Does the world need another iPhone? Why not

Rodney Gedda

Rodney Gedda is the former deputy editor of CIO and former editor of Techworld.

Am I alone in being less than enthused by the local iPad launch last week? The answer to that is probably a big yes. Nevertheless, for me the exciting news came out of the US this week in the form of iPhone 4. Apple has always been quite aggressive with pushing out bleeding edge technologies and designs with its products.

An unfortunate side-effect of this strategy is quite a few bugs often enter Apple’s products – particularly in the first-generation.

When the first iPhone was released people complained of everything from poor battery life to slow data throughput.

Incidentally, a co-worker recently told me a distressing tale of how a file which was assumed to be backed up by Apple’s Time Capsule was lost, never to be seen again. Apple, backups need to work, not look beautiful.

The iPhone 4 represents Apple’s best effort to make something revolutionary more evolutionary.

It’s a chance to consolidate its position as the mobile computing leader and eliminate any annoying glitches present on the previous generation iPhones.

Of course, at the launch Apple couldn’t help itself and Steve Jobs spruiked all the innovative features of the iPhone 4.

“This changes everything. Again.” Really? Mobile video calling has been around for about a decade and multitasking is nothing new at all, but why stop when you’re on a roll.

In the case of multitasking it’s “done the right way”. So there.

iPhone users will no doubt find flaws in the new device, but from the outset it looks as though Apple has addressed the pain points that dogged earlier models.

And, as we witnessed with the iPad, there are plenty of directions Apple can take its portable computing strategy.

It seems only inevitable that Apple will release a cut-down, “mini” version of the iPhone. That may cannibalise some of its smaller size iPod sales, but it’s always better to cannibalise than loose to another type of phone that just happens to have a music player.

One thing that remains is Apple’s tight control of the whole iPhone, iTunes, App Store ecosystem.

While I’ll be the first to say Apple shouldn’t be so restrictive with its development and app delivery, for most people this is not even a concern.

Today, at the dawn of the age of mobile computing, it’s use first and worry about privacy, security and sovereignty later (if at all).

For now, it’s time to give due thanks to Apple for raising the mobile bar even higher. At the very least the industry will soon follow suit.