Bluetooth keyboard with iPhone?

[agahran]

The lack of a bluetooth or other keyboard option is definitely a dealbreaker for me with the iPhone right now. I'm a journalist, and I'm looking not just for a cool camera/web phone but for pro-quality all-in-one handheld reporting tool.

It sounds like the next-generation iPhone will probably have real GPS and be 3G compatible (two other must-haves, for me), but I'm disappointed that there's still no word on the bluetooth or other keyboard.

I've demoed the iPhone's touchscreen keyboard several times, and I absolutely detest it for anything more than typing a few words at a time. It's definitely not something I could take notes with or write a real blog post on while in the field, and I'm sick of lugging a laptop plus a camera, voice recorder, etc.

I had a brief, torrid affair with the Nokia N95, which was exactly what I wanted -- interface wasn't as intuitive as the iPhone, but the functionality and features were, for my needs, far superior. However, the very first firmware upgrade from Nokia bricked my N95, and since I was facing a tight refund deadline from Amazon and Nokia would take 2-3 weeks to fix/replace and return it to me, I reluctantly decided to give up for now.

I'm an avid Mac use and I'd love for the iPhone to catch up with what I really need -- but if the N95 or forthcoming N96 becomes available from a local retail outlet so I could get more immediate service if needed, I'm running back to Nokia. I think they have a better handle than Apple so far on what kind of device mobile content creators (rather than consumers) really need. So far.

More about my experience with the N95 here:

http://urltea.com/3353

- Amy Gahran