Some thoughts on the iPhone SDK

I'm sure this has been done to death already on countless other blogs, but being a mobile device fanatic I had to sound off too.

Like most people, I was very impressed with the iPhone SDK roadmap yesterday. The game demos, the App Store revenue sharing model, and the enterprise features are all very cool and I look forward to seeing them implemented.

The App Store in particular seems like a really great setup, and I think Nokia/Symbian should learn a lesson from this. Freeware developers can have a difficult time getting a Symbian application signed to easily distribute, and there are only a select few applications available for over-the-air installation with Nokia's Download! client.

It's still not enough to lure me away from my beloved Nokia N95, though.

The game demos looked great. I'm not sold on the iPhone as a gaming device, though. First there's the battery problem. Games suck up a lot of battery power, and since the iPhone battery is not user-replaceable, it's not possible to carry a spare battery for extended gaming sessions. The other problem is the lack of tactile buttons. Touch and gesture control is great, but for many games you still need your basic D-pad and action buttons. Anybody who has tried the NES emulator on a jailbroken iPhone can attest to the difficulty of playing Super Mario Bros. without feeling the D-pad or A/B buttons.

I had a hope, however faint it may have been, that Apple would come to their senses and introduce a Java ME runtime. The iPhone still has the distinction of being the only consumer targeted smartphone missing Java ME. Steve's comment about Java being a heavyweight ball and chain that "nobody uses anymore" couldn't be further from the truth.

My other complaints are not new ones, but I'll summarize them here anyhow:

• No MMS! You can't send a picture to a friend using MMS, something pretty much all basic level handsets have.
• EDGE! Until there's a 3G iPhone (or even, wishfully, 3.5G), I can't see how the iPhone's Internet experience can be enjoyable. Unless you live in an area with citywide Wi-Fi, of course! The coverage is really good in the Boston area, and let me tell you, the difference between EDGE and a HSDPA connection is astounding.
  
• No video! Most camera phones now have the ability to record video clips. I can't understand Apple's decision to leave out the capability to record videos, especially on a phone that has such an emphasis on multimedia.

If the next revision of the iPhone resolves these issues - it's a certainty that it will at least be 3G - I think it will really be a serious threat to the big mobile players. Or, at least, give them a run for their money.

The next year or two will be very busy with new developments in the mobile space. We've seen peeks of the innovative touch features of the upcoming Windows Mobile 7, the S60 Touch demos from the Mobile World Congress last month, and the impending arrival of Android. At this point, it will be anyone's game!

For now though, I'll keep loving my N95.