iPhone Provides a Peek at the Mobile Future, Study Says
477905
Mobile Internet Devices will surf, play music and video, take calls and pictures--and more.
492255
Just how much will the iPhone boost AT&T's business?
322248
The music industry has long hoped  mobile phones will help turn around weak music sales, but music  executives privately fear the most obvious contender, the  iPhone, may give too much clout to Apple Inc., in shaping the  future of the fledgling mobile music market.
205308
Citing research from ChangeWave Research, Jonny Evans (Macworld) reports that âthe iPhone now leads the pack in terms of customer satisfaction among its US customer base. An unprecedented 82 per cent of iPhone owners reported being Very Satisfied with their purchase, up five points since the previous survey in July and by far the highest rating of any mobile manufacturer.â Evans notes that âthe research found 16 per cent of respondents who plan to purchase a phone in the next six months saying theyâll buy an iPhone - placing Apple up at the top among all manufacturers.â
16848
Writing for USA Today, Edward Baig finds iPhone âindeed worth lusting after.â Apple, he says, âhas delivered a prodigyâa slender fashion phone, a slick iPod, and an Internet experience unlike any before it on a mobile handset.â âThe most chic cellphone Iâve seen,â iPhone is âa breeze to set up and fun to use, evident from the moment you slide your finger across the screen to unlock it. Itâs a wonderful widescreen iPod and fabulous picture viewer.â And he tells us that âmaking calls was surprisingly simple. You can flick through your list of contacts or favorites â¦ and then tap on a name to make a call or send a text message. The keys of the virtual keypad are large enough so that dialing a number manually â or punching in a code to access voice mail remotely â is easy. I rarely made a mistake.â He awards iPhone 3.5 stars out of 4.
467662
Your cell phone is a potential gold mine for marketers: It can reveal where you are, whom you call and even what music you like.
650864
Apple's iPhone has generated a lot of excitement over the last few months and the device hasn't even been released yet. However, a recent survey conducted by market research firms IDC and Market Insight show that the iPhone's success is not a sure thing.
422457
After taking stock of the hottest Internet and technology stories of the year, Michael Krey (Yahoo) puts the release of iPhone at the top of the list.  âThe iPhone marked Appleâs first smart phone, and the cell phone industry will never be the same. Appleâs product doubles as an iPod digital music and video player.â iPhone, Krey concludes, ushers in âan era of more user-friendly handheld gadgets.â
675605
In an attempt to become more useful, US researchers are developing new smartphone software which watches usersâ calling and usage patterns and tries to learn how best to âhelpâ.
57904
The iPhone is about to do for smartphones what the iPod did for digital music players: put one in everyone&#8217;s pocket.
319464
The future of Apple&#39;s much ballyhooed and eagerly anticipated iPhones is finally in the hands of devotees of the iconic company&#39;s culture-altering gadgets.
607237
After testing the iPhone for two weeks in multiple US cities, Walter Mossberg and Katherine Boehret consider it âa beautiful and breakthrough handheld computer. Its software, especially, sets a new bar for the smart-phone industry, and its clever finger-touch interface,â they say, âworks well.â In addition to combining âintelligent voice calling and a full-blown iPod,â iPhone also âoffers the best Web browser we have seen on a smart phone and robust email software.â It offers âthe largest and highest-resolution screen of any smart phone weâve seen, and the most internal memory by far. Yet it is one of the thinnest smart phones available and offers impressive battery life, better than its key competitors claim.â It is, the two conclude, âa pleasure to use.â
589826
The Apple iPhone can reduce the total number of devices used by employees and thus increase productivity.
598696
About 19 million U.S. cell phone users are ready to buy Apple Inc.'s iPhone, nearly double the number Apple projected it would sell by the end of 2008, according to a new survey.
247193
After months of silence, Bob Levitus (Houston Chronicle) wanted to âshare my opinion of iPhone after seven months of heavy use.â After saying that he couldnât âimagine living without oneâ way back in July, Levitus adds âthat is still true today, as well.â Seven months later, he says, âI believe the iPhone is the best darn mobile phone money can buy.â âWhere else,â he wonders, could âcan you find a world-class phone, plus video, audio, Web and e-mail, all in a single hand-held device with an intuitive user interface?â
327297
What might your mobile future look like? Sitting at the airport, you pull out a laptop or personal digital assistant and watch TV, delivered through Wi-Fi. Perhaps you'll grab an MP3 player instead, but rather than listen to downloaded tunes, you check out Internet radio. Or maybe you'll just make a call but thanks to the headset into which you are speaking, the person at the other end can make out your voice and not the blur of jet engines taking off at the same time.Each scenario is already possible, as evidenced last week in La Jolla, Calif., during the sixth annual DemoMobile conference. The gathering is a showcase for promising wireless technologies targeted at people on the go. Three dozen companies participated, many start-ups, representing more than &#36;142 million in cumulative venture funding.Consider the scope: Luxembourg's Skype Technologies demonstrated free software that lets consumers make voice calls over a Wi-Fi-capable Pocket PC.Handmark of Kansas City, Mo., showed off Pocket Express, a wireless information service for smart phones. If a phone has "location-based" capabilities, Handmark can provide listings of nearby restaurants or theaters, and map the fastest route to that spot.Xora in Mountain View, Calif., lets companies track the whereabouts of mobile employees via its GPS TimeTrack offering. And EverNote in Sunnyvale, Calif., has software that lets someone organize notes on a PC, then synchronize them with portable devices.OurPictures unveiled the OurPictures Mobile service. With a single click, consumers can send photos taken with a camera phone to designated PCs, TVs, printers or a local photo processor. And games publisher Sorrent showed off a new way to punch in your vote: its Bush vs. Kerry Boxing cell phone game. The results of every Bush/Kerry rumble on every portable phone are scored on a pugilist poll posted at Sorrent's site; as of Wednesday, Kerry was out-pointing Bush by about 2,350 votes. Other would-be knockouts:&#8226;Couch computing. The &#36;800, 2.3-pound wireless Pepper Pad 2 from Pepper Computer in Lexington, Mass., lets you browse the Web, do e-mail, play videos and games and more. Due in January, it has an 8.4-inch display, Bluetooth, an SD card slot and 20 GB hard drive. It also has a directional game pad and small lighted qwerty keypad that is split so that half flanks the left side of the screen and half, the right.&#8226;Making a motion. Synaptics is behind the track-wheel on Apple's iPods and the touchpads on several notebook PCs. The new MobileTouch platform is Synaptics' foray into cell phones. You'll be able to scribble on the screen or scroll by using your fingers to lightly make small gestures across a keypad (or other interface), just as you do with a touchpad. I was wowed even more by technology out of Oulu, Finland, where F-Origin originated a "motion control solution" called Iris. Consumers using a phone or computer with F-Origin's software will be able to control the orientation of the screen by merely tilting and moving the device. What you see on the display corresponds to the angle in which you rotate the gizmo. F-Origin takes advantage of gravity sensors.&#8226;That's (mobile) entertainment. ViewSonic's new Wireless Media Gateway and Wireless Media Adapter (&#36;799 packaged together, and coming later in the year) represent the company's move into wireless networking. The product line is designed to deliver digital videos, music and pictures to any monitor or TV in the house, at better-than-DVD quality. The company says it can stream video to a single TV at up to 10 megabits per second or two different streams at 5 megabits. You can also print from the gateway devices and take advantage of 80 or 120 GB storage capacities.Watching TV on a handheld is the idea behind WiFi-TV from OnAir Entertainment in Sunnyvale, Calif. OnAir is working with hot-spot providers to deliver TV or video-on-demand at public places. Consumers can access an interactive programming guide and pause live TV. OnAir is conducting a free trial at the Austin airport, though the company expects people to eventually pay about &#36;5 for a day pass.Meanwhile, another Silicon Valley start-up, AudioFeast, is focusing on Internet radio for portable music players. Its virtual broadcasting network delivers refreshed content from A &amp; E, BBC Radio, NPR and Sporting News Radio, among others. You download software onto your computer, then choose the channels you want to sync with a compatible MP3 player. A one-year AudioFeast subscription costs &#36;50. Contact my phone. Is there anything more tedious than entering hundreds of phone numbers into a phone? Palo Alto, Calif.-based Vazu has come up with a suite of services that lets you automatically transmit selected contacts, as well as such Web data as driving directions or movie schedules, to a phone. Vazu's Internet Explorer plug-in places a small "V" icon next to a phone number on a Web page. When you click on the icon, the contact name and number are sent to your phone. What's more, users of Outlook, Outlook Express, Apple Mail and Linux Evolution can dispatch contacts via Vazu to their phone's address book. Lose a phone? Vazu can serve as a backup to your data. &#8226;Now hear this. Logitech, Plantronics and Aliph submitted headsets for a Sound Off challenge voted on by conference attendees. The winner was Aliph's Jawbone, based on military-grade technology. To prove that this funky-looking &#36;150 "adaptive" headset can suppress background noises while keeping a caller's voice audible, Aliph conducted a crowd-pleasing experiment. First a caller had a noisy blender behind him. When Jawbone's technology was applied, the person could be heard clearly, not the blender. Aliph successfully repeated the exercise with a boombox. The coup de gr&#226;ce: The caller could be heard over a weed whacker. It is made possible by a sensor that feels vibrations on your cheek. Jawbone works with phones from Motorola, Nokia and Sony Ericsson.&#8226;Mobile marketing. Intrigued by the Armani, Gap or Toyota ads in the September issue of Jane? Snap a picture and e-mail images to the magazine. You'll get back text messages with tailored promotional offers. It's part of a promotion based on technology from conference demonstrator Mobot.The Waltham, Mass., company was but one demonstrator to give a hint where mobile marketing is heading. MediaTile of Scotts Valley, Calif., delivers point-of-sale digital signs. Digimarc in Tualatin, Ore., places invisible digital watermarks into banner ads. When a consumer takes a picture of, say, a movie ad, they might see a trailer on the phone or directions to the nearest theater. Another demonstrator, DRM Labs of Dallas, uses text messages to send digital coupons called Voupons. For these schemes to pan out, consumers must "opt-in; privacy must be respected."This is just the tip of the iceberg for many of the companies exhibiting at DemoMobile. Indeed, I expect to explore some of these technologies in future coverage. After all, what could be more mobile than the pace of change?E-mail ebaig@usatoday.com
672715
The iPhone doesn't look, sound or feel like other cellphones. With its smooth, almost button-free contours, it could be the product of an advanced, alien civilization.