iPhone 4S

Last week, before the sad news of Steve Jobs’ passing, Apple unveiled their new phone. I am currently using the iPhone 3GS and my contract is up so I ordered the new iPhone Friday morning. I am pretty eager to play with it and here is why.

  1. Retina Display: Print quality resolution is where displays are going and I have been wanting to use them for a long time.
  2. Speed: it seems zippy, always good to have a quick phone.
  3. Camera: I use my iPhone camera constantly with my family and am looking forward to having better results with the new camera.
  4. Siri: “Computer, tell me about the weather.” enough said.
  5. Dieter Rams inspired design. I have loved the look of the iPhone 4 and I am glad that I will be able to own it myself.

A lot of the tech press has been complaining that the new phone is not more revolutionary. One million people preordering in the first 24 hours demonstrates that they do not know what they are talking about. I think it will succeed and here is why:

  1. Apple will be able to take advantage of streamlined manufacturing processes and and make their phones more profitable for another year.
  2. Many 3GS owners, myself included, will upgrade because their contracts are up. This is how Americans buy phones, by contract cycle, not on a whim. This is something that tech writers, who are paid to review several devices a year, often lose sight of.
  3. It is a significant upgrade, despite a lack of major design overhaul.
  4. Where else will people who care about a quality user experience go? Windows Phone 7 is getting better all the time but it still has a long way to go before Apple needs to worry about losing many customers to them.
  5. With Sprint, Apple now has almost complete market saturation within the United States.
  6. Apple now has a phone for any budget, ignoring data plans. iMessage will also lower many people’s monthly rates, as they will be able to get by on fewer SMS messages.

All in all, iPhone 4S looks like a great update. I’m looking forward to trying it out on Friday.

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