iPhone

The iPhone Is Blocking The AT&T BlackBerry Bold Launch… Literally

by Robb Dunewood on September 17, 2008 · 15 comments

We’ve been saying for a while that the AT&T BlackBerry Bold was being delayed becasue of the iPhone, however, we thought that it was becuase AT&T really wanted to sell a lot of iPhones.

According to the Globe and Mail, the reason, at least in part, that the AT&T BlackBerry Bold hasn’t been launched is becasue the iPhone 3G is such a 3G bandwidth hog it clogs AT&T’s network to the point of not having enough resources to effectively launch the Bold.

The iPhone utilizes a “ping-pong” technology which must constantly access AT&T’s network in order to receive data and e-mails, placing a great strain on the telecom company’s cellular infrastructure. “We believe that AT&T is now realizing that it can have up to 20 BlackBerrys for every iPhone on its network. AT&T will need to spend as much as $1-billion (U.S.) to repair its network.

BlackBerry

BlackBerry Bold

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Orange Paying Actors To Stand In Line For iPhone 3G In Poland

by Robb Dunewood on August 22, 2008 · 1 comment

Actors Paid To Stand In Line At iPhone 3G Release In Poland

I know that this post is not about BlackBerrys or even how the iPhone is related to the BlackBerry, but, I find it hilarious, so, here it goes.

In an effort to “drum up interest” around the release of the iPhone 3G in Poland, Orange has hired dozens of actors to stand in line at 20 stores around the country.

It’s kind of sad that Orange feels that they need to resort to faking buzz around the iPhone. What’s even worse is that on some level it will probably work.

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iPhone

Orange

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Apple Extends MobileMe Subscriptions An Additional 60 Days

by Robb Dunewood on August 19, 2008 · 2 comments

Apple has decided to extend MobileMe access an additional 60 days on top of the 30 days that they previously extended it to everyone that shelled out $100 forcing you to use a service that doesn’t work for a full 15 months.

Personally, I would prefer that Apple keep their 90 days and just refund my $100, however, I don’t see that happening until a few class action suites have been settled.

I will say that Apple is very lucky that they are Apple. I don’t believe too many other service providers could withstand such an embarrassing launch.

[Source]

iPhone

Apple, MobileMe

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HSBC May Swap Out BlackBerrys For iPhones… Really?

by Robb Dunewood on August 15, 2008 · 6 comments

According to ZDNet Austrailia, HSBC is considering swapping out it’s current BlackBerry deployment and replacing it with the iPhone. The CIO of HSBC Austrailia and New Zeland, Brenton Hush, was quoted saying “We are actually reviewing iPhones from a HSBC Group perspective … and when I say that, I mean globally“.

In my other life I’ve dealt with HSBC quite a bit and let me tell you that they are always considering doing something other than what they are currently doing. I remember several years ago how they were considering moving to Linux desktops.

At the end of the day you’ve got to consider the “Why”. What does HSBC gain by switching from the BlackBerry to the iPhone? If they gain anything does it warrant a global rollout to a completely new platform. Buying 200,000 iPhones is the easy part. Everything that comes along with swapping them in and replacing all those BlackBerrys would take years and cost $10s of millions.

I am not saying that this won’t ever happen. I just can’t imagine it happening anytime in the near future.

BlackBerry

HSBC, iPhone

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iPhone 3G Coming To Best Buy In September

by Robb Dunewood on August 13, 2008 · 1 comment

Best Buy will become the first U.S. 3rd party retailer to carry the iPhone in September. That’s right, starting on the 7th of next month you will be able to yourself an iPhone 3G in 970 Best Buy Stores and 18 dedicated Mobile locations.

[Source]

iPhone

Best Buy

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Have You Ever Heard Of A “Jail Broken” BlackBerry?

by Robb Dunewood on July 29, 2008 · 16 comments

So, I was talking with an IT Guy who just finished up a project where he was looking to see if the iPhone was a viable alternative to using the BlackBerry at his company. Like many companies, he said that there are a ton of non-BlackBerry using folks that want to be able to get their email via the iPhone.

IT Guy said that he picked up on iPhone 3G the Sunday after they launched and knew before the following Monday morning that he wouldn’t be able to do anything more than allow web access to email as far are corporate applications go. IT guy said that he wouldn’t even be able to set up the email push which is now native to the iPhone.

IT Guy’s biggest concern… Security. His exact words were, “Apple knows everyone would be hacking these things and it seems like they didn’t even try when it comes to security”.

IT Guy said that he bought his iPhone 3G on Sunday morning and had the thing “jail broken” by Sunday night. Jail Breaking is the basically hacking your iPhone to allow it to do things that it wasn’t intended to do.

IT Guy asked me if I had ever heard of a jail broken BlackBerry. I said “no”, then he said “That’s why Apple won’t be moving in on their turf in the enterprise anytime soon.

Believe it or not, IT Guy said that he is going to hang on to his liberated iPhone 3G because it is cool to hack around with. He won’t be letting it anywhere near his corporate network though.

BlackBerry

JailBreak

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To Get An iPhone Or Not To Get An iPhone?

by Robb Dunewood on July 18, 2008 · 25 comments

I know that RIMarkable is a blog about BlackBerrys and that BlackBerrys dominate the discussion around here, however, I have to admit, I am a bit torn on whether to buy a new iPhone 3G or not.

As many of you know, I got the first iPhone day one, and, after the initial fascination with it faded, I completely lost interest in it, as did my daughter who couldn’t text without looking at the keys like she could on her Samsung. It was a cool cell phone, however, I had no interest in jailbreaking it and there really was no software for it.

The only thing that I thought that first iPhone was really good at was web browsing, and for me that was only over Wi-Fi, because Edge browsing is so slow. I no longer even have service on the device and it has been relegated to nothing more than a gadget used to watch movies on long airplane trips when I don’t feel like pulling out the laptop.

I wouldn’t say that I was burned by getting the iPhone because it is the coolest cell phone not named BlackBerry that I’ve ever owned. It didn’t, however, grab me in the way that the BlackBerry did way back when I switched from Windows Mobile.

I am hearing that the addition of 3G and the number of really cool applications that you can get on the iPhone may make it worth checking out. The $200 for the phone isn’t so bad, but, I don’t want to throw $1200 bucks away on a service plan that I don’t use.

There is no doubt that my BlackBerry will remain my primary device, so, do all the applications that you can run on the iPhone make it worth having as a second device? Maybe if I started an iPhone blog, writing about the iPhone everyday would make me use it.

I may stop by the Apple Store this weekend if it isn’t too crowded. We will see if all the iPhone hype grabs me like it did last year.

iPhone

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Apple Sold A Million iPhone 3Gs Over The Weekend

by Robb Dunewood on July 14, 2008 · 12 comments

Apple isn’t messing around this time. They reported that they sold their one millionth iPhone 3G Sunday. That is compared to 270,000 iPhones which sold in the first weekend last year.

It took Apple 2 and a half months to reach the the one million iPhone mark last year. No matter how you look at, whether you like the iPhone or not, to sell one million of them in under 3 days is impressive.

[Source]

iPhone

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