Chaotic Neutrality

Disclaimer: I am definitely not an Apple fanboy. The thought of Steve Jobs controlling every aspect of my electronics causes me immense pain.

With that being said, I did buy an iPhone. Mind you, I did not wait in line for it, but I was pleased to hear that the closest Apple retail store was still in stock on the Monday following release.

Enough of the background and onto the review…

Positives

1. The iPhone is a sleek piece of electronics. It looks cool and feels cool. Definitely what Apple is best at.
2. Its touchscreen is actually pretty neat. No scroll wheels or buttons, just cute little finger taps and swipes.
3. That screen is ginormous.
4. Safari web browsing experience is unrivaled in mobile devices.
5. iPod music features are strong. It really is meant to replace your other iDevices.

Negatives

1. Too few buttons. Come on. It takes 738 taps, swipes, and pinches to do anything. It is too minimalist for its own good.
2. No Adobe Flash! This is crazy. It is definitely a watered down Web with no Flash. This means virtually all of the non-converted YouTube videos are unplayable on the iPhone.
3. No customization allowed. Steve Jobs control-freakishness continues. No ringtone customization, no changes allowed to the home screen, and no 3rd party applications. Sadness.
4. Did I mention No 3rd Party Apps? Could be the downfall of the device as more mobile devices become available that allow full customization and file system access.
5. The headphone jack is a standard size. Unfortunately, it is recessed into the frame of the phone. Why? This is just silly. Why make it a standard jack and then make standard accessories incompatible? Dumb, dumb, dumb.

Overall, I love the idea of the iPhone. It looks cool, is very intuitive, and reduces the number of devices that I need to cart around.

Unfortunately, it suffers from many of the same problems that have plagued Apple forever. Maybe someday they will learn.

My recommendation would be to wait for the next big version of the iPhone. Hopefully, that will fix some of the major bugs and other issues. Then again, this is Apple… so probably not.

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