The PSPgo is Sony’s answer to the iPhone in a post-App Store world, but unfortunately it looks like charging more for poorly ported games is the question. Gizmodo explains the obvious — to everyone but Sony — problem:

You see, PSP Minis can’t have any network or online features. Nor can they support camera peripherals (a major focus of DSiWare innovation) or DLC. Kotaku just reviewed iPhone port Hero of Sparta. On the PSP it costs triple what you’ll pay at the App Store. Their review? “Simplistic controls, muddled graphics and abysmal sounds turn what was a fantastic iPhone game into a oddly disjointed Playstation Portable experience.” Kotaku’s review of Tetris was much better. But you know what? Tetris costs twice as much on the PSP as it does the iPhone.

Just like ATRAC and rootkits (ouch, we know), we’re beginning to wonder if anyone at Sony will ever get this brave, new, post-iPhone world?

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

iPhone Games Ported to PSPgo Play Worse, Cost More

According to Times Online, It now seems as if Sony, Warner, Universal and EMI are putting the finishing touches on their new album format, CMX, and are ready to do battle against Apple’s rumored “Cocktail” enhanced album format.

It was just last month we reported about Cocktail, which would feature new interactive booklets, sleeve notes and other features alongside music downloads in an attempt to lure consumers into making more full album purchases. Now, while it looks like “Cocktail” does exist, it seems that none of the record labels had any hand in creating it. According to this story, record labels first approached Apple 18 months ago to see if they wanted in on this new CMX format and Apple politely refused. Apple then created “Cocktail” in order to compete with Sony, Warner, Universal and EMI.

One senior record label insider said: “Apple at first told us that they were not interested, but now they have decided to do their own, in case ours catches on.

While most of us here at TiPb have no major quarrels purchasing our music digitally, there are a lot of people out there who feel when purchasing digital albums over the internet you are not getting the full album experience. Would this new format make purchasing digital albums any less painful for you? And would you rather go with Apple’s “Cocktail” or the music industry’s CMX?

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

Sony, Warner, Universal and EMI to Launch iTunes “Cocktail” Album Competitor?

Eurogamer spoke to Johnny Two Shoes (The Heist, Banana Dash), Normalware (Bebot) and Firemint (Flight Control) about how Sony’s new PSPgo platform may compete with the iPhone, and the answers were interesting:

• After an 80% price cut to PSP dev tool charges, bring the price down to $1500) it’s still much more expensive than Apple’s $99.
• Developers can’t target the existing PSP install base of 50 million, PSPgo has only just been released, and Apple’s iPhone and iPod touch have an install base of over 40 million devices.

However, Apple growing the download gaming market and PSP games traditionally being bigger and longer (as opposed to casual iPhone gaming) were seen as positives for Sony.

“In the end,” Maxwell Scott-Slade concludes, “the consumer wins for choice and developers win for a more direct access to their audience.”

[via PS3blog.net]

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

The Competition: Sony PSPgo or No-Go for iPhone Developers?

Oft rumored, is Sony ready to leverage both the struggling Sony Ericsson partnership and the still fairly solid Sony Playstation brand to produce a Playstation Phone? (PSP Phone? PSPhone? PSP Go-Call-Someone?).

Makes sense from a competitive point of view, and something we certainly thought we’d see sooner. If Sony can get passed their historic intra-company integration problems, and avoid doing anything silly like ATRAC DRM or root kits — if they could get a product manager who could cut through the quagmire and drive everything that’s good about Sony into the product — it could be an interesting contender.

For the iPhone, of course:

Nikkei says it will directly compete with the iPhone, and that a project team was set up last July to start working on the console/phone hybrid. So basically, it’s the same rumor we’ve been hearing for years, except this time from a reliable source. Whether it’s got any truth to it remains to be seen. Note: The above image is a mockup. Seems obvious but sometimes you gotta say it out loud.

[Gizmodo via Reuters]

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

The Competition: Sony Working on Playstation/PSP Phone?

We have covered the iPhone and gaming from top to bottom here at TiPb. The iPhone still has a lot of catching up to do in terms of the quality of the games and you can also toss in the lack of physical controls as a huge negative. All that aside, for the most part we’ve felt that if Apple plays their cards correctly, they could be a major player in the handheld gaming wars alongside the likes of Nintendo and Sony.

Maybe you’ve agreed with us, maybe you haven’t. If you’ve disagreed with our opinions and views that’s fine and dandy but maybe, just maybe, you will listen to Trip Hawkins. Who’s Trip Hawkins you ask? He started a little gaming company called Electronic Arts.

“The iPhone is by far our most effective platform. We make as much money with these games on one device as we do putting a game on 100 different cell phone platforms. Between the iPod touch and the iPhone, I think the platform is freaking out Sony and Nintendo.”

That is a pretty strong statement. It may be a great thing as more and more developers will take the iPhone as a serious contender and produce more and higher quality games, or it may prove to be one of the biggest pitfalls. It may encourage more developers to throw quality and innovation out the window and simply pump out below-average games just to make that quick profit. Up until this point we’ve seen a combination of some high quality games and some pure garbage. In the end, it’s about the almighty dollar and we get that. Hopefully game developers come up with ways to push the platform to the next level.

So where do you see this going in the long run for the iPhone as a gaming platform? Lets hear your thoughts!

[Via theappleblog.com]

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

Nintendo and Sony Feeling iPhone Heat?

According to CNet (via Apple Insider), Apple is in talks with the remaining 3 out of the Big 4 record labels who still refuse to allow iTunes to sell DRM-free music.

Universal Music Group, Warner Music Group, and Sony BMG currently provide DRM-free music to rival services like Amazon MP3 as a way to promote competition to iTunes, though the lack of availability of these services outside the US, along with iTunes continued (and growing) dominance in digital music, may be causing them to rethink that position.

EMI, of course, has been offering DRM-free music via Apple’s iTunes Plus service since it launched, and at double the bit rate (quality) of the regular music.

Hopefully we’ll soon see the day that big music decides to stop treating their customers as de facto thieves and realizes offering quality goods at fair market prizes is the only real way to stop piracy. Or am I the crazy one?

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

Apple Trying to Offer More DRM-Free Music on iTunes?

Back in September, TiPb posted a few articles in regards to Apple becoming a major player in the hand held gaming wars. We faced off the iPhone against Sony’s PSP and Nintendo’s DS.

The main question to be answered is should Sony and Nintendo be worried? I’d say yes, indeed they should be worried. Business Week seems to feel the same way as well. Some of their points are right on key with what we had to say back in September (see the articles linked above). While that is no doubt a coincidence, here is what they had to say:

Now look at Apple’s advantages over competitors. Apple already has more titles for its games than both of the other two combined. And aside from the free ones, games on the App Store sell at prices ranging up to $9.99 and sometimes a little more. Compare that with the $20 to $40 for Nintendo DS games and the $10 to $40 for games on the PSP.

This goes along with exactly what we said, doesn’t it? How about this one?

And with Apple selling via iTunes, there are no costs associated with the distribution of physical media. All games are downloaded directly to the device. And in the event the game is buggy, the developer can easily issue an easy-to-download fix. The developer gets 70% of the sale and Apple keeps 30%, with no one else to get in the middle. Nintendo and Sony partners have to worry about shelf space at stores, shipping, returns, defective merchandise, and even the occasional shoplifter.

Also a good point that we stressed a few months back. With the holiday season fast approaching, it should be mighty interesting to see just how the hand held gaming wars works out.

For more gaming coverage from TiPb be sure to check out these articles.

(Via Business Week)

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

Apple Becoming a Gaming Power House?

For the last two weeks we here at TiPb have been taking a deeper look into Apple’s “Game On” push. Can anyone really doubt Steve Jobs is trying to make the iPhone/iPod Touch into the next big portable gaming device? Stop and think about it, he took the idea of a portable MP3 player and made it into a device that has dominated the music business ever since. Now, according to Jobsy, “you could make a pretty good argument [the iPhone is] the best portable device for playing games on.”

Michael Gartenberg, vice president of Mobile Strategy at Jupitermedia’s MobileDevicesToday.com, chimed in:

The not-so-subtle message was, ‘If you’re thinking about buying something like a PSP or a DS, maybe you want to think again because we’ve got this cool device that does all your mobile stuff and, by the way, is a pretty excellent game platform as well’

Steve Palley, Editorial Guru for Vivendi Games Mobile said:

The iPhone is going to make the mobile games industry into everything we always wanted it to be but failed to achieve.

Even Nintendo’s Denise Kaigler, VP of Corporate Affairs spoke out regarding the iPhone:

Any time you have a new company enter an industry, it’s always good for the consumer. It gives them choices and we welcome that. But we have found over the last 20 years, despite all the choices consumers have had, that the Nintendo devices have enjoyed a great deal of success.

I really can not argue with Nintendo’s comment. Nintendo is the king of the hill in the handheld gaming industry. Many have tried to overtake them, all failing. Here’s what I’m thinking, though, Apple may not be the top dog at the moment but by the time the next iPhone is released, Jobsy might just be saying “I told you so!”. Give the App Store a year to grow, software developers time to get the most out of the hardware, etc… And then lets see how things start to shake out. What are you guys and gals thinking?

[Via MSBC.com]

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

Apple and Video Games: Should Sony and Nintendo be Worried?

[Ed: We're bringing back the Wait-a-Thon and making it regular again. Sorry we dropped it off there for awhile, folks. With all those 3G and iPhone 2.0 rumors flying about these past couple of weeks, it almost felt like the release was already here. In the meantime, comment on any post tagged "Wait-a-Thon" for your chance to win a $100 iTunes Gift Card!]

This is not a response to Crackberry.com’s excellent article, Top 10 Reasons Why the iPhone Is NO BlackBerry. Quite frankly, the iPhone doesn’t need a response; it’s the rest of industry that’s so desperately trying to find one to the iPhone.

I don’t know about you, but it’s getting more than a little tiring hearing everyone compare themselves to — and constantly try to rip-off — the iPhone. I can’t surf a website or cruise the main without some claw-handed Crackberry addict, neck-bearded Palm artifact, or frazzle-haired WinMob frustrati glaring and frothing with barely-contained envy at the perfectly balanced, seamlessly integrated, lustfully convergent iPhone held ever-so casually in my grip.

They know the iPhone is beyond cool. Sure, they cling to their once innovative, formerly revolutionary (at least in the case of Palm and RIM) devices, the ones overwhelming nostalgia or massive business infrastructure investment won’t let them slam to the ground and stomp into the call-dropping, web-mangling, constantly crashing oblivion they so richly deserve.

So the comparisons to the iPhone just won’t stop, despite the fact that the iPhone is pretty much incomparable. Don’t believe me? I’ve got ten reasons to back me up. And these aren’t minor feature gripes or personal peccadilloes. In proper Apple fashion, these are just 10 simple little words…

10. Communication

It’s right there in the name: iPhone. Steve Jobs said it himself at Macworld 2007: the killer smartphone app is voice. How ironic, then, that so many other smartphones so often kill voice.

Making and receiving calls without my phone freezing or crashing, as my previous device did almost daily, is huge. Unprecedented simplicity in everything from easily finding my way back if I navigate away from the phone app, to elegantly handling call holding, muting, and multiple output sources like Blue Tooth, to effortlessly setting up conference calls is huger still. I can’t remember how often I got lost, couldn’t get calls off my headset, or accidentally hung up on people with the confusing hackjobs that passed for interfaces on my previous smartphones.

The iPhone also introduced desktop-class HTML email rendering and “just the internet”, AJaX powered, standards compliant web browsing, along with interface innovations for SMS, .MAC gallery transfer for photos, and the ability to email YouTube videos, photos, and web links at the tap of a virtual button.

(The browsing is so good, ironically, everyone from Amazon to Facebook to popular blogging plugin makers are providing iPhone-optimized web pages now, lumping every other device into the substandard “mobile” experience or the abortive hell that is WAP).

While some may grumble that this or that power-user feature, or device-specific protocol is missing, Apple has proven they can deliver updates faster and better than anyone in the industry (going from version 1 to 1.1.4, with 2.0 immanent, in less than a year and adding significant capability in the process).

For the user, the interface is the app, and for Apple, their interfaces are remarkably back-end independent. So, if the iPhone needs to improve SMS, or add IM or MMS for now until the differences between desktop and handset protocols evaporate, well Apple’s already got patents pending for that as well.

In the mean time, as most of the iPhone commercials show, having music or video or web pages fade away when your phone rings only to fade right back when your done — that’s truly killer.

Listen up, communication-centric users, especially those who want the internet in their pocket, are all over the iPhone.

9. Media

The iPod is the king of all mobile media, with an over 70% share of the US market. People love them their iPods and Steve Jobs has repeatedly said the iPhone is the best iPod Apple has ever made.

Just look at the stats: up to 16GB of flash storage, a 3.5”, 160dpi wide screen display, and seamless integration with the #1 music and leading downloadable media store in the US, iTunes.

Apple can also extend iPhone media in ways their competitors can only dream. From high-end Final Cut Pro for Hollywood scale video production, to (Mac) desktop Garage Band podcast and ringtone creation, to Apple TV syncing and streaming the same iTunes content to your big screen TV, Apple literally can create, manage, and deploy iPhone media from end-to-end. They can do it easily, and what’s really scary (for the competition) is that this is something the iPhone merely inherited. (Imagine what they might just be preparing for the future…)

No one else, not desktop monopolists, old media stalwarts, or upstart email monsters, even come close.

For media-centric users who don’t want to fill their pockets with a second device just for voice and data, the iPhone’s barrier of entry is zero.

8. Gaming

Though not to anywhere near the extent of media, Apple has been integrating gaming into the iPod — and into iTunes — for years now, and with the SDK Roadmap event, they’re getting serious about putting it on the iPhone as well.

EA’s Spore and Sega’s Super Monkey Ball (among others, including Apple’s homegrown Touch Fighter) were given the spotlight, taking full advantage of the iPhone’s unique video and audio power, accelerometer, and multi-touch controls. Sega even said they’d so underestimate the iPhone’s potential they had to fly in another developer just to crank up the graphics. Wow.

No other smartphone, even today, can boast the 1 year old iPhone’s raw feature set (chips + sensors + inputs + display). As for gaming handhelds, the Sony PSP can’t fully match it (though their dedicated chipsets and vast software library clearly give them a huge advantage… for now). Only the Nintendo DS, which sports touch and mic, is competitive (massive understatement given they’re the sales leader in mobile gaming).

But here’s the thing: while other smartphone are playing copycat and catchup with 1.0, the iPhone is poised to go to 2.0, and while dedicated gaming kits have undeniable advantages, they can’t make cell phone calls, can’t play iTunes media, and can’t do a host of other things the iPhone delivered on day one.

For anyone who wants to game and doesn’t want to carry around a second, dedicated box to go with their media-savvy phone, June will score for the iPhone as well.

7. Business

Make no mistake, the aforementioned iPhone SDK event didn’t only reach out to gamers, it offered a firm handshake to business as well. Exchange ActiveSync (not to be confused with the confusingly named desktop Windows ActiveSync), 802.1x, Cisco VPN, remote wipe, Enterprise “App Stores”, and a host of other features were released as part of the iPhone 2.0 beta.

What’s more, unlike RIM’s technology, which uses a single Network Operations Center (NOC) to handle all Blackberry data transactions — making the service infamously prone to failures and terrifyingly susceptible to security compromises, state-sponsored and otherwise, ActiveSync offers a direct connection between enterprise server and user client. No Chinese or Singaporean RIM-supplied proxy snoopers, no Indian data disconnections. With ActiveSync, each individual business’ server would have to be individually compromised or blocked, a vastly more difficult task.

For Microsoft users worried about a “premiere” experience, having an Apple client may just redefine their concept of “premiere”. And for open-source advocates, Apple’s been their from the beginning, with full support for standards like IMAP, and community-friendly initiatives like CalDAV.

Bottom line, the iPhone is in a unique position to appeal to almost all business-centric users who don’t want to lug around an second or third device just to watch a movie or play a game on the flight home, or call their loved ones when they land.

6. Convergence

Communication, media, gaming, and business. In one or two of these areas, other devices currently have an edge. That is, if you’re happy with the idea of carrying around a feature phone, iPod Touch, Nintendo DS, and Blackberry all strapped to your utility belt (I’ve been there and it wasn’t pretty!).

Convergence, however, doesn’t begin or end with just the iPhone. As we touched on before, Apple is the first, and so far only company to truly deploy spherical integration across their product line.

Apple designs its own hardware (iPhone handset), engineers its own operating system (OS X) and software (built in apps like MobileSafari Touch and the Google Maps client), creates its own accessories (docks, media cables, headsets, etc.), offers its own ecosystem (from Macs to the Apple TV, from iLife to Leopard Server), sells them all in their own retail Apple Stores (which bested Tiffanies last year in earnings per square foot), handles their own carrier activation via iTunes, provides value-added services (iPhoto books), runs its own cloud services (.Mac) and ties into other cloud service providers (Google search, Yahoo! weather), offers the #1 music marketplace in the US (iTunes), which also provides TV, movies, and a staggering amount of free audio and video podcasts, iTunes University, and other free content, and is about to be joined by the App Store, which may just do for 3rd party App sales what iTunes did for music.

Verizon commercials like to show a virtual network of technicians following its users around everywhere they go. Just imagine that commercial with Apple’s 360 degrees of integration backing up every iPhone user.

When it comes to convergence, nothing else matches the current iPhone’s capabilities, never mind its next-generation potential. Anyone looking for the “one device to rule them all” will find it all elegantly wrapped up in only one package: the iPhone.

5. Development

Okay, numbers 8 and 7 — and thus 6 — are still in beta. Fair enough. But what’s driving that beta is an SDK the likes of which has never been seen before in the mobile space.

Sure, some platforms use Sun’s “Compile once… er… often.. run anywhere” Java language/interpreter, or Microsoft’s Windows-in-name only kit, and others delve deep to the metal on Palm’s sold and bought-back and locked-in-stasis OS.

Apple, much as they miraculously managed to cram a UNIX-based OS, BSD networking, Open GL, and other desktop class systems into the iPhone, also delivered a remarkably mature, surprisingly polished SDK based entirely on their existing Mac Objective C and Cocoa (dubbed Cocoa Touch for the iPhone) architectures.

Far from the afterthought or hurried response partisan pundits paint it, thanks to Steve Jobs’ legacy from NeXTStep, its frameworks, and its processor independence (it’s run on PowerPC, x86, and now Arm), Mac developers instantly gained the ability to dive right into the system, while those familiar with other flavors of C quickly ramped up thanks to powerful tools like X-Code and Interface Builder.

(It was stated repeatedly during the SDK event that demoes were produced in just two weeks, mostly by developers who’d never touched Objective C before in their lives. Amazing.)

A desktop-class OS with desktop-class development tools leads to something no other smartphone maker has ever been able to deliver to consumers before: desktop class mobile Apps.

Even a cursory look at who’s announced development plans for the iPhone reveals an impressive list of real companies making real apps… maybe even Microsoft and RIM.

Combine all this with a serious attitude towards security, ensuring the platform doesn’t become unstable or an easy target for malware, along with an unprecedented delivery system in App Store — which will put every App in front of every iPhone user, including free Apps for free, and numbers 8, 7, and 6 might actually underestimate the iPhone’s ultimate appeal.

Basically, anyone who wants to run anything on the next great platform wants an iPhone.

4. Design

While software may sell systems, when electronics became mainstream consumers began to shop not only with their brains but with their senses and their tastes.

And if there’s one thing Apple has plenty of, it’s taste.

From the translucent berry-colored iMac and clamshell iBook that re-ignited Apple’s consumer push, to the iconic brushed-aluminum, rounded-rectangular slab that all but makes the computer disappear inside the ultra-thin current iMac, MacBook Air, and iPhone, Apple (or more specifically, the team led by perennial design award winner, Jonathan Ive) seems to hold the magic formula to modern, drool-inducing, industrial design.

Indeed, Apple has not only shaped this electronic generation, it’s shaped the design path of many of it’s copiers… er… competitors as well.

Let’s face it, for a long time garish gray or neon paint over chintzy plastic bodies that looked at though they were assembled from old lego parts with build quality straight out of the Soviet salvage committee were all consumers had to choose from. And, as the saying goes, while consumers don’t always notice good design, they sure do notice it’s absence. Apple knows this, just like they know for good design to be great, it has to be functional.

See, it’s not that Apple “just works”, it’s that Apple designs things, from first transistor to final trim, to “just work.”

Why else, at this very moment, would Jonathan Ive be jetting between NASA and Shenzhen finalizing some futuristic, light and yet durable stealth-like composite that will form the outer shell of the next most lusted-after consumer electronic device — the iPhone 3G?

So that when consumers see, touch, and use it, it’ll be just like the first iPhone — what they want.

3. Usability

I have a two-and-half-year old godson who, first time he picked up the iPhone, figured out how to navigate in and between photos, effortlessly type his ABCs and 123s on the soft keyboard, play with his numbers on the calculator, tap to show and hide video controls, use the camera, flick through the weather, and transition between them all with the solitary hard button on the device face. And not only that, he enjoyed it so much he wants to do it again and again (and again!) every time I see him. (If Apple would just add dial-by-photo, I swear he could call me on his own already).

Give him any other smartphone and you know what he could figure out? How to use it as a building block or a projectile (and with my luck, the latter). A quick search of YouTube will show he’s not the only infant interfacing with the iPhone either.

We’ve seen a lot of iClone skins and sku’s, attempts to duplicate the most superficial aspects of the iPhone, but what few competitors understand is that its not the gradients and transparencies, not the special effects and animation that make the iPhone’s software revolutionary — it’s the user experience.

Sure, I could lecture on about how animation hides transition, allows for error recovery, lends analog comfort, taps into intuitive understanding, and makes use of precious space in truly Tog-worthy fashion, but what’s the point?

Apple has made the smartphone so elegant and easy that a two-and-half year old not only can use, but really wants to. And they’ve done the same thing for adult consumers.

2. Brand

The little forbidden fruit with a bite out of it ranks up there with Superman’s S and the Golden McArches as one of the most recognized brands in the world.

Apple brought the first consumer computers to market with the Apple II, the first consumer GUI machines to market with the Mac, the first consumer MP3 (AAC if you want to get technical) players to market with the iPod, the first consumer music download service to market with iTunes. And in so doing, they’ve earned a reputation for cutting-edge, consumer-driven innovation.

Sure, Blackberries have their addicts, but the cult of apple is legendary and, as outlined before, far wider reaching than just the smartphone space. You can’t buy that kind of brand projection, trust, or loyalty (just ask Microsoft).

When Apple negotiates innovative features like Visual Voice-Mail, pressures carryings to lower data rates, gets Starbucks and AT&T to stop gouging and start giving away free WiFi at their hotspots, their brand is leveraged to benefit consumers.

When Apple Care or the Apple Store swaps out a 8GB iPhone with one dead pixel for a 16GB replacement, or instantly commands a managerial intervention for any unsatisfied email response, their brand is being protected to consumer advantage.

Other smartphone makers, who worry less about their lesser brands often abandon you the moment your credit card clears, or dump you to outsourced OEM ping-pong at the first sign of trouble. Is it any wonder the iPhone continually tops user satisfaction surveys?

1. Leadership

Apple is far from the sales leader in the smartphone space, yet they’ve instantly become the de facto market leader. When every other company is racing to copy Apple’s hardware and interface, and all competitive product releases are tripping over each other to proclaim themselves the iPhone (or Apple) Killer, they can’t be doing anything else but following.

Palm almost patented Zen with their original Treo, but then they got comfortable and stayed there, with the original Treo, long after the world — and technology — moved on. Blackberry made mobile email so addictive it’s likened to a drug (and for the record, please don’t drop and drive), but buried their head so far up their email they seemingly forgot about everything else. And Microsoft… well, if Zen has an opposite, it’s Windows Mobile, an OS whose power is matched only by its legacy handicaps and user impenetrability.

So now Palm is raiding Apple talent. RIM either wants to be the iPhone or just on it. And even die-hard Windows Mobile pundits have given up on Microsoft’s ability to deliver on even their most realistic of vaporwares.

That leaves Apple, alone atop innovation mountain. And luckily, that’s just where one Steven P. Jobs likes to meditate.

It’s impossible to discuss Apple’s leadership without discussing its leader. If any one factor encompasses Apple’s (and the iPhone’s) current success, it’s the CEO. Perfectly melding unsurpassed customer savvy with unequalled industry prescience, his singular focus and uncanny aesthetic have not only brought Apple back from the brink, but made it the greatest second act in tech history.

It’s largely due to Steve Jobs that no one else has, or can come close to the iPhone. Who else besides Jobs or Apple could sit on something like the iPhone for close to 3 years without so much as a peak or a peep. Who else could ditch the floppy one generation (iMac) and the optical disk the next (MacBook Air)?

Every great artist (like Johnny Ive’s design team) needs a patron and every benevolent dictatorship (like Apple Inc.) needs its guiding mind. As long as Apple has Steve Jobs, the competition can try to copy iPhone 1.0 all they want. Jobs is already putting the final, tiny touches on 2.0 and has his sites firmly set on 3.0 and 4.0. And that’s fine because Apple — as it proved when it killed the iPod Mini and replaced it with the Nano — is really the only one who can compete with Apple anyway.

Jobs has always said Apple makes the devices they themselves want to use. Well, they make the devices an ever increasing amount of consumers want to use as well.

Conclusion

So, there they are. The top ten reasons that every other smartphone maker on the planet keeps comparing themselves to the incomparable iPhone. Come WWDC in June, the official SDK release, and — dare we guess? — iPhone 3G debut, it’s only going to get worse (and harder!)

What do you think?

[Ed- Digg link...]

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

Top 10 Reasons the iPhone is Incomparable – Wait-a-Thon!

Not only did the iPhone serve RIM at the SDK event. But after Apple showcased the demos of Touch Fighter, Spore, and Super Monkey Ball on the iPhone, Nintendo and Sony better watch out as well. Game controls utilized the accelerometer and multi-touch while the graphics were displayed on that crystal clear screen–make no mistake–Apple is ready to revolutionize gaming.

With the early glimpses into the gaming capabilities of the iPhone, we’ve learned that:

1. The possibilities are endless
2. It looks really fun
3. Apple has a potential gaming jackpot in their hands

If we have learned anything from the current console “war” between the Xbox 360, Playstation 3, and the Nintendo Wii—consumers are more interested in buying the “fun” games as opposed to those that are graphically superior. At its bare minimum, gaming on the iPhone can be likened to a ridiculously advanced wii-mote. At its maximum potential? Quite possibly the best mobile gaming experience ever.

Earlier today Chad asked about what your favorite gaming experiences on the iPhone might be. But how will Apple deal with the business side of it? How can the iPhone conquer gaming? Find out after the jump.

Present State of Entertainment

As home entertainment becomes busier with multiple types of on-demand entertainment, there is little to no room on people’s TV stands. In a sense, to get a foot into the living room—there would have to be too much investment for such uncertain gain. Hence, the Apple TV has manifested into a ‘hobby’ unit because of the overcrowded entertainment stand. If we can compare this generation’s gaming battle to a war, the living room would be its trenches where little to no room is actually gained.

However, portable gaming as a whole is on an upward rise. Sales of the Nintendo DS and the Sony PSP almost always outpace those of their home console counterparts. With total sales of the DS approaching 70 million units worldwide and the PSP with around 25 million units. The global appetite for portable gaming is only beginning to be realized.

Still the portable market has yet to be conquered. People are carrying too many items around—phones, cameras, planners, gaming devices—only because there has yet to be a true all-in-one device. Before the SDK announcement, the iPhone could only realistically cover your phone, planner, and camera (to an extent). But now? If this is entertainment war, the iPhone should be likened to the A(pple)-Bomb.

Portable Gaming Today

Today’s market of portable gaming consists of two titans. The behemoth of fun, the Nintendo DS and the sleek, cool Sony PSP. Comparatively speaking, they come from two different backgrounds. The PSP has a beautiful screen that the DS lacks but makes up for in a touchscreen. The PSP CPU is light-years faster than the DS, but the DS answers back with better games and an easier to learn experience. With these two portable gaming consoles dominating the market, it begs the question–is there room for one more?

Lets take a quick look at the processors and screen quality of all three devices and see where the iPhone stands in the pack.

Nintendo DS

Processor: two ARM CPUs @ 67MHz and 33MHz

Screen Resolution: (2) 256 x 192 pixels

Sony PSP

Processor: MIPS CPU @ 222 or 333MHz

Screen Resolution: 480 x 272 pixels

iPhone

Processor: ARM CPU @ 620MHz

Screen Resolution: 480 x 320 pixels

Using that as a rough barometer of gaming possibilities, we can see that the iPhone is perfectly capable of handling any game that the PSP runs sans ugly UMD and awkward analog stick. In fact, combining the more powerful CPU processor with OpenGL and Core Animation for developers, we truly have the capabilities for great looking games. But again, being more powerful than the next machine doesn’t guarantee victory. What does help however, is having a fun and unique experience.

So taking on the current king, the Nintendo DS, is crucial if Apple wants to walk away victorious. As Nintendo continues to raise the bar in fun gaming experiences, Apple is hot on their heels. Any game that involves touching, the iPhone can match and raise with its accelerometer. In fact, as Nintendo often suggests, touching is good, but as any iPhone users would say multi-touch is much better.

iPhone users really have the best of both worlds in their hands. Not only do they have a machine more powerful than the PSP but they also combine it with a gaming experience on par with the Nintendo DS. The iPhone (and to the same extent, the iPod Touch) certainly has the technological prowess to take the portable gaming market by storm. Include the fact that with Apple’s goal to sell 10 million iPhones by the end of the year and the onset of a 3G iPhone along with more potential carriers across the world, Apple certainly will have enough iPhones in people’s hands to make a dent in the gaming industry.

Where Can The iPhone Fit In?

Looking past the enormous fun-factor in all the games demoed at the SDK roadmap event (and boy, were they fun), we should note something much more important: how quickly the games were developed and how eager the developers are. If developing games for the iPhone was tough, even the most powerful system would squander its potential without the best developers on board. Luckily, the people over at EA and SEGA continually stressed the ease of developing games for the iPhone throughout the entire event. In fact, Sega likened creating games for the iPhone to creating games for any console. The iPhone has THAT much potential.

Using iTunes to promote the games will serve as the perfect billboard for developers. Mobile gaming (and products, for that matter) has never seen an outlet such as iTunes. Gone are the days of searching for fun games on your mobile carrier’s store and scouring versiontracker for the latest build, iTunes is a media outlet that has become near universal. Having your product on the pages of iTunes is on par with being on the shelves at Wal-Mart and Best Buy.

The iPhone’s true soul is being a blank slate—that principle reflects in its design. By building a powerful device from the ground up (that just so happens to be a phone, among other things)—the iPhone has made developers re-think mobile gaming. No longer are they confined to uncomfortably small buttons or screens with horrible resolution—they truly have their blank slate to go wild on.

What Will Apple Do?

But the question remains, does Apple really want to pursue Nintendo and Sony in portable gaming or are they satisfied with being just better than mobile phone gaming? I think the answer lies somewhere closer to challenging the DS and the PSP. They have the technology behind their device, developers already on board, and a cool and fun factor that neither Sony nor Nintendo could match. But if games provide to be too tough to develop (I doubt it) or end up being terrible (Again, I doubt it), Apple can easily back off and claim it never planned for the iPhone to be the next big thing in gaming.

Either way, it is an entirely win-win situation for Apple—portable gaming just adds to the near-perfect resume of the iPhone. Remember folks, the iPhone is already a great phone, the best mobile internet portal, and the best iPod—in one device. Asking it to be the best gaming device, might be a little too much, but that’s how high Apple has set the bar. And I think they just might reach it.

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

Is the iPhone Ready to Take on Gaming?