There comes a point where every early adopter realizes they are no longer really adopting anything unique any more. This happens when a product becomes saturated, more available and more universal. For me, as I've seen over the past few days, that point has come to pass - at least in San Francisco.
Walking around, eating out, and driving around San Francisco, all I see are iPhones. But it's not only the young yupppie/guppie types any more. Rather, there are kids, young professionals, middle-aged folks (not so many older folks though), men, women, white, Black, Latino, Asian, you name it and they are touting an iPhone. Have prices fallen drastically? No. Has that SDK come out yet? Not in an appreciable way yet. But nonetheless, visual evidence indicates that Apple and AT&T are on their way to selling millions of units this year, even if it's not 10 million.
This would explain, perhaps, why it was so easy for me to get another replacement iPhone when I thought I'd have to buy a new one. Unlike my last iPhone which had a portion of the touch-screen die (cell death is what the Apple rep temred it), this time I dropped my iPhone during a 20-mile training ride for the AIDS LifeCycle. It was my fault, plain and simple. The iPhone still 'worked' in a sense as it powered up and displayed its main menu. After all, it's tough enough to have been rolled over by a semi truck - but it was odd to me that a simple drop would disable it to such a great extent. But nonetheless, to fix this problem, or replace my iPhnne, I thought I'd be out a few hundred bucks. I thought wrong.
Because my iPhone impacted on that single spot, it kept switching off and on, and off, and on with a consistent "No Service" message with an occasional sign of hope from AT&T saying service was found. I toyed around with the idea of being to live with a bi-polar iPhone, but dismissed it.
So, I made an appointment at the nearest Apple Store at Stonestown in San Francisco later that day, and came up with all the possible rationales for them to swap my iPhone out. "It was like this way already. Version 1.1.4 messed up my iPhone. My iPhone was possessed." But all these excuses couldn't hide the fact there was a big 'ol dent and scratch on my iPhone that was clearly my fault. Turns out that was all unnecessary as the clerk took a look, noted the issue and muttered something about the iPhone being useful for "research."
With that, I wasn't going to ask any more questions nor say anything And, in less than 10 minutes, I had a 'new' refurbished iPhone in hand. This time I bought a plastic cover for it and promised it that I wouldn't drop it. I walked out wondering what the terms of the warranty were. Would I have really been forced to buy a new iPhone? Luckily, I didn't have to answer those questions.
Next time, the trauma of finally migrating all my music, contacts and ringtones to an iMac from a PC-based iPhone account.
iSkin's offerings: typical
(Credit: Kevin Ho)Much like CES, the vast majority of iPhone accessories were limited to carrying cases or skins, which is surprising given that this was the event where the iPhone was introduced. While entries from iSkin and CaseLogic were there, these entries from Gilty Couture caught my eye. A gold-plated case ($99) and a diamond-encrusted (not real diamonds, right?) case ($135). However, not sure what the taste factor would be here. When we rolled up to the booth it looked as if a deal was going down, so you may see these soon.
Blinged out iPhone cases from Gilty Couture
(Credit: Kevin Ho)
This morning I saw a man with an iPhone run the San Francisco Marathon. I was using my trusty iPod Nano with the Nike+ feature instead. There was something about the iPhone that wouldn't allow me to even bring the iPhone to the race. I wouldn't check it in with my sweats, much less wear it on my arm as I run 13+ miles. I would fear losing it or breaking it. So, I went without phone - which caused me to miss one of my friends at the finish line.
This leads me to think that this fellow iPhone-laden marathoner had: (1) purchased one of the raft of iPhone cases as part of the accessories that have flooded the market recently and, (2) really embraced the iPhone as his go-to device under all circumstances. I'm not sure how I'd feel if someone called me after the 10th mile, but it'd be an interesting prospect.
But, this lead me to consider to a larger question about how integrated the iPhone gets with our daily lives. There are some like me who wouldn't even check the iPhone in with my things for fear of losing it (it did take about 15 minutes of searching to find my bag filled with my wind pants and sweat shirt at the end of the race) or breaking it. Yet there are others like iPhone man who are more than willing to wear it running an inordinate amount of miles with the ability to browse a page or two, answer a call or catch a SMS text all while running along. The iPhone's capabilities both presents increased social convenience and yet it can also increase social alienation at the same time.
For example, at the Daft Punk concert in Berkeley on Friday with my friends, the iPhone allowed us to text drink orders and locations to each other rather than trying to call them through the noisy din. Also, better yet, we had a camera along too that could allow us to take pictures of the concert/light show. The browser allowed us to look up random trivia about Daft Punk on Wikipedia. For example, did you know that Daft Punk's first album was influenced from attending a rave at Euro Disneyland?
But there is an anti-social element to having an iPhone along in daily life too. Sure you can be inherently social by taking photos, having constant accessibility and having an iPhone as a conversation starter. But, as I've often experienced in the past month, when a friend pulls out their iPhone to text, browse, or what not, it's pretty obvious that your friend is no longer looking at you. And, since the iPhone is both larger and more beautiful than an ordinary cell phone, you really notice when people have broken eye-contact with you to look at a text message, email or webpage that's just loaded.
So what does this mean overall?
Perhaps the iPhone heralds a shift in the way we interact with one another. It's only a part of a larger trend sure, but the iPhone may well lead to people being less social in person, but more social in the abstract, i.e., with people who are not physically present. Worrying about this, I've recently learned that I should try harder to keep my iPhone out of sight and to enjoy the company I am with or to enjoy that bit of in-accessibility, especially when running a road race. (Also, at the movies, anyone checking their iPhones should realize the screen's size makes it a virtual flashlight!)
This is all kind of appropriate because one of the big things Daft Punk 'sang' about was the difference between "human" and "robot" - Where does the line end and start? Add in the new Bluetooth headset to the fray and a truly confusing situation could emerge.
Anway, I've attached some photos of humans and humans pretending to be robots (I think) from the Daft Punk show that I took (obviously) with my iPhone's camera.
Humans (my friends Max and Zach) being social at Daft Punk as captured with the iPhone's camera.
(Credit: Kevin Ho)
More humans (Me and Logan) being social at Daft Punk as captured by the iPhone.
(Credit: Max Tiran)
Humans looking like robots, Daft Punk in concert as captured by the iPhone's camera.
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