I don’t have an iPhone but I’ve heard enough and messed enough with it to tell you this phone is an overhyped fashion item with no functionality. As soon as other phone manufacturers start creating touch UI phones (i.e. 2009), this phone will be left in the dust. Apple fan boys, shield your eyes.

My current phone is a Nokia N95 8GB. It doesn’t have a sexy UI nor is its form factor cool. It’s a black brick with a Web 1.0 interface but it does at least 1000 more things than the iPhone ever could (even with the unofficial “jailbreak” hack). Apple are competing the market with looks and a revolutionary touch UI, that’s all.

Let’s start with the good about this phone (it’s a short list):

The touch UI and form factor

I don’t need to tell you the iPhone looks good and the UI is both intuitive and sexy, everyone knows that. It goes downhill from here though.

GPS

I was very impressed by GPS on the iPhone but only due to the speed it was able to give me a location. Loading up the Maps app took less than 30 seconds in giving me an accurate location. Compared to the N95, that’s about a 600% improvement, which might actually make GPS useful.

iPod

Whoa! It’s an iPod too. It’s debateable that the iPod is the best MP3 player on the market (mainly due to its lack of format support and radio) but I’m sure the numbers out do me there, so I won’t argue.

Safari

One thing Apple definitely did right was Safari. The browser renders pages accurately and large screen area makes it shine. Touch UI and zooming makes browsing the web nearly as fast as if you were in front of a desktop. Although it doesn’t fully pass ACID 2 or 3, it’s close. It’s definitely the best mobile web browser on the market (but only because of the touch UI).

And here’s the bad (it’s a long list):

The App Store

The implementation and ease of use of the store is great. The users and developers however, are horrible. Comments turn the App Store into the new Digg and there are only a few GOOD developers. Quality apps are at an all time low (especially free apps) and users have reported apps being the main problem in bricking and crashing their phones.  Users also seem to think that quality apps at the store are things like “Bubblewrap”, which turns your phone into bubble wrapping paper, and “iBeer”, which turns your phone into a glass of beer,  …seriously?  Steve showed off the crème of crop for apps at WWDC, which was only impressive to an Apple fan boy. You can argue that the phone has only been out for a couple of months, but developers have had an SDK that “has made mobile development revolutionary” since March 2008.

Background Applications, Push Notifications

At WWDC Apple announced they would not allow background applications and instead announced a Push Notification system, which they fucked up. As of today, the push notification system doesn’t exist in retail builds of the firmware making it impossible to do any sort of Internet multitasking on the phone. Their excuse? Hackers will get your phone! Background apps slow your phone! Sorry Apple, but no, Symbian OS has supported multitasking for quite some time now (enabling Instant Messaging applications to run in the background) and you have to ask yourself, when was the last time your phone was hacked? Oh what, never?

GPS

There’s no turn-by-turn voice navigation and the developer’s license forbids creating an application to do so. Maps also need to be downloaded on the fly making it useless if you’re travelling. Don’t Apple know roaming data costs a shit-ton?

The Camera

It sucks. Not to mention it’s impossible to send the photo you take to anyone except via e-mail. No Bluetooth transfer, no MMS. Oh yeah, no video either. Oh yeah, no front facing camera for video calls on a phone that’s marketed as 3G.

Touch Keyboard

Steve promised me that I could trust the thing but alas, unless you have the skinniest of fingers you’re going to make mistakes…a lot. Not to mention the lack of tactile feedback makes it impossible to write a comprehensible message while drunk.

VPN/Proxy Support

OK, so I’m getting a bit picky on this one because it only applies to very specific users BUT…Apple offer good VPN and Proxy support, in terms of protocols, but alas some of their apps will refuse to use the proxy (or proxy through HTTP) making it impossible to use half the applications on the phone when at a workplace/school. The proxy also refuses to apply itself when using the VPN making the user choose between usability and security.

Battery

I can’t complain about battery life, any phone with a lot of features will die fast, but the lack of a removable battery makes it impossible to swap in a new battery when you run out. If you actually used your phone, it dies….fast.

Things that SHOULD BE THERE

Copy and Paste! To-Do lists! A whole lot of things big names on the Internet have complained about…and every other phone has. Bluetooth features (i.e. modem, file transfer) just aren’t there. Applications that attempt to implement some of these features (mainly the modem) get pulled from the App Store. It’s a 3G phone, Apple marketed this thing as being fast, so why can’t it be used as a modem for your laptop? Just another thing this phone lacks compared to any other phone on the market.

People

And lastly, the people. Apple fan boys, I’m sick of you. People that buy this thing just for the hype and looks (without actually knowing what it does), I’m sick of you. Developers that create web applications JUST for the iPhone (even though they work on other mobile browsers), I’m sick of you.

OK, I’m done here.