6 ms·

The iPhone is White Label Hardware

48 points by dbreunig 17y ago

akirk 17y ago
I just don't get why Apple doesn't just sell a higher-priced, unlocked iPhone, so that you don't have to get yourself screwed by your local carrier.
- dbreunig 17y ago
  As always: business. AT&T is effectively paying Apple to prevent that very scenario. AT&T is weathering the downturn relatively nicely thanks to their exclusive deal with Apple. The ~$200 check they cut Apple per 2-year contract is paying for that exclusivity plus like-advertising.
  - akirk 17y ago
    Sometimes I just wish that they would focus more on the customers' needs :)
- cujo 17y ago
  I believe you can get one from ATT unlocked without a plan, but the price is way up there. I believe $600 and $800 for the 2 models. That was for the 3G though. I don't know if they still do it for the 3GS.
  - martey 17y ago
    I found no-commitment pricing at http://www.att.com/gen/press-room?pid=1574 http://www.att.com/gen/press-room?pid=1574: iPhone 3G: $499 (8GB) and $549 (16GB) iPhone 3GS: $599 (16GB) and $699 (32GB)
    - jcl 17y ago
      But does "no-commitment" mean the phone can be used on any carrier? Since you can only order it directly from AT&T, I'd guess that it can't.
jonknee 17y ago
Except for all the artificial limitations (no background processes is a huge let down) and the fact that Steve Jobs can crush your iPhone businesses if he chooses.
- jodrellblank 17y ago
  How is it a let down? For two years, two releases, two versions of software and one beta of OS 3 it hasn't been present. It's only ever been mentioned by Apple to say they aren't doing it, and always they've been discussing, advertising and working on push notifications as an alternative. Given all that, why were you in any way expecting it?
  - jonknee 17y ago
    I didn't say I was expecting it, only that it's a bummer that it's not there.
  - jm4 17y ago
    Maybe because it's possible on competing smartphones? I was curious about the new features in IPhone OS 3 and decided to take a look at the list. Copy and paste? MMS? Voice memos? Search? You've got to be kidding me. The competition has had that stuff for ages. If Apple couldn't deliver that stuff on day one that's fine, but it should have been released in an update shortly afterward. It's absurd that 2 years later people are still waiting for basic functionality that's been available elsewhere the whole time. Don't get me wrong. Although I choose not to use the iPhone, I still like it. Despite the fact that it does some very basic things badly or not at all, it does have some neat features and has driven the competition to work a little harder. The iPhone made mobile app stores commonplace. The 'find my phone' and 'remote wipe' features are very cool and I haven't seen those on another phone. I'm looking forward to how the competition responds. What does bother me, though, is all the Apple apologists coming out of the woodwork to brush all of their faults under the rug. Apple does some good things and some not so good things. In my opinion, a lot of the features in this update are things that people should not still be waiting for. I also think we don't need to be in the habit of excusing the lack of background applications. We're so fond of innovation, yet this missing features prevents the kind of innovation happening on other platforms.
aaronblohowiak 17y ago
AT&T lock-in is one of the larger barriers preventing the universality of the iPhone as "the" mobile computing platform.
- dbreunig 17y ago
  Very true. It's a huge hinderance. However, the international audience of the device cannot be ignored. Neither can the huge base of iPod Touches.
  - yhnbgty 17y ago
    The international audience is the problem with iPhone. You can finally now get it in Canada (a year late) and the UK.
    - godDLL 17y ago
      You still can't get it in Israel. You can import an unlocked device from France or something, but you'll have no visual voicemail, no 3G (EDGE/GPS works with Orange/Partner with some tweaking). The Maps app doesn't have any info beyond the general border outline. You can get street names and all that from maps.google.com/ but that works awful in Mobile Safari.
- GHFigs 17y ago
  The author means universal in the sense of a universal remote control, not universal adoption. Also, a big chunk of that 40 million is iPod Touch owners, who are not subject to carrier lock-in. The point is that it is a sufficiently generic and popular platform that many companies that might once have rolled their own hardware have diminished need to. If the platform supports what they need and they can make do in a market of 40 million (and growing), why not? For consumers it is the same way; why buy a device when you can just download that functionality? It raises the threshold of utility. The market doesn't have to be universal, it just has to be big and and consistent. Right now the iPhone is the only platform that can claim to have both of those qualities.
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
jmtulloss 17y ago
Apple's hardware isn't appropriate for every situation. If it were to be white label, they would need to make the software available to other hardware developers, and that's never going to happen. This article is more about software than hardware, the apps largely don't care what hardware it's running on.
- upinsmoke 17y ago
  Your sentence doesn't make any sense, you start with "Apple's hardware" then you talk about "make the software available to other hardware developers". Do you mean hardware accessories for iPhone? It's in 3.0.
  - jmtulloss 17y ago
    What? No. I mean they would need to make the software (iPhone OS 3.0) available to 3rd party hardware developers in order to have a "white label" platform.
mcantor 17y ago
Full disclosure: I recently purchased a T-Mobile Android-powered G-1, with which I am more than a little enamored. Feel free to discard the following post as fanboy tripe. Couldn't this article have just as easily been written about the G-1, or certain models of Blackberry? (Especially since Android is open-source. Isn't it?) It disturbs me when Apple products are treated like the exclusive apotheosis of their niche. I remember reading an article in which the journalist blathered spastically about "iPod-jacking," the paradigm-breaking practice of two people swapping headphones on their iPod to see what the other is listening to. Huh??? ANY pair of MP3 players could accomplish the same thing, just like any modern wi-fi/GPS/accelerometer/etc. enabled smartphone could accomplish what this article is talking about. Also, I have an open question: I'm perplexed by people who criticize Apple for keeping apps out of the store. Aren't you free to publish your app on your own website, which any user can navigate to, and install your app from there? Are people angry because, if Apple doesn't let you in the app store, you're almost definitely going to get less customers? (That's a fair thing to be angry about). Or... are people angry because, if you get kicked out of the app store, no one can install your app AT ALL?
- jonknee 17y ago
  "Aren't you free to publish your app on your own website, which any user can navigate to, and install your app from there?" No. Which is why having a gate keeper at the store is so frustrating. There are three ways to distribute--iTunes store, ad hoc (limited to 100 device IDs per app and is designed to use for testing) and enterprise which only works for corporate accounts and is limited to devices inside your company.
  - mcantor 17y ago
    Then how do you develop for the iPhone, without being able to install the app you're developing on your own device?
    - menloparkbum 17y ago
      You can't. You have to sign up for the dev program to get the app on your device. You can program to the simulator, but that doesn't help you with the unique features of the phone (camera, accelerometer, etc).
symesc 17y ago
Oh FSM I love it when someone gets it exactly right!
JimmyL 17y ago
It's an interesting argument the author is making, but it sure sounds like it's a bit of a reach at this point. Sure, the iPhone has nice market penetration in a certain demographic (who are more likely than others to buy gizmos) but I strongly doubt that you'll see companies that would have otherwise developed hardware, not do so. Instead, I think you'll see the flourishing of products with small enough niches such that if they had to build their own hardware, the product would have been shelved. This section: Even established businesses seemed to disprove their own divisions: as tomtom showed off their upcoming navigation software I was left wondering why they need to make their own devices anymore. is the epitome of that reach. Why does TomTom need to make their own devices any more? Because they don't want to add in an implicit $60/month data fee to use their service, which you have when it's iPhone based. Because if it's strictly iPhone, you can't give it to your parents as a gift so they stop getting lost. Because they make some nice margins off their high-end hardware, which they can't on an iPhone. Because they don't want to limit themselves to the (comparatively) small demographic of people with an iPhone who drive in an area with a cellular data connection, as opposed to the much larger one of people who drive cars that have 12V accessory plugs. Likewise with the ZipCar application - they're not going to go iPhone-only, since it's giving up free market share. So they'll add an iPhone interface for coolness purposes and to appeal to a certain demo (which they probably do pretty well with already), but it won't fundamentally change their business plan. The Pasco demo (focusing on teaching science to kids) also seemed somewhat contrived - who's gonna outfit a lab with iPhones to do readings? More importantly, what makes more sense for a school board buying a new lab's worth of equipment - buying sensor packages that work with a dedicated ruggedized central station that the school owns, or buying ones that require all students to have and use expensive and relatively flimsy cell phones of one particular brand? So yes, I think that the iPhone represents an interesting new platform and will enable some new business opportunities (especially at the small end of the busines ecosystem), but it's not going to cause the end of all commercial customized hardware.

48 points by dbreunig 17y ago

akirk 17y ago

I just don't get why Apple doesn't just sell a higher-priced, unlocked iPhone, so that you don't have to get yourself screwed by your local carrier.

dbreunig 17y ago
As always: business. AT&T is effectively paying Apple to prevent that very scenario. AT&T is weathering the downturn relatively nicely thanks to their exclusive deal with Apple. The ~$200 check they cut Apple per 2-year contract is paying for that exclusivity plus like-advertising.
- akirk 17y ago
  Sometimes I just wish that they would focus more on the customers' needs :)
cujo 17y ago
I believe you can get one from ATT unlocked without a plan, but the price is way up there. I believe $600 and $800 for the 2 models. That was for the 3G though. I don't know if they still do it for the 3GS.
- martey 17y ago
  I found no-commitment pricing at http://www.att.com/gen/press-room?pid=1574 http://www.att.com/gen/press-room?pid=1574: iPhone 3G: $499 (8GB) and $549 (16GB) iPhone 3GS: $599 (16GB) and $699 (32GB)
  - jcl 17y ago
    But does "no-commitment" mean the phone can be used on any carrier? Since you can only order it directly from AT&T, I'd guess that it can't.

jonknee 17y ago

Except for all the artificial limitations (no background processes is a huge let down) and the fact that Steve Jobs can crush your iPhone businesses if he chooses.

jodrellblank 17y ago
How is it a let down? For two years, two releases, two versions of software and one beta of OS 3 it hasn't been present. It's only ever been mentioned by Apple to say they aren't doing it, and always they've been discussing, advertising and working on push notifications as an alternative. Given all that, why were you in any way expecting it?
- jonknee 17y ago
  I didn't say I was expecting it, only that it's a bummer that it's not there.
- jm4 17y ago
  Maybe because it's possible on competing smartphones? I was curious about the new features in IPhone OS 3 and decided to take a look at the list. Copy and paste? MMS? Voice memos? Search? You've got to be kidding me. The competition has had that stuff for ages. If Apple couldn't deliver that stuff on day one that's fine, but it should have been released in an update shortly afterward. It's absurd that 2 years later people are still waiting for basic functionality that's been available elsewhere the whole time. Don't get me wrong. Although I choose not to use the iPhone, I still like it. Despite the fact that it does some very basic things badly or not at all, it does have some neat features and has driven the competition to work a little harder. The iPhone made mobile app stores commonplace. The 'find my phone' and 'remote wipe' features are very cool and I haven't seen those on another phone. I'm looking forward to how the competition responds. What does bother me, though, is all the Apple apologists coming out of the woodwork to brush all of their faults under the rug. Apple does some good things and some not so good things. In my opinion, a lot of the features in this update are things that people should not still be waiting for. I also think we don't need to be in the habit of excusing the lack of background applications. We're so fond of innovation, yet this missing features prevents the kind of innovation happening on other platforms.

aaronblohowiak 17y ago

AT&T lock-in is one of the larger barriers preventing the universality of the iPhone as "the" mobile computing platform.

dbreunig 17y ago
Very true. It's a huge hinderance. However, the international audience of the device cannot be ignored. Neither can the huge base of iPod Touches.
- yhnbgty 17y ago
  The international audience is the problem with iPhone. You can finally now get it in Canada (a year late) and the UK.
  - godDLL 17y ago
    You still can't get it in Israel. You can import an unlocked device from France or something, but you'll have no visual voicemail, no 3G (EDGE/GPS works with Orange/Partner with some tweaking). The Maps app doesn't have any info beyond the general border outline. You can get street names and all that from maps.google.com/ but that works awful in Mobile Safari.
GHFigs 17y ago
The author means universal in the sense of a universal remote control, not universal adoption. Also, a big chunk of that 40 million is iPod Touch owners, who are not subject to carrier lock-in. The point is that it is a sufficiently generic and popular platform that many companies that might once have rolled their own hardware have diminished need to. If the platform supports what they need and they can make do in a market of 40 million (and growing), why not? For consumers it is the same way; why buy a device when you can just download that functionality? It raises the threshold of utility. The market doesn't have to be universal, it just has to be big and and consistent. Right now the iPhone is the only platform that can claim to have both of those qualities.

deleted 17y ago

[deleted]

jmtulloss 17y ago

Apple's hardware isn't appropriate for every situation. If it were to be white label, they would need to make the software available to other hardware developers, and that's never going to happen. This article is more about software than hardware, the apps largely don't care what hardware it's running on.

upinsmoke 17y ago
Your sentence doesn't make any sense, you start with "Apple's hardware" then you talk about "make the software available to other hardware developers". Do you mean hardware accessories for iPhone? It's in 3.0.
- jmtulloss 17y ago
  What? No. I mean they would need to make the software (iPhone OS 3.0) available to 3rd party hardware developers in order to have a "white label" platform.

mcantor 17y ago

Full disclosure: I recently purchased a T-Mobile Android-powered G-1, with which I am more than a little enamored. Feel free to discard the following post as fanboy tripe. Couldn't this article have just as easily been written about the G-1, or certain models of Blackberry? (Especially since Android is open-source. Isn't it?) It disturbs me when Apple products are treated like the exclusive apotheosis of their niche. I remember reading an article in which the journalist blathered spastically about "iPod-jacking," the paradigm-breaking practice of two people swapping headphones on their iPod to see what the other is listening to. Huh??? ANY pair of MP3 players could accomplish the same thing, just like any modern wi-fi/GPS/accelerometer/etc. enabled smartphone could accomplish what this article is talking about. Also, I have an open question: I'm perplexed by people who criticize Apple for keeping apps out of the store. Aren't you free to publish your app on your own website, which any user can navigate to, and install your app from there? Are people angry because, if Apple doesn't let you in the app store, you're almost definitely going to get less customers? (That's a fair thing to be angry about). Or... are people angry because, if you get kicked out of the app store, no one can install your app AT ALL?

jonknee 17y ago
"Aren't you free to publish your app on your own website, which any user can navigate to, and install your app from there?" No. Which is why having a gate keeper at the store is so frustrating. There are three ways to distribute--iTunes store, ad hoc (limited to 100 device IDs per app and is designed to use for testing) and enterprise which only works for corporate accounts and is limited to devices inside your company.
- mcantor 17y ago
  Then how do you develop for the iPhone, without being able to install the app you're developing on your own device?
  - menloparkbum 17y ago
    You can't. You have to sign up for the dev program to get the app on your device. You can program to the simulator, but that doesn't help you with the unique features of the phone (camera, accelerometer, etc).

symesc 17y ago

Oh FSM I love it when someone gets it exactly right!

JimmyL 17y ago

It's an interesting argument the author is making, but it sure sounds like it's a bit of a reach at this point. Sure, the iPhone has nice market penetration in a certain demographic (who are more likely than others to buy gizmos) but I strongly doubt that you'll see companies that would have otherwise developed hardware, not do so. Instead, I think you'll see the flourishing of products with small enough niches such that if they had to build their own hardware, the product would have been shelved. This section: Even established businesses seemed to disprove their own divisions: as tomtom showed off their upcoming navigation software I was left wondering why they need to make their own devices anymore. is the epitome of that reach. Why does TomTom need to make their own devices any more? Because they don't want to add in an implicit $60/month data fee to use their service, which you have when it's iPhone based. Because if it's strictly iPhone, you can't give it to your parents as a gift so they stop getting lost. Because they make some nice margins off their high-end hardware, which they can't on an iPhone. Because they don't want to limit themselves to the (comparatively) small demographic of people with an iPhone who drive in an area with a cellular data connection, as opposed to the much larger one of people who drive cars that have 12V accessory plugs. Likewise with the ZipCar application - they're not going to go iPhone-only, since it's giving up free market share. So they'll add an iPhone interface for coolness purposes and to appeal to a certain demo (which they probably do pretty well with already), but it won't fundamentally change their business plan. The Pasco demo (focusing on teaching science to kids) also seemed somewhat contrived - who's gonna outfit a lab with iPhones to do readings? More importantly, what makes more sense for a school board buying a new lab's worth of equipment - buying sensor packages that work with a dedicated ruggedized central station that the school owns, or buying ones that require all students to have and use expensive and relatively flimsy cell phones of one particular brand? So yes, I think that the iPhone represents an interesting new platform and will enable some new business opportunities (especially at the small end of the busines ecosystem), but it's not going to cause the end of all commercial customized hardware.