A cell phone buff is not a name anyone in their right mind would use to describe me. I only got my first cell phone about 4 years ago, and I'm in my early thirties. I used it to make phone calls and send the occasional text message. And I rarely even managed to do either of those. I didn't download ring tones, I didn't download wallpapers, I didn't even download games and I'm a huge gamer.
And my phones? Oh yeah, those. Absolute technological marvels I tell you. I've had three phones over the years and the prices I paid were free, 10 bucks, and free. And the last one was a used one someone else gave me six months ago. That was the first phone I owned that had a camera in it, could play videos, and had the capability to access the Internet and email.
Of course, I didn't do any of that.
So enough of that garbage. Did you hear about this fancy phone that came out a couple years ago, the iPhone? Yeah, I know, everyone has heard of it. Everyone I know jumped on it right from the beginning, a lot of them right when it came out for $600. I mocked them mercilessly for this. Seriously, over half a thousand dollars on a stupid phone? I don't care that Apple made it. That's ridiculous.
But the strangest thing started happening a few months ago. And it would go like this:
We'd be out and needed directions. "If I only had an iPhone...".
We couldn't figure out where to eat. "If I only had an iPhone...".
We didn't know if a store was open or the number to call it. "If I only had an iPhone...".
I really wanted to know the hockey scores. "If I only had an iPhone...".
I was too lazy to get off the couch to check my email. "If I only had an iPhone...".
A couple things happened in 2008 with the second version of the iPhone that was released in the summer. They got it hooked up to the 3G network, which was a huge speed increase. I had watched all the early adopters stare at their fancy touch screens as a webpage loaded. And stared. And stared. I remember right after it came out when my friend bragged about how he could order our movie tickets online from Fandango while we were at the restaurant. Forty-five minutes later he'd almost pulled it off.
The second thing was the price almost became reasonable. Two hundred dollars is still a ton of money for a phone to someone like me who always just used it as a basic communication device. All of this is pretty strange as I'm actually quite a fan of gadgets and have all kinds of little toys. But a fancy cell phone never interested me at all. I was slowly starting to convince myself that it was something I might want to invest in. I was losing all my arguments not to. The price was coming down, the speed was going up, my contract with my other non-AT&T provider was about to run out. The only real thing stopping me was the increase in monthly price.
Then Christmas came and I got an iPhone. I don't think I've stopped playing with it since.
It plays video. It can double as an iPod. You can buy either an 8GB or 16GB version. It has a decent little camera. The touch screen is large and easy to navigate. Typing on the virtual keyboard is amazingly easy and the auto-correction is fantastic. You can easily surf full version web pages. I actually get frustrated every time a mobile version pops up when I'm surfing it.
And the apps. Oh the glorious apps. You can download just about anything you can think of. Full games. An app to tell you all movies playing in your area. Fox Sports to keep up with all of the scores. A restaurant slot machine that will pick a restaurant in your area when you can't decide on one. Driving directions. Even stupid ones that turn your iPhone into a light-saber or a flashlight. I even saw a Fart Generator yesterday for a dollar. Oh, capitalism at its finest.
Is it the most technologically advanced cell phone? I can't tell you for sure but I doubt it. Is it the most reasonably priced? Are you kidding me? With the Apple tax? (Apple tax means you pay me for it just so you can have the fancy Apple logo on the back. It's dumb, but people love it. Go figure). But it just all brings everything together perfectly. Ease of use, attractiveness, apps, cool factor, whatever.
The Apple iPhone is the cell phone of 2008 and I think it will be the cell phone of the foreseeable future.