, it seems you are ignorant about the state of the art in Smart Phones. If you are responding to someone that has a Treo and have to ask whether it has a touchscreen, a web browser, or a virtual keypad, you are woefully ignorant of Smart Phone technology for the last few years.
I was talking with a friend yesterday about this. I think the iPhone is way too hyped. My friend showed me a video of the features, etc. and the only thing my Treo doesn't do is the MP3 player part--and I understand I *could* use my Treo for that, if I were so inclined.
I have an iPod Nano and I don't want anything physically larger for my MP3 player. My Treo 650 seems to do everything else that I saw in the iPhone promotional video. Sure, maybe not with the Mac-like/iPod-like interface that some people like. And the Treo's been on the market for how many years?
I really don't see what all the fuss about the iPhone is. But, hey, if that competition further drives down prices on the Treo, that's always a good thing.
If you are a U.S. citizen, don't worry. The US-Visit system does NOT apply to you. You do not have to provide your fingerprints when you enter the country.
I still don't like fingerprint-based identity. It's not necessarily difficult to fake fingerprints and leave them at a crime scene, etc. I actually don't know how advanced fingerprint-forging is, but if it's not do-able now, it will be soon. I much prefer retinal scans. I am not comfortable giving up my fingerprints because I think there is a reasonable chance that that could be abused to frame people. I'm much less worried about a retinal scan because my retinal scan cannot place me at the scene of a crime (either for real or framed). As such, I am not concerned about giving up that "personal information" as a very good way to positively identify me without the risk of it being used to frame me.
There were armed National Guard soldiers in airports for a few months following 9/11, yes. There aren't any more. However back in 1996 I went to Germany for the first time and there were "jackbooted" troopers with dogs and machine guns patrolling the airport. In 1998 they were still there. Saw some in Amsterdam that year too. In 2002 I saw cops with machine guns in Gatwick airport and again in Amsterdam. Just last year I saw them in Rome.
And I've seen them in Colombia and Ecuador, too, and along the highways in Mexico where you have to stop your vehicle, roll down your window, and "chat" with some Mexican military guy with a huge machine gun. You bring up a good point. Even for all the nonsense people spew about a police state, most other countries of the world are still orders of magnitude worse than the U.S. And that includes many of the countries from which people launch criticisms. Maybe "hypocrisy" is part of European culture....:)
Other than your locks being smashed, was anything missing? The last time someone I knew flew from Paris to London, a pair of new $100 gloves were stolen from his suitcase.
Hey, I'm an US Citizen and I couldn't agree more with you. Our culture is McDonnalds, and there is no history or culture here past what happened on last weeks talk shows.
You are either NOT a U.S. citizen, or are a very ignorant one. You are focusing on the least common denominator of our culture and saying that that's all we have to offer.
Throw in the extra "Romance", History and Culture* of the major Europian cities what does the US have to draw my tourist £££s any more?
*No offence meant, the US has it's merits and is unique in it's own way, but American culture is very different from European culture; When some one says "American culture", my first thought is of McDonalds if some one talks about "European culture" I think of the Renaissance.
I find it amazing (though not surprising) that this kind of message is modded as "insightful" while similar messages basically slamming Europe are modded as flamebait. All part of the "hate U.S. first" mentality, I guess.
Anyway, if your first thought of American culture is McDonald's, then you definitely need to spend some money and get out here and educate yourself. It seems that your "knowledge" of American culture is more an echoing of a common, superficial stereotype. Spend some time in the historic northeast, get to know southern hospitality, take a swing through Texas and the midwest, and then stop by San Francisco and Seattle on your way out. Try to do as much of it as possible off the interstates. If, after that, the first thing that comes to mind when you hear "American Culture" is McDonald's, you're beyond help.
And, since you took a shot by comparing the Renaissance to McDonald's, I'll point out that if the first thing that comes to mind when someone mentions European culture is something that is centuries in the past, you might want to consider the possibility that your "culture" reached its peak a few centuries ago. Just a thought.
My guess is that he mentioned that he went to church so that people here don't think he's some loser that has nothing better to do than wait for some hundred-MB download to complete. That's what I personally got out of the comment.
Do not believe in public. It is not warranted.
Nor is not-believing in public. You're a hypocrite--you realize that, right?
Saying the word "church" is NOT shoving it down your throat. You definitely need to take a chill pill and recognize that your right to not believe in God doesn't mean you'll never hear something that mentions religion. Sheesh.
As far as the McMansion thing, you might be right. It was probably uncalled for. However, it's still my opinion that a person who lives in a 6500 ft^2 house does not have the right to feel all environmentally righteous just because he springs for a little extra insulation to lower his energy bill.
I'd say everyone has a right to feel exactly like they want to. Whether others see them as a hypocrite is up to others. I just know that when I see people complaining about "6500 ft^2 McMansions" (as if we all have a responsibility to live in 20 ft^2 environmentally-friendly cardboard boxes) their credibility drops to just about zero in my book.
It's even more simple than that: If you feel that you'd be ashamed of something you say or do, you really need to ask yourself why you are saying or doing it in the first place. Perhaps you could more easily get away with it before, but that doesn't make Myspace the bad guy for allowing others to see who you really are.
You, sir, are 100% right on everything you said. You'd think that intelligent people would be able to be capable of recognizing such an amazing scam but, like you said, they're willing to look the other way for political reasons.
Slashdot Mirror
No, actually we don't know that. There are some theories that suggest that, but it seems that the better and better the models get, the less impact it looks like we have. We most definitely don't know we're responsible for "most if that warming."
I guess I am, Pink. I've never wanted to click on two things at once on my desktop and I'm not inclined to want to do so on a phone. How is mutlitouch really useful on a phone? Really? Seriously, when I was driving through Texas and New Mexico, I was checking my email and the weather forecasts as I drove down the highway (don't worry, no traffic out there)... and I always had a hand on the steering wheel. What is mutlitouch going to get me? And why aren't people clamoring for it on the desktop?
If everyone had their basic needs met, I don't think income inequality would matter as much.
Now you're getting closer. It's about having their basic meeds net. If everyone was earning the equivalent of $100,000/yr, it wouldn't matter if 5% of the population were earning $10 billion/yr. It's not the inequality that's the problem, it's the lack of wealth on the low side of the income spectrum. The high salaries or bonuses of CEOs, etc. are a popular target these days, but they are not the problem: The problem isn't that some people are making too much, the problem is that some people aren't earning enough. We aren't going to reduce crime by making sure CEOs are paid less.
But as long as some people are desperare and feel they are being screwed, and they can find an easy target in a rich person, there will be crime.
That's crazy. I admit I don't have any hard evidence, but I'm pretty darned sure that most crime is poor people on poor people, not poor on rich. Sure, it happens, but the majority of crime, it seems, is poor people committing crimes against other poor people.
No, you're right. I can do this on the Treo's apparently obsolete single-touch touchscreen with just a single finger rather than two. I guess that's progress, right?
Me too. To-date, Palm is the most stable mobile OS I've used or developed for. Not that it's the most advanced, but I do find it the most stable. And that's something people like to have in a phone.
The answer is that no, the Treo does not have an accelerometer. It does not have a proximity sensor. It does not have an ambient light sensor as the iphone does. Hence it does not switch to landscape mode when you tilt it (actually, it doesn't even have landscape mode as the screen is smaller and square). It does not turn off the screen automatically when it's close to your face when you're speaking. It also does not adjust its brightness based on the ambient light (apple is not the first to do this - my w810i does it too, but your treo doesn't).
Please tell me why I care about an accelerometer? Proximity sensor? No, Treo doesn't have one. So? Mine is configured to automatically turn off the screen after a few seconds of using the phone. Same result: My screen is off when I'm talking. Landscape mode? Well, like you said, the screen is square so it's a moot point. Adjust brightness based on ambient light? I guess that's kind of cool and marginally useful, but nothing earth-shattering. I've never changed my Treo's screen brightness (even though I can) and that's never been a problem.
However, the PalmOS based Treos are doomed, especially in the face of the iphone which also threatens the Windows mobile ones.
Maybe. People have been predicting the end of Palm and PalmOS for years. But it just keeps on working. Which is probably why it's still with us. As a developer I prefer the PalmOS because when I write an app for it, it just works. I like it as a user for the same reason.
What the GP post probably meant is: Can you connect the vast number of accessories that Apple has enabled through the doc connector to the Treo? External speakers? FM transmitters? The Treo is a USB slave device, which means you can only use that USB port to connect it to a computer - you can't connect an accessory that way. The treo doesn't even ship with a cradle. The iphone does (apparently).
Why do I want a cradle? All day it's in my belt case and at night I plug it in and set it on the nightstand next to the bed where it serves as my alarm clock. During the day, if I want to connect to the computer, that's what Bluetooth is for.
As for your other points, I'll agree there are some media-specific things that the iPhone was specifically designed to do. Great if you want a media device first, a phone second, and Internet connectivity last.
No. Blazer is a baby browser.
It works.
Can blazer run in the background while you do something else?
Technically, nothing on a Palm can. But jumping on GP's citation of Blazer and acting like that's the limit of what a Palm-based browser can do is not very honest.
Can it view PDFs?
Sure, I don't do it that often really. But I loaded my Treo full of PDFs I thought I might need sometime. Turns out, I've never actually needed them. But they're there if I want them.
Can it run Ajax ("web 2.0") sites? The answer to all of these, as you well know, is no.
Can iPhone? Do we know? And do we care? What exactly are you trying to do with your web browser on a phone that requires this stuff? Really, have you actually used Internet browsing on a phone? It's not very useful for the things you're describing, and that has nothing to do with the iPhone or the Treo. It has to do with the screen size, period. There might be some extreme geeks that might want to spend the day squinting at a web page on their little screen when a normal person will use a 17" monitor; but for most people, you use a web browser on a phone to quickly check a stock quote, the weather forecast, maybe read some news that was targeted for
Putting 8 gigs of memory in any device is no big deal. Were the Treo trying to be an MP3 player, it'd have more memory. But even though the Treo isn't trying to be an MP3 player, it can be one--and these days you can buy a 4GB SD card which puts the Treo at the same memory size as the 4GB iPhone. So without batting an eye, there is nothing technologically interesting about the iPhone over the Treo except the high-end model has 8GB (and my Treo can effectively have 12GB if I want to get 3 cards... how expandable is the iPhone?). Now if you want to make the argument that the GUI of the iPhone is better, well, that's something we won't really know until they start selling them and it's also ultimately a matter of opinion. Some people like bells and whistles, some people like simplicity. I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of things the iPhone does can ultimately be done on the Treo with fewer clicks based on the iPhone demo video I saw--they were doing zooms and stuff by moving two fingers in opposite directions while I could do the same thing on my Treo with a single hand with a single click. There just wasn't anything I saw the iPhone do that made me think, "Awesome!" because I'd done it all before on my Treo. Sure the iPhone looks pretty, no-one's denying that. But things like zooming in by moving two fingers in opposite directions strikes me as a whistle that'd probably slow me down rather than make my experience easier.
Anyway, it takes something a little more technologically innovative to get me excited about a product. I don't doubt they'll succeed at selling a good number of these things, but my point is that it's most definitely not the earth-shattering innovative next generation smart phone. It's essentially a Treo with a bit more emphasis on the media side than the phone side. But there's nothing really new about anything they've done.
Just because you select your self out of the market doesn't mean it's not interesting to anyone else.
I never said it won't be interesting to someone else. I'm sure it will be. I'm sure they'll sell quite a few. My musings are over the undue excitement about the technological aspects of this device. It's not doing anything that hasn't already been done by a Treo for years. I wouldn't be surprised to see a lot of brainless wonders on CNN reporting on this new fangled device; but I've always thought that Slashdot was more of a geek site where people have some understanding of the technology involved. And feature and technology-wise, there really isn't anything new here that warrants so much excitement.
Like I said, if someone really loves the iPod/Mac interface, sure, I can see why they'd be excited about that. But all the hype this product is getting is completely out of proportion with the advances it offers. It's a smart phone by Apple that does about the same thing as Palm's been offering for years. Forgive me if I'm not acting like this is some big deal.
To be clear, nobody (not even Steve Jobs) cares why you don't want it. You asked why someone would.
Maybe you were replying to someone else. I never asked why anyone would want one (though I did ask why someone would want 8GB on a phone). Talk about a strawman.
He doesn't know any Treo users, period. He had to ask whether we had a touchscreen. *sigh*
Why would I need 8 gigs of memory on my phone? I mean, really? Yeah, if you are using your phone as an MP3 player or a movie player, perhaps. But if you use your phone as a phone, why do you need 8 gigs? I have a 512MB SD card in my phone and I don't think it's even 10% full.
You understand that your Treo *could* be used as an MP3 player but you choose to use an iPod instead. I won't quarrel with you over that, there are a lot of very good reasons many people spend hundreds of dollars on iPod's to do something their phone already does, and they put up with fumbling with an extra device to do it.
As soon as the iPhone or Treo has the same size and weight as an iPod Nano and I can comfortably strap it to my left arm when I'm biking, you might have a point. Until then, you're under the mistaken impression that everyone wants a single device for everything. I don't. I don't want a phone as small as an iPod Nano and I don't want an MP3 as large as a phone.
I have a Treo and I've used it to browse the Internet and download email sometimes. When? Well, not often. Because most of the time I want to do these things, I'm at my computer anyway. Sometimes if I'm at Blockbuster and I see a movie that looks interesting, I'll browse to IMDB and get more information/reviews. A week ago I was driving through Texas and New Mexico towards Colorado and I was checking the weather along my route every half an hour via the NWS website--looking at NEXRAD radar graphics at cities along my routes. Since I was on the road for two days, I was checking my business email every so often to make sure there was nothing that required my immediate attention. And more than once, I've been at an airport waiting for a flight and while I didn't feel like taking out my laptop, I checked and responded to a few emails before I got on the plane and disappeared into those several hours of communication void.
The point being... Regardless of how neat the interface is, few people will use any phone-sized device for extensive browsing or emailing on a regular basis. They are great features when you're away from your computer--especially for extended periods of times--or when, like I said, you're "out in the wild" and just need to check some information real quick. But using a cell phone to browse the Internet? It's just not comfortable on a screen that size. And I don't hold that against the iPhone or Treo--it's just reality.
No, and my use of the phone has not been hindered in any way. I have yet to think to myself, "Damn, if I just had an acceleratometer and a proximity sensor in my phone." I have wished for a GPS inside it, but I guess the iPhone doesn't have that, either.
It has a Dock Connector?
A dock connector? It docks to my ear just fine, docks to the Internet just fine, and docks to my computer via Bluetooth just fine. What else do you want me to dock my phone to?
It has a full web browser (not some shrunken down "baby browser")?
Any web browser that runs on a screen that is the size of the Treo or the iPhone is going to be "shrunken down." My Treo has a web browser that works just fine. I'll admit that the "see the web page and then zoom in on certain sections" is kind of cool looking, but I'm going to bet in real life it's not going to be very useful. You're still going to have to scroll left and right to read stories that don't fit on the screen. If you zoom out enough for them to fit on the screen, you're going to have text so small you can't read it. There's no way to get around the realities of a friggin' small screen.
It has a touchscreen interface?
Uh, yes. And a keypad interace, too, whichever I feel like using.
It has a virtual keyboard so you don't have to press 7 four times to get an S?
As I said, it has both a virtual keyboard if you want to use the touchscreen or a real QWERTY-style keypad with real keys if I want to use that. So, yes.
It syncs with iTunes?
No, it doesn't. So? I already said I don't use my phone as an MP3 player. My iPod Nano is perfect for when I go out bike riding. It attaches securely and almost weightlessly to my left arm. I wouldn't want to attach either an iPhone or a Treo to my arm when I'm biking.
How many people are going to post ignorant "My phone does all this" claims without thinking it through? No, your phone does NOT do all this.
Looks like the only thing you were able to find that my phone doesn't do is sync to iTunes. I guess if syncing your phone to iTunes is important to you, buy the iPhone. Valid point--about the only one I see in your message.
And speaking of ignorant, it seems you are ignorant about the state of the art in Smart Phones. If you are responding to someone that has a Treo and have to ask whether it has a touchscreen, a web browser, or a virtual keypad, you are woefully ignorant of Smart Phone technology for the last few years.
Maybe the NewPhone?
I have an iPod Nano and I don't want anything physically larger for my MP3 player. My Treo 650 seems to do everything else that I saw in the iPhone promotional video. Sure, maybe not with the Mac-like/iPod-like interface that some people like. And the Treo's been on the market for how many years?
I really don't see what all the fuss about the iPhone is. But, hey, if that competition further drives down prices on the Treo, that's always a good thing.
Fricken scary.
If you are a U.S. citizen, don't worry. The US-Visit system does NOT apply to you. You do not have to provide your fingerprints when you enter the country.
I still don't like fingerprint-based identity. It's not necessarily difficult to fake fingerprints and leave them at a crime scene, etc. I actually don't know how advanced fingerprint-forging is, but if it's not do-able now, it will be soon. I much prefer retinal scans. I am not comfortable giving up my fingerprints because I think there is a reasonable chance that that could be abused to frame people. I'm much less worried about a retinal scan because my retinal scan cannot place me at the scene of a crime (either for real or framed). As such, I am not concerned about giving up that "personal information" as a very good way to positively identify me without the risk of it being used to frame me.
As someone who lived in Mexico for the last decade (just moved back to the U.S. in March), I can say that the same is true of the U.S./Mexican border.
And I've seen them in Colombia and Ecuador, too, and along the highways in Mexico where you have to stop your vehicle, roll down your window, and "chat" with some Mexican military guy with a huge machine gun. You bring up a good point. Even for all the nonsense people spew about a police state, most other countries of the world are still orders of magnitude worse than the U.S. And that includes many of the countries from which people launch criticisms. Maybe "hypocrisy" is part of European culture....
Other than your locks being smashed, was anything missing? The last time someone I knew flew from Paris to London, a pair of new $100 gloves were stolen from his suitcase.
You are either NOT a U.S. citizen, or are a very ignorant one. You are focusing on the least common denominator of our culture and saying that that's all we have to offer.
*No offence meant, the US has it's merits and is unique in it's own way, but American culture is very different from European culture; When some one says "American culture", my first thought is of McDonalds if some one talks about "European culture" I think of the Renaissance.
I find it amazing (though not surprising) that this kind of message is modded as "insightful" while similar messages basically slamming Europe are modded as flamebait. All part of the "hate U.S. first" mentality, I guess.
Anyway, if your first thought of American culture is McDonald's, then you definitely need to spend some money and get out here and educate yourself. It seems that your "knowledge" of American culture is more an echoing of a common, superficial stereotype. Spend some time in the historic northeast, get to know southern hospitality, take a swing through Texas and the midwest, and then stop by San Francisco and Seattle on your way out. Try to do as much of it as possible off the interstates. If, after that, the first thing that comes to mind when you hear "American Culture" is McDonald's, you're beyond help.
And, since you took a shot by comparing the Renaissance to McDonald's, I'll point out that if the first thing that comes to mind when someone mentions European culture is something that is centuries in the past, you might want to consider the possibility that your "culture" reached its peak a few centuries ago. Just a thought.
Do not believe in public. It is not warranted.
Nor is not-believing in public. You're a hypocrite--you realize that, right?
Saying the word "church" is NOT shoving it down your throat. You definitely need to take a chill pill and recognize that your right to not believe in God doesn't mean you'll never hear something that mentions religion. Sheesh.
Could you please explain further? How is my SUV cheaper than it should be? Especially due to "loopholes?"
I'd say everyone has a right to feel exactly like they want to. Whether others see them as a hypocrite is up to others. I just know that when I see people complaining about "6500 ft^2 McMansions" (as if we all have a responsibility to live in 20 ft^2 environmentally-friendly cardboard boxes) their credibility drops to just about zero in my book.
It's even more simple than that: If you feel that you'd be ashamed of something you say or do, you really need to ask yourself why you are saying or doing it in the first place. Perhaps you could more easily get away with it before, but that doesn't make Myspace the bad guy for allowing others to see who you really are.
Thanks, you are a perfect example of radical extremists that are exactly what I'm opposed to.
You, sir, are 100% right on everything you said. You'd think that intelligent people would be able to be capable of recognizing such an amazing scam but, like you said, they're willing to look the other way for political reasons.