If just ten independent developers with interesting apps ported to another platform (doesn't have to be to Android, but of course I'd prefer that) in a coordinated fashion, they'd get immense press and have some real impact.

The app store is a nice value add, but it's hardly instrumental in the iPhone success story.

If it isn't, why is the iPhone tagline "there's an app for that?"

Kids loving playing games so much on their parents phones that Nintendo actually acknowledged the iPhone as a competitive threat on their earnings call.

Statistically, 75% of iPhone users use apps, which is 5x more than other phone users. Nielsen: http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/iphone-use... .

Be careful about assuming things. Apple's iPhone is important because for the first time ever there is an incredibly simple, usable interface to a full-powered computer.

How successful was the iPhone before the app store existed? I'd say very.

>> "Apple's iPhone is important because for the first time ever there is an incredibly simple, usable interface to a full-powered computer."

OR

Apples iPhone is important, because it's the first usable portable interface to the web.

"For free applications, only about 20 percent of users return to use the app the first day after they download it, and then it quickly drops off from there. By 30 days out, less than 5 percent are using the app. The chart for paid apps shows a slightly steeper fall-off rate."

The iPhone isn't effectively utilized by the vast majority of its users, who value its cachet more then its applications ecosystem. As sibling points out, all the evidence you need is in the overwhelming success of the device before the app store existed.

http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/02/19/pinch-media-data-shows-...

>> "because they want their apps to access the 'net everywhere, not just wi-fi spots."

This may be true more in the US, if you don't have many wifi spots. Here in the UK, you get free data (3G and wifi spots). The wifi spots cover most towns and cities, restaurants etc.

In 5 years we'll probably have wifi everywhere, so the whole thing will be a little redundant.

Well, isn't it the connectivity they want then, and not the App Store specifically?

Also, I have noticed that the people that do have Iphones use every opportunity to 'flash' them.

Probably a big part of the appeal of the Ipod touch is that it looks like an Iphone...

or maybe they just take every opportunity to use them

or maybe they just take every opportunity to use them

or maybe they just take every opportunity to use them

That does suck, but it has little overall effect on the usefulness of the phone to me as a portable computer. When I bought my first iPhone, there was no App Store at all, and Apple was actively stating that there was not going to be any such thing. The value proposition was OK then, and it's OK now.

As far as people flashing their iPhones around conspicuously, I really wouldn't know anything about that. I use mine in public all the time, and one of the things I don't like about the experience is the way I completely lose awareness of my surroundings and people nearby.

That's a new one, never even thought that that might be the case. Interesting!

I've had it while on the phone and driving 'on autopilot', and since then I've become a lot more careful about using the phone in the car. (headset only anyway of course, but still). One day I missed my exit completely, and wasn't aware that it had happened until 20 minutes later (still in the same conversation). Quite a good lesson.

I really don't understand why no other manufacturer is capable of producing something that gets close to the iphone. Even less since android is available as a platform. Sure, there still is the lack of multitouch, but I really don't get why nobody can come up with a serious device.

Because they're idiots who won't stand up to the tin-pot dictators at the mobile carriers.

The secret to Apple's success is actually quite similar to the secret to Microsoft's success: they've been fortunate at having incompetent competition.