Oh yeah, feels like new again. Today I downloaded the new firmware for my iPhone and in case you haven’t been following my tweets, pownces, plurks, or friendfeed I am very satisfied. I haven’t felt this good about the device since I originally bought it, of course jail breaking it did feel good too but now these apps are leaps and bounds ahead of the original third party apps. Now I have something to hold me over until the AT&T 3G network stretches to my neck of the woods.

Of course I hit all the free apps first and most of those were to all my social networks. Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, and Pownce all have apps and I have a feeling that I may be using most of those more than their actual websites. All of these social apps allow use of the camera or your photo library to upload pics right to their site. They also speed up the delivery and surfing of all the essential data related to those sites i.e. who is eating cheese, who is playing with their new iPhone, and who is in the shower.

Another notable free app is the weather bug which far exceeds the included weather app. Now you can see which way the wind is blowing, radar maps, and any weather alerts.

The list of free apps that wouldn’t be complete without Apple’s own remote for iTunes and the Apple TV. Now you can surf and control the media in your library just like you are using an iPod. This will be handy in those party situations when you want to have your iPhone on you but still be in control of the tunes.

There are a few familiar programs in the app store that you may have seen in installer.app. I will look forward to supporting as soon as I have a few extra bucks lying around; Band, Mobile Flickr, and Sketches to name a few. I’m still looking for cameraPro or Snapture as I feel they include many features that are missing from the iPhones camera like a self timer. SummerBoard would also be nice as I like to customize the look of the icons and the dock.

One new app I went out and bought was the new MLB app. This app is a must for anyone who spends as much time refreshing baseball scores. It also has the option to watch video highlights of the games. You still have to use mlb.com to view the play by play, hopefully that comes in the form of an update soon.

I could go on and on about all the new apps but the jist of the situation is that all in all I am happier than ever with my old iPhone. I will someday go out and replace it but as it is I feel now I am in no hurry. Since I don’t have access to 3g I don’t feel like paying an extra $10 a month to have fewer text messages and a useless 3Gcard in my phone. The fact that it has GPS doesn’t sell me on the new one either as I have already noticed a big improvement in the “current location” that is already in google maps.

Reasons For

1. it is made by apple
Apple make some of the best products in their market and are always pushing the envelope.

2. Apple has been good about adding features to the iPhone. They just released an update the other day which added GPS like functionality to Google maps, the ability to rearrange your icons, add bookmarks to your springboard (the iPhone’s desktop), and the ability to send a text message to multiple recipients.

3. It is fun to play with. Flicking through and zooming in and out of pictures, browsing the web when you need a quick answer to some trivia, listening to your favorite tunes, watching movies on a plane, and text messaging with a full keyboard while the whole conversation is displayed on one page.

Reasons Against

1. it is made by apple
Apple is always pushing the envelope so it will be outdated within a year.

2. Apple’s updates are a bit behind the third party applications that require you to “hack” your iPhone. Apple will be opening up their developer platform for the iPhone in February. Some of the functionality will likely be crippled so some the third party apps won’t be as robust as their “hacked” counterparts.

3. It is fun to play with. Meaning that when your playtime may be cut short when your battery dies (only has happened to me 3 or 4 times) or you may get frustrated when you are away from a wi-fi hot spot and have to search the web on AT&T’s slow edge network.

My mother also asked me another very important question which should be answered the same way throughout time.

“So and So wants to get a new (insert apple product), should he/she wait until after Macworld?”

Always wait until Macworld is over if the product you want hasn’t been updated in the last 6-9 months!

Sitting in a starbucks with itunes ads all over the place I am reminded of the last apple event announcing the online store coming to the iPhone & iPod touch. Theoretically I could buy that Marvin Gaye song I’m listening to, but one thing stands in my way … Apple.

They released the update with the music store for the iPhone but I’m not upgrading. Why? Well I’m on another turn of this rollorcoaster ride of being an iPhone owner.

The anticipation of this ride was the best part. We heard rumors for months before hand stocked with patent filings, fake ads on youtube, and the leaked announcement on diggnation.

Then there was the line to get on this ride, people were lifecasting, the news was all over it, and people were calling it the launch of the century.

Of course we early adopters will never forget the $200 price drop & $100 credit.

The next high I got was when I found my way through jailbreak and started installing third party apps. I could now play games, keep track of my checking, and draw on my iPhone.

Now apple has come out with a new update that will kill all those apps if I install it. So I like so many iPhone owners are holding out on the install. Who is the biggest loser in this situation? I say it is apple. Now they won’t have their music store on these phones for impulse buys and they also have a core group of users making awsome apps that make this phone more appealing to potential buyers. Sure people like the photo capabilities and coverflow but I get more ohhs and ahhs with ttr (iPhone Guitar Hero) and sketch (high tech etch-a-sketch).

I would like to think someone at apple will read this and have an epiphany but I’m thinking I have a better chance of mutating into a superhero.

from: engadget

Apple did it to us once when they first announced the iPhone, they left out the youTube button only to announce it at a later time. Now they have announced that they will be adding the iTunes store to the iPhone, but there are still three spots left on the homepage. Will we be seeing a games button there soon? What else could they be plotting to add. It does look out of place, that new little button there on the bottom of the screen, a little lonely.

Will there be the addition of sanctioned third party apps in this void at the bottom of the screen? With the abundance of iPhone hacks out there that prove this can be done, will Apple give in? There is already a hack that allows multiple homepages on the iPhone and one that allows you to scroll this page so the possibilities are endless. It is doubtful that Apple will implement these hacks but they still have a little over three months till Christmas to entice those who haven’t given in already.

Not only that but she was on the front page of Yahoo news, CNN, Fox news and a few other news sources because of it

Now you may say that she talks on the phone way to much but the real meat of the bill comes from AT&T itemizing every data transfer. In this day and age of the internet I am glad AT&T woke up, though they were probably looking at their bottom line, thinking $9 is to much to spend sending out bills.

After using Safari for a day, well not quite a day because it was hard to use it exclusively, I have found some pros and cons.

The first pro is that it seemed to render faster, i.e. the Digg page that announced the product to digg’s users and has over 8300 diggs and 1134 comments at the time of this writing (a recipe for a very big web page). It also has a very slick looking interface, my history carried over from firefox after install, and more real-estate for the web page.

My main con would be that Safari doesn’t implement add-ons yet (I must have ad-block, greasemonkey, de.licio.us, and over a dozen other extensions in firefox). This could be coming in the future as Apple’s webkit is going open source (the engine underlying Safari). I also was missing Firefox’s “spell check this field” feature which I use regularly in forums, comments, twitters, blog posts, digg submissions, and anywhere else I am placing my words on the web.

So yes I’ll use Safari, but as it stands it won’t be for much more that debugging websites and trying to render large websites (by the way, digg when are you going to page out your comments?). As it stands that is how I use IE, unless I’m watching movies in Netflix’s “Watch now” or MLB.tv which don’t support Firefox yet (I’m running vista so don’t correct me about MLB).

I’m wondering when we’ll see the release of the firefox add-ons “open this page in Safari” and “Safari Tab” (Damn I shouldn’t of said anything, I could have finally found my first Firefox add-on)

I can see why Apple is trying to make this move, they are trying to put yet another application on the desktops of the Widows iPod users (rumor has it that it will eventually be bundled w/ iTunes and quicktime) to help coerce then into buying a Apple computer once they become familiar with their products but why haven’t they incorporated more into the browser. Right now it seems like Firefox lite, which is what Apple seems to do best, they seem to always take the minimalist approach which may hurt or help them in this market. Most of the users I know that have gave up IE on Widows only did so because Firefox gave them more thus leading IE to incorporate more to win back some users. The users I know that still use IE only do so because it is familiar and came with their system. So Safari’s only chance in its current state is to appeal to the minimalist user who uses iTunes and the developers who will use webkit to develop what I hope to a long list of Add-ons to rival Firefox and make it a better browser, it still has a long way to go.