Craig Hockenberry, the widely acclaimed Mac developer of Twitterific, has had extensive experience developing for jailbroken iPhones and iPod Touches. So, when he weighs in on the iPhone SDK, it’s definitely worth a read.

From the 70/30 split to the $99 publishing fee, the lack of information about distributing 3rd party apps to beta testers, the possibility of try-before-you-buy demos, and the mechanism for paid upgrades, Hockenberry pulls no punches:

One thing that disappoints me about the iPhone SDK sign-up is that the entry fee of $99 is too low. I look at the entry fee as a way to filter out developers that aren’t fully committed to the platform. [...] A higher entry fee would lessen the chance of this becoming a bottleneck for getting my product into the system. Please charge me $499 and let move to the front of the line.

Wait… Charge developers MORE? And what, pass the costs on to the consumer?

Not according to former Apple programmer (and writer of Apple’s GeekGameBoard sample code), Jens Alfke. He thinks $0.99 – $1.99 might just set off the perfect high-volume price storm:

So assume you spent some evenings and weekends writing a cool little utility or game. You submit it to the App Store and set the price at $1.43. You get $1 of pure, unadulterated profit from every user of the app. [...] Steve promises us there will be ten million iPhones in the world. If a tenth of a percent of them impulse-purchase your $1.43 app, that’s $100,000.

Alfke also covers the interesting possibility of Xbox-style game expansion packs as revenue streams, and takes a not-to-subtle swipe at carrier gouging and consumer gluttony via the ringtone market.

Hmm, serious developers charging no-brainer prices for “next great platform” apps? I’m in! What about you?

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Devs on Apps: Charge Us More, Users Less

Unless you’ve been pinned under a bus for the past 24 hours, you’ve no doubt witnessed the unfolding drama from yesterday’s announcement by Google about its upcoming open mobile platform, dubbed Android. Opinions range from Android’s arrival heralding the end of the wireless world as we know it, to “Oh my God…targeted ads on a mobile phone!” This story isn’t particularly relevant to iPhone enthusiasts, but its impact will affect the handset industry as a whole. And being the smarty pants, know-it-all, Smartphone expert, tech talkin guy that I am, I couldn’t let this topic pass by without weighing in.

Let’s start off by cutting through marketing speak and deciphering what Android is and isn’t. What it is, according to Google, is a software stack and not the packaged operating system we came to expect from rumors preceding the announcement. What does that mean? In plain English it means Google’s OS is a bag of parts, unassembled and customizable for any application, like a pile of Lego building blocks. More on that later. As part of this venture, Google has lined up an impressive group of A-list industry partners to back its platform… all part of a larger open source initiative called the Open Handset Alliance. The group includes companies ranging from handset makers, software developers, and carriers alike. Each one lends a hand in developing Android’s software stack, and each has own interests and agenda…each using the other to get what it wants. Here is where Android begins falling apart like a house of cards on a wobbly table.

Speaking as someone who has covered the mobile industry for many years, I can tell you from experience that such conglomerations almost universally end in failure. The reason is simple; no one entity controls platform development guidelines or sets roadmap. With proprietary operating systems like Windows Mobile, or OSX, one company or development teams controls the entire development process and most importantly… user experience. Google is being less than transparent with Andriod’s UI experience and application framework, but if my hunch is correct (and it usually is on matters of mobile tech) Android will end up being a mélange of disparate and disjointed software environments with different interfaces running on different hardware, all with different application layers. Apps that run on one device may not run on another (think Symbian).

Usability is another problem. Software is nothing unless it offers a compelling user experience. An operating system must be aesthetically pleasing, reliable, and brain-dead simple to operate. iPhone delivers all of these qualities in world class fashion, which is largely reason for its success. Looking through the list of Open Handset Alliance partners reads like a who’s who in the FBI’s ten most wanted list. None of the companies involved, including Google, are known for building pretty and usable interfaces. Google’s web based properties are minimalist at best and ugly at worst. Google search does what it does. Google Doc’s gets the job done, but certainly is no replacement for Office 2007 in either. HTC isn’t exactly a hotbed of innovation when it comes to handset design. The company has done well in the Windows Mobile camp, but that’s not saying very much given the lackluster success Microsoft has had outside of the enterprise, where looks and brains don’t count. Motorola, couldn’t design a proper GUI to save its own…business. Needless to say I have very low expectations from the first round of Android-based devices to hit the market later next year.

Then we have Google’s disturbing revenue model behind Android’s distribution…one that is ad-based. The plan, as disclosed by Eric Schmidt, is to license Android freely (under the Apache GPL) in return for targeted ad revenues with carrier partners. This is worrisome to me for two reasons. 1) Handset displays are simply too small to allocate already taxed space to text-based ads. 2) I don’t fancy the thought of Google aggregating my data and bombarding me with targeted ads. Imagine this scenario – your car needs repaired…you call your nearest garage for an estimate…suddenly a text message pops up on your screen soliciting a car insurance ad from Geico. Not the kind of mobile experience I want on my phone.

So what good is Android anyway? For starters, it could do a world of good for mobile platform development by bringing an end to the confused noise of different languages that exist today. As it stands now the wireless industry is a virtual alphabet soup of different proprietary operating systems, some closed – some open, all sporting different APIs and different incompatible software stacks. Other mobile Linux efforts abound, but having Google’s name attached to this venture provides a unifying label to get behind. My bet is that over the next few years, proprietary platform vendors, particularly Nokia and RIM, will layer their own software on top of Google’s Linux foundation. Consolidation is badly needed in this industry, and Google’s platform may offer that hope.

The big losers in this endeavor will be Access, the company that acquired PalmSource, the former software division of Palm Inc. Access has been working on a project similar to Google’s for some time, named ALP (Access Linux Platform). After yesterday’s announcement that project is as good as dead. Palm is another company to be placed on death watch, where they’ve been for some time now. Palm is locked in a desperate struggle to remain viable and get its long delayed Linux operating system out the gate. Android will ship months before Palm’s, making former handheld leader and its yet-to-be-released OS as irrelevant as Britney Spears music career. Microsoft’s executive team, too, will have reason to drink Pepto-Bismol in boardroom meetings, though I doubt Android will put them out of the mobile business anytime soon. Windows Mobile is well established with legions of backers and garners a handsome chunk in market share.

How does this play out for Apple? Android and its Open Handset Alliance will have little impact on iPhone or Apple’s handset business. iPhone, much like all products that wear the Apple logo, is a lifestyle device, not a commodity product like the PC. Mobile technology is a delicate interplay between hardware and software. If either one component is deficient or lacking in any way, the total product fails. That kind of synergy is only achieved when the software and hardware are made by the same creative team, with a cohesive strategy and vision. Google will quickly discover that merely getting the software equation right will be challenging enough. Getting device makers to build compelling hardware to wrap around its OS will be even harder.

Android could (emphasis) prove to be a turning point in mobile platform development, approaching a single but open environment for all to build upon, bringing an end to the Pan’s Labyrinth of platforms we know today. But the cynic in me feels this is just a lot of hot air. I’m anxious to see what this platform will offer, and rest assured I’ll be right there on day one standing first in line with other Smartphone aficionados waiting to get an Android phone. But given what I know from past efforts, my expectations are low.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Google’s Android Will Terrorize Proprietary Platforms, But Won’t Threaten Apple

With the release of firmware update 1.1.1 came something new to iPhone that I think may prove to be its most insidious feature yet; iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store. Now I know that many of you don’t purchase music via iTunes, preferring instead to utilize certain ahem free source, but you may sing a different tune once you start rummaging through genres and newly released content on the screen of your iPhone. For me it’s becoming an addiction. I have to force myself not to tap on the lovely purple store icon that beckons me to enter and pay pay pay. iPhone has now become a gateway drug to iTunes.

As you would expect, Apple has made the experience brain dead simple and beautifully designed. You can almost feel Steve Jobs standing beside you, holding your hand and guiding you along the walkways of his walled garden. Drinking from the Chalice of Kool-Aid.To start your journey to DRM’d happiness, simply tap the iTunes Store icon and you’re instantly greeted with a lovely graphical, but pint sized, version of iTunes formatted for iPhone’s HVGA screen. A row of buttons along the bottom take you to Featured Artists and albums, Top tens, Search, and Downloads. Search for you favorite artist and tap to select your choice of available albums. To hear a preview, tap on any available track, and a tiny album thumbnail image with visually rotate, revealing a player icon that rotates clockwise, representing 30-second playback countdown. If you wish to buy that track, tap on the $.99 priced icon, which then transforms into another button innocently labeled “Buy Now”.

This is where the experience becomes a mechanism for costly music addiction. Having instant access to music download via iPhone somehow dramatically changes the paradigm. The required footwork imposed by bolting the music store onto a PC or Mac (running iTunes) acted a natural barrier to entry. If I wanted to buy a particular song or album, I have to go trotting off to my Mac, launch iTunes, find the song or artist, purchase, download, then sync my iPod or iPhone in order to access my purchase. Too much work. Apple just turned that five step process into one, opening a new venue for window shopping audiophiles. Before I knew it, on the first day of use, I had downloaded ten tracks without giving a second thought. Then I realized… my God, I could do this for hours!

Could this euphoric instant gratification be iPhone’s killer app? It could be. But I do know that my credit card company will be very happy as I rack up interest charges. What’s in your wallet?

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

iCrack: iTunes Wi-Fi Store Makes Music Purchase All Too Easy, Dangerously Addictive

Tech curmudgeon John C. Dvorak (the C stands for cranky) points the spotlight of criticism on Apple for its blatant act of bricking unlocked iPhones. He points out that in many overseas markets unlocked phones are common place, and a lucrative business. Hey, John… I agree with you, but trying to get Apple to change its policies is like trying to wrestle a half ton alligator. It’s a futile effort and just makes the gator angry.

Read

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Dvorak Slams Apple for iBricking, Threatens to Write More Crazy Editorials

Last week and the proceeding weekend I was on the receiving end of some terrible misfortune; the worst series of mishaps I have endured in… well, quite a long while. Fools rush in where hackers fear to tread. And I not only rushed in, I kicked in the door and set fire to the house on my in. Very unwise.

When news of Apple’s posted firmware update became available I anxiously awaited news from guinea pig unlockers, who bravely installed the update, whether or not updating results in brickage. Gizmodo boisterously (and prematurely) proclaimed that it was all a poker bluff from Apple. No bricks, nor breakage. That news emboldened me to proceed with flashing. Count me in! No sooner had a I begun applying the update when the first wave of reported problems began rolling in. Gizmodo was wrong, and led me to my doom.

But he who proceeds without hearing all the facts, suffers the consequences. I take full responsibility for the untimely but temporary demise of my iPhone. I knew I was playing with fire, and I got burned. That’s life. You roll the dice and take your chance.

Unfortunately that was only the beginning of my problems.

Friday night is, for me, a time to hang out with friends and socialize. Blowing off steam from the pressures of work. Not this particular evening as the case would be. My workstation PC had other plans in store for me. I had installed Vista Service Pack 1 beta earlier in the week, which took several attempts to get up and running, and this system has behaved unpredictably ever since. That description could easily be applied to Vista itself – unpredictable.

There is no way to put this subtly; Windows Vista is raw fecal waste material, minus the color and oder. Five years in development by Microsoft has yielded the absolute worst operating system they’ve ever released. It is slow, cumbersome, offers poor compatibility, miserable gaming performance, spotty driver support. The list goes on. I can’t begin to tell you how much I HATE this OS.

So when it became clear that SP1 (beta though it is) actually worsened my “Wow” experience promised by Vista. This was the last straw for me. I pulled out an external hard drive. Backed up all my critical data, and reformatted the hard drive, rolling back to XP Pro. Vista is gone from my hard drive, never to return again. From this point on I am moving over to OSX. I use both platforms daily, Windows and Mac, but Microsoft continues pushing me ever increasingly towards using Mac as my primary platform. When Leopard arrives this month, I’m pushing all of production workload over to my Mac Pro. Windows will live on as a virtual machine running in OSX.

So, in addition to a dead iPhone I now had to make an unexpected OS transition as well. Fun stuff. As I’m typing this I am staring at XP’s hideous blue Fisher Price interface and an antiquated Palm Treo Smartphone, which has replaced iPhone as my pocket companion. Needless to say I am not in the best of moods right now, and it’s a hell of a way to start a week.

As I’m sure most of you heard; over the weekend some enterprising user discovered a method for downgrading iPhone’s firmware from 1.1.1 to 1.02, providing a reversal (or so we all thought) to the bricking that occurred. Not so. It turns out this procedure does not downgrade baseband drivers to an earlier state necessary to reactivate AT&T SIMs. It only enables jailbreakage, so iPhone can be used with WiFi only. A nice start, but it doesn’t provide an end game solution to reactivating a “bricked” iPhone.

At this point there is little else to do but wait patiently for iPhone Dev Team to work out a reversal solution. Whether I can hold out for such a workaround is another matter. Right now I am this >< close to applying my $100 Apple Store credit towards the purchase of a second iPhone. It would probably be in my best interest to own two iPhones, using one as a “beater” device for testing and review purposes. With the second unit left in virgin condition as my personal daily use phone.

So in case you were all wondering why i have been so quite over the weekend… now you know. But enough of my whining. It’s a new week. Time to get back to work. And get writing again. I never seem to have the time to write good content for this site. The iPhone Blog is run with one hand and four fingers tied behind my back. Since I works as a freelance web designer as an occupation, that’s where I have to devote my time. This site is a secondary hobby, which is unfortunate. But I do have some ideas in play that I hope you guys will like. More on that later.

Back to work, and back to writing.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

A Weekend of Restoration Provides a Painful Lesson In Patience and Haste

I have setup a petition page to record every feature request made by my readers. This is your chance to speak out and be heard. What features do you want added to iPhone? Visit this link, and post your request in the comments section. I will then add your request to the list. I expect this page to grow long over time, so I placed a permalink in the left sidebar so you’ll always know right where it’s at.

Click here, and post.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Reader Requests: What Do You Want Added to iPhone?

Angry words and heated accusations were being flung at a certain well known product maker today, and I’m not talking about Mattel’s recall of lead-painted toys for tots. Early adopters who patiently stood in long lines on June 29 (including yours truly), eager to be first on the block to own iPhones, are being rewarded with the sudden devaluation of their investments. Today Apple dropped the price of its most popular iPhone model (8GB) by $200, just two months after launch. What cost six Ben Franklins yesterday now costs only $399.

This sudden deflation in price has many incumbent iPhone users feeling cheated. Some are posting angry letters on Apple’s support forums, expressing frustration, agitation, degradation, and other words that end in ion. My inbox is flooding with angry comments, I feel like a rape crisis hotline. Many are asking for some type of reasonable compensation or token for this punch to the stomach, or wallet as it were. A two hundred dollar cashback reward perhaps? Not going to happen. How about a voucher for a truckload worth of free iTunes downloads? Nope. The best solution I can come up with is for Apple to offer early adopters a coupon or discount redeemable at any Apple Store, good towards the purchase of any Apple product. Of course, the illogic of that is inescapable – I already paid too much for an iPhone, now I’m going to go further in debt by buying more Apple products?

So what is your solution to the problem? What should Apple do to compensate its loyal users? Speaking as someone who operates one of the most popular iPhone enthusiast sites on the entire bloody internet I feel that Apple needs to take care of its audience, no matter what the outcome. We helped lay the foundation for a new community, and help build the product’s success. I certainly did anyway. How about it Steve? Throw us a bone.

[update] Just wanted to clarify a point – if you recently purchased an iPhone within the last 14 days you can request a refund on the $200 price difference by calling or returning to the origin of purchase. If your iPhone was purchased prior to that period…well…you are screwed. Sorry.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Apple’s iPhone Price Cut Wounds Early Adopters, Wreaks Havoc on my Wallet

MSNBC.com technology writer, Joe Hutsko, purchased an iPhone to replace his Treo 680 (a common trend it seems) and decided to put the much hyped gadget to the test, to see whether iPhone is road worthy as a laptop replacement.

Can I type as quickly on it as I can on my MacBook or any real keyboard? No. As fast as on my Treo 680? Yes. Faster, actually. And comfortably enough that I can imagine getting real editing work done once there’s a Word-compatible editor for the iPhone. And not just editing, but real writing too, as demonstrated by this story — the first draft of which was written entirely on the iPhone.

Joe was so impressed with iPhone’s proven mobile computing potential he sees it replacing the role currently served by laptops.

ReadSource

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Can the iPhone Double As a Laptop? MSNBC Thinks So

As a mobile enthusiast, I own (or have owned) a cross sample of every major platform on the market today, ranging from Windows Mobile, Symbian, embedded Linux (well, one flavor anyway), and BlackBerry OS. I first cut my teeth on mobile technology with PalmOS way back in 1997 when a small startup named Palm Computing introduced a product called the Palm Pilot, launching an industry of software and hardware development. The Pilot 1000 was my very first PDA, and I immediately fell in love with the software and its hallmark simplicity. That device kindled a love affair with mobile technology that has lasted to this day.

While my tastes in gadgets changed over the years as I migrated from one device and platform to another, PalmOS has always been a key part of my mobile lifestyle. Partly for nostalgia and partly because the OS still had a certain understated flair that enabled me to remain productive even while lacking advanced features and functionality offered by my Windows Mobile and Symbian based Smartphones. I still preferred the elegance and intuitive interface found on my Palm Treos.

Prior to acquiring the iPhone, my primary Smartphone of choice was an unlocked Treo 650. Just months prior I had been using Palm’s latest GSM model, the Treo 680, which I later sold on eBay because it sucked so badly (mainly poor battery life). The 650, much like the OS it runs, was tired and showing its age.

Unfortunately the long winding road has reached an end. A dead end. Palm is a dead platform. The OS that we know today as Garnet (PalmOS version 5) has lived well beyond its shelf life, and is built upon on a creaky and woefully obsolete single-tasking framework with an ancient GUI that hasn’t seen improvement in nearly a decade. To make matters worse, Garnet’s successor is roughly two years away, and potentially may be vaporware like the failed development project that preceded it, a never to-be-seen OS called Cobalt. Too little, too late.

Since the iPhone entered my gadget collection, it has permanently displaced Palm from my list of devices. OSX is everything PalmOS should have been but never came to be. Apple has taken interface elegance and software innovation to a whole new level. iPhone eliminated the need for Palm in my mobile computing lifestyle. I can’t even stand looking at PalmOS, let alone having to use it. So, it is with some sadness that I have to report that I am dumping the platform for good. Last weekend I handed down my poor careworn Treo 650 to my niece, where the device will probably end up gathering dust because she doesn’t understand how to use it, and shows little interest.

For the first time in nearly a decade I am without a Palm device. Time to move on.

iPhone has rekindled an excitement within me, for mobile tech, that I haven’t felt since the early days of PalmOS when the platform was new and fresh, with fanatical development and innovation taking place in all directions. iPhone is the new Palm.

I’ll always look back fondly on the platform that started it all and sparked my passion for gadgets. But the past is history, and it’s time to migrate to growth platforms.

Bye bye Palm, thanks for the memories.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Saying Goodbye to Palm

So how many of you out there are syncing your iPhones with a Mac vs. PC? Are you using both platforms? Vote in the poll below.

[poll=3]

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Poll: Mac or PC? Which iPhone User Are You?