My iPhone, Six Months Later...

Tuesday, February 12, 2008 -

I bought an iPhone roughly six months ago and I thought it would be a fun thing to post my experiences with said phone. You either love em or hate em - no getting around it. You can actually rephrase that sentence to be "you either have one or don't". I won't lapse into prose-speak or feign some kind of love affair here - I'll just tell you the truth about it all: This phone has stopped my vicious phone-buying cycle. Forever. Cold, dead fingers....

This Really Happened.
My Wife hates, no HATES my gadget obsession but she knows it comes with the territory. I make my money in Babylon and the "toys" tend to stick to you; eventually you acquire a taste for them.

I won't bore you with my list of phones I've had over the years, suffice to say it's whatever Gizmodo tells me to buy :). As Mae West once said:

I generally avoid temptation unless I can't resist it

Sometimes it works out, however...

We're sitting on Bainbridge Island (west of Seattle - a very, very beautiful place), just off the fairy and my kids are running around next to the water. It's a beautiful fall day, and my family has joined me on my trip to Redmond while I go through "NEO" - New Employee Orientation.

We came 3 days early so we could take in Seattle and it's surroundings. Absolutely stunning area and today lived up to all the promise of a warm, sunny day in the Pacific Northwest.

We're sitting in Doc's Marina Grill and I'm enjoying a Mac And Jacks - my favorite new beer. It's 12:30 and we just ate lunch, and we're trying to figure out our day.

"Let's drive up to Port Townsend! I really want to take you there some time!" my wife says to me.

"Oh! That sounds like fun! I wonder how far away it is..."

"Why don't you use that phone you just had to have Mr. Smart Man" Uh. A setup.

"Good Idea..."

So I whip out the phone, open up Google Maps and hit the "Locate Me" button. It zeroes in on us and I locate where we are (I could have just typed in the name of the place, but this is more fun). I then tell it to plot directions between us and Port Townsend.

Three minutes and 10 seconds have gone by, and I look up at my wife:

"It's about an hour according to Google - lemme see how long it takes to get back to Redmond" and I add another destination to our route.

After all is said and done, we realize that we'd be on the road that day a total of 3.5 hours - way too much for this sunny day. So we decide to stay right where we are and take it easy - Port Townsend can wait for another day. Wife acknowledges that the phone just saved the day, and I order another Mac And Jacks.

This Really Happened Too.
The phone is so damn sexxy - but it's almost too damn sexxy. If you're not careful it can slide right out of your hand on hurt itself on the ground. I did this, and it sucked. I almost cried. No, I did cry. Actually I bawled my eyes out and begged for digital forgiveness.

It didn't work. My phone was hurt. My ineptitude caused a small crack down by the only button on the screen, and it evidently dislodged my antenna. Ouch. At least there's no blood :(.

I took the phone into the Apple Store in San Jose when we were there for Christmas and told the guy what I did and asked if they could repair it. I told him I loved the phone so much I was ready to buy two more just in case I dropped one. He smiled, said "hold on one second" and went in the back.

When he came back he had a nice new phone in his right hand, in his left was my old phone and my SIM card. "This should only take a minute" he says and proceeds to move all the contents from my old phone to this new one.

"Merry Christmas" he says as he hands my my new phone.

"How much?" I ask.

"Nada - you're all set".

My knees buckled a bit and I think I literally started to cry (again... these things are emotional...). He just gave me a free phone, over the counter, as a replacement. No whining or begging - heck I didn't even ask for this! It was my fault! I need to pay some kind of pennance!

"Go have some ice cream - you're good to go" he tells me with a smile. Good grief.

Just try walking into your phone store and telling them you dropped your phone. Then tell them you'll buy two of them. I'm going to bet that the last thing they do is offer to replace your phone for free.

This Really Happened, Three
Last month (January) I was back in Redmond for work and it was Phil's birthday, and he invited me out with his family and friends (how very nice!). So I head over to Mercer Island where he's living these days and we hop in their family car (Cody has got to be the cutest kid, outside of my own, that I've ever seen) and head out to Seattle which is about 30 minutes away.

Well, normally 30 minutes. Tonight the Sonics are playing and our exit is packed with cars. Traffic is ridiculous and we quickly realize that we're going to miss dinner entirely - so I tell Phil to drive on, we'll find a back way.

I take out my phone and zero in on where I am, and Akumi (Phil's wife) takes out her map. We start pitching Phil directions and before you know it we're almost there. Normally this wouldn't be a big deal, but the place we're going is evidently located in another dimension and only phase-shifts to our reality every Wednesday - cause we just can't find it.

Akumi finally tosses the map in frustration - but I zero in on us and find where we are, and then find a "back" way to get there (cause Phil has missed the stree we needed to turn down - not his fault - it was hard to see!).

We make it - 40 minutes late but we made it. Cody's still happy, Phil is a little frazzled, and Akumi is a champ. I'm giggling because digital (my phone) beat analog (the map).

Do You Need This Thing?
No. Your life isn't about the gadgets you own (or so people tell me) - but if you do need a phone, I always tell people that the iPhone has done what no other phone has ever done: pull through in the clutch.

My wife always jokes about it, but every phone I've ever had with any kind of internet connectivity or email access somehow manages to crap on me when I need it. This is either through a functional issue or just that the feature plain sucks.

Not the iPhone. What it does it does very well. It doesn't have Exchange support - but I don't care about that. It does have IMAP support and it's really, really fast. I told it my GMail address and was hooked up within 90 seconds. When I'm not around my PC I forward various email to my GMail account and I'm always in touch.

I can't tell you how much fun YouTube is, especially waiting in the airport with nothing to do, or when you're just "sitting around". My wife calls it the "Can Phone". I'll leave that one right there - but you get the idea :).

But, to me, the best part about the whole thing is the screen. I know it may sound silly and sappy  but when I'm away on trips, I really really miss my kids. I have their photos and some movies on the phone, and the screen is so big, bright and clear that I can see their smiles that much clearer.

I know, but those of you who have kids and travel know precisely what I'm talking about. This, to me, is the killer feature and makes the extra cost of the phone worth every penny.

Finally - the phone is just a computer with a big button and two small ones. There's a lot you can do there software-wise, and new features have already been rolled into the firmware. A new phone is, literally, a rev of the OS. I don't need new hardware (I hope) - I get new features when they send out an update. This has already happened with iTunes - I can download songs right to my phone from iTunes, which, believe it or not, has come in handy (my wife called me in Redmond and told me about the new Radiohead album. I was at the airport - I downloaded it right there and listened to it all the way home. Clutch...).

So no - need is not a word you should use with a phone. But this phone, so far, has saved 4 dinners, one very nice day in Seattle, a broken network (I ordered a part from the airport and had it ready when I landed), and has pulled through in the clutch countless times. I haven't ever really been able to say that about a phone. Ever. Until now.