David Young’s "Joyeur" Blog
I stood in line at an AT&T store last summer the day the iPhone first became publicly available. I thought the local Apple store would be mobbed. Four hours later the AT&T store was out of phones. With not much hope, I drove to the Apple store. Within 15 minutes I was inside buying two iPhones. So my relationship with the iPhone started out well, on balance. But I kept on using other phones on the side.
The virtual keyboard of the iPhone has been the cause of many near automobile collisions. Don’t believe in guardian angels? OK, but I don’t think I’m that lucky. I don’t have the fingers and toes to count the number of times I’ve been accelerating into the car or truck in front of me when I look up from http://m.twitter.com or Mail just in time to stomp on the brake. Honestly, I’m not that stupid to be trying to do actual work while driving. But I would like to check voicemail without unlocking the phone > touch phone icon > touch voicemail icon > grok the visual in visual voicemail (i.e. who called, and who do I want to listen to?) > touch the voicemail. And that’s about the time when I’m startled into an emergency braking procedure. Not to mention typing emails. Some at Joyent claim to be just as proficient on the touch keyboard as, say, a Blackberry Curve (one of the phones I kept using this past year). Has this claim been tested? Your mileage may vary, sure, but would any of us want to put up with this on a laptop keyboard? Touch to me implies physical. Gesture, now that’s where the iPhone excels. I say all this, but will also admit, in the end, I left the Curve. I really didn’t want to carry two devices. And Grandcentral SMS messages for voicemail reduced the number of touches required for voicemail.

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