Some people here...
1. Apple gives you screen real estate not take it away with both sides of the notch. What better place to have the status symbols there? You free up like at least 6 mm that would be used on the "main screen" area instead.
2. You only have a video or picture use the full screen if you zoom in. Has been shown on so many pictures now, that a 16:9 movie will be a perfect rectangle. And since it is OLED the not used pixel will be completely black.
3. Even if a game or so uses the whole screen, who cares? I have like never played a game that only plays at the corners...
So please just stop repeating those lies.
1. given that on most items the status bar hides it self I don't think that it's a problem on much of the other iPhones. RE: Apps I don't think having the extra real estate would have night and day differences for apps, maybe games could benefit but otherwise it's videos and photos mostly that look to gain the most.
2. which brings me to my next point, if videos and photos are the ones primarily benefiting from the '5.8"' screen then why is it that to make full use of the screen you either need to blow the video up so that the notch takes a chunk of it away, or as you suggested use it in the standard 16:9 ration without zooming in which would result in letterboxing on both the notch AND the non notch side?
3. Apple's own HCI guidelines only show a comparison between a 4.7" screen but I'd be more interested to see a comparison with the 5.5" screen, cos my guess is, when it comes to media consumption (without comparing the quality of the screen it self) a iPhone + model would have more screen real estate for videos.
4. RE: Games... I'd imagine games and apps that run in landscape mode alike, it's a UI nightmare, which ever way you hold it, games will have buttons on both sides, and you're inevitably gonna be obstructed by the notch. Now the HCI guidelines say that apps and UI objects must embrace the notch, so apart from the amount of work devs now need to put in to create a specific version of the UI for the iPhone X, if they just choose to make a blanket change, then for the non X users the buttons will be a bit further in the screen making it a less optimal experience.
All in all, I don't think they should market it as a 5.8" screen cos it's not, and like many have said it's a really inelegant solution, I get that they couldn't get the tech in time to hide the sensors under the screen, but surely they could have done a better job dealing with the notch. I personally like how Essential deals with it by blacking it out but that's just me.