Zibri says no COPY & PASTE or MMS?

[thevibesman]

Seriously don't you think MMS, with video recording would be worth an Apple App???

I am pretty sure Steve doesn't think so. I've always had the feeling Steve/Apple view MMS as an older technology with problems (e.g. across carrier compression) that internet enabled smart phone needs. I bet in the next few years we will see MMS (and SMS too) disappear like the 1.44MB disk drive.

I understand why people complain about this now because that will be one convenience I will lose when I switch to iPhone in July. I can see myself missing MMS from time to time at first, but to answer your question, I don't think MMS is worth an Apple app. If you look at the history of the company they always have been about forward thinking hardware and software technology, not legacy support. With the iPhone SDK 2008 will be like 1984 and the Macintosh release. We have already seen how Apple has forced other phone manufacturers to ratchet up their smart phone development. To quote a great Firesign Theater episode: "Welcome to the future, the future is now."

Yeah, the adjustment period until theses technologies die kinda sucks (reminds me of needing to buy a USB disk drive for my 2x500MHz G4--that drive now lives in a box at my parents house) but every time you are stuck going to a URL to see a picture message just try to remember all the other great technology the iPhone platform brings to you now and represents for future development. Soon our 3G network download speeds will seem slow, non-smart phones will start disappearing and then hopefully no one will miss MMS.

But where is my copy/paste!? That is the one that bugs me. I will probably just have to learn to deal, because I am sick of carrying a cellphone, iPod, and PDA (well, I really don't use the PDA to organize myself at all these days, I have enough to carry around...plus, phone, iPod, and PDA all have the ability to store separate contact lists. I'll deal with no copy and paste I guess for that reason, but I hope Apple finally gets around to making a clipboard for the iPhone--for you and others sake, I'll put aside my vision of the future for now and hope for MMS too

 

[t0mat0]

The phone simply does not meet my needs. I only know one or two people that have phones with email. So paying hundreds of dollars to alienate myself from the non emailers doesnt make sense for me. Yeah, the phone is awesome...maybe one day I will get one...but not now.

Zibri hasn't actually updated his blog since before the 9th June. So he hasn't seen the latest firmware.

Monday, June 9, 2008 Here we go At least! Now who will be the fastest to send me one to start testing ? It appears that firmware 2.0 won't be available today. Fortunately. It also appears I got right almost all my predictions: colours, no front cam. I wasn't sure (as anyone else) about the GPS presence till the last moment, but in the article I wrote for the italian magazine Panorama I also got the shape and 3G hsdpa capabilities. I am ready to start working on it as soon as someone will provide me one. As usual, I'll keep you posted here. Zibri

MMS is like an old cable spec (SCSI, large parallel, take your pick), or a 1.44MB drive, as mentioned above. Apple's not shipping with it. Where did 1.44MB drives go? The way of the Museum. Floppy drives? Tape drives? Punch cards? You get my point has at least a week or so before shipping 3G iPhones out, no?

As for copy and paste? it's software. Whens the next big software announcement? Maybe July 11th? They could introduce new gestures for all we know... And if they're doing that, why only leak cut and paste? Cut and past update will possibly be part of a cluster of improvements, that'll hit us all in one go.

SMS was one of the money pots for the networks. Now they're lining up to make data that money pot. (MMS is data after all)
I think a lot more people share photos via Facebook and social networking sites at their full size, than they do via MMS (I hate having to go from 3.2Mpixel shots to MMS level when taking a MMS picture). Why do people with N series Nokia's send MMS? Because other's can't even look at Facebook on the net in the proper format, or even get Facebook on the mobile baby web. So it's the same for these other phones too. Not so much back compatability I guess!

Apple is basically setting the bar higher. By not including it, it's sending a strong message. (We may differ in opinion slightly as to what that is )

Somewhere I read that the 3G iPhone will have more power and space than a 1999 Apple computer. Musn't grumble, as Mark and Lard once said

If it doesn't meet your needs, wait, get a different phone, or find an alternative solution. Don't you think if Apple doesn't do MMS, someone will make an app for it? Till July 11, we don't know the final spec of the 3G iPhone, both software, hardware, and to an extent, firmware. We'll know more July 11th

 

[w00master]

When the flopyless iMac came out, this created a real problem for many people. Of course, they couldn't just tell their friends, "get on the Internet" and expect it to happen overnight. But happen it did.

The no-MMS situation will be embarrassing and inconvenient for a while. If you can stomach it, tell you friends that having email on their phones would be much cooler. They may justifiably tell you to go suck a doorknob, they're not buying a new phone. I think Apple is betting that eventually they will (perhaps from them! Perhaps with a .mac email!) and they're willing to take the complaints they get in the meantime.

My problem with this line of logic is then why include SMS then? All of this can be done through e-mail, heck just call 'em! Or, just include an IM app (which they still haven't).

E-mail, technologically speaking, is far more advanced and more flexible. So, why does Apple include SMS and not MMS? This still does not make any sense to me whatsoever.

w00master

 

[CrazEtooN]

I would just like to say that people are misunderstanding MMS. MMS is a simplified form of email, to put it, umm... simply.

That being the case, every carrier provides every phone with an MMS email address. To find this address, you simply have to send an MMS from your MMS app to an email account. The receiving email account will display the MMS email address, and if you reply to it, it will be received by the person as an MMS, and they won't know the difference.

All it requires is telling the people that MMS you to direct it to your email address you have synced with the iPhone. They don't need an email capable phone to do this either. They will just use the same old MMS app they have always used, only they will change your phone number to your email address.

When you receive the email address, add the "from" address to that persons contact in your address book. Now, you can send them an email with a pic attached that they will receive as though it was an MMS.

It is not perfect, and it doesn't always work right, but it is a million times better than that stupid viewmymessage.com service. You can keep moaning about its absence, or you can try to work around it. Either way, it isn't there, and it isn't likely to come as it is a dying technology, and Apple doesn't like dying technology.

 

[ipodtouchy333]

Wow. Thanks ! I had no idea. So I can send my friend a pic from my iphone I just took to their crappy verizon phone lets say ?

 

[marksman]

My mom says she kissed Zibri and his mouth tasted like tuna fish.

 

[w00master]

I would just like to say that people are misunderstanding MMS. MMS is a simplified form of email, to put it, umm... simply.

That being the case, every carrier provides every phone with an MMS email address. To find this address, you simply have to send an MMS from your MMS app to an email account. The receiving email account will display the MMS email address, and if you reply to it, it will be received by the person as an MMS, and they won't know the difference.

All it requires is telling the people that MMS you to direct it to your email address you have synced with the iPhone. They don't need an email capable phone to do this either. They will just use the same old MMS app they have always used, only they will change your phone number to your email address.

When you receive the email address, add the "from" address to that persons contact in your address book. Now, you can send them an email with a pic attached that they will receive as though it was an MMS.

It is not perfect, and it doesn't always work right, but it is a million times better than that stupid viewmymessage.com service. You can keep moaning about its absence, or you can try to work around it. Either way, it isn't there, and it isn't likely to come as it is a dying technology, and Apple doesn't like dying technology.

Guess what, a lot of us know this, but it is hardly perfect and hardly a good solution. Also (beyond making money), isn't Apple about a good user experience? How is what you list above a "good user experience?" ESPECIALLY considering that the iPhone is "the World's Most Advanced Cellphone?"

w00master

 

[ipodtouchy333]

So if you do send a MMS to someone with just a regular phone who doesn't have internet or email and who has, lets say sprint, what email do you send it to?

 

[CrazEtooN]

Guess what, a lot of us know this, but it is hardly perfect and hardly a good solution. Also (beyond making money), isn't Apple about a good user experience? How is what you list above a "good user experience?" ESPECIALLY considering that the iPhone is "the World's Most Advanced Cellphone?"

w00master

I acknowledged that it wasn't perfect and didn't always work. Go ahead and keep complaining about it instead of at least trying to utilize the work around though, because that is obviously bringing you a dedicated MMS client.

So if you do send a MMS to someone with just a regular phone who doesn't have internet or email and who has, lets say sprint, what email do you send it to?

I don't think Sprint allows MMS on any of their phones, so I don't think they count for this. Anyway, each phone that is MMS capable has a dedicated MMS email address tied to it. Tell your friends to send you an MMS, only to address it to your email address instead of your phone number. When you receive the email, you will be able to see the address you are looking for.

 

[w00master]

I acknowledged that it wasn't perfect and didn't always work. Go ahead and keep complaining about it instead of at least trying to utilize the work around though, because that is obviously bringing you a dedicated MMS client.

If we, the users, do not complain about missing features, support, etc., in the long run we too are also doing Apple a disservice in competing in a competitive market. It goes both ways.

I'll turn it around to you then, there isn't a single thing that Apple does that you find missing/broken/etc?

w00master

 

[Wingnut330]

I am pretty sure Steve doesn't think so. I've always had the feeling Steve/Apple view MMS as an older technology with problems (e.g. across carrier compression) that internet enabled smart phone needs. I bet in the next few years we will see MMS (and SMS too) disappear like the 1.44MB disk drive.

That's a prety strong statement given triple digit SMS growth year over year for the last few years for carriers and SMS aggregators.

Given the 'options' for phone based applications - things like on-deck and off-deck mobile banking SMS will likely be here for a while. The other options just aren't robust or widely deployed enough. SMS is easy to use and doesn't require a 3rd party application to use.

Another reason SMS will be here for a long time is because not everyone has or can afford an iPhone or Blackberry but nearly EVERYONE has a cell phone. Cell phone adoption will go over 100% saturation in the US at some point as it has in Europe.

When folks have phones with true browsers etc in them and robust data plan options as the iPhone does, then you may see the death of SMS - until then it stays.

I think it's the data plan that will get hacked out thus driving things like SMS away. Remember what a long distance call cost you 15 years ago? Or how about call waiting, 3 way calling etc? At some point data plans will get bundled in with normal calling plans. Business customers may pay more, but my guess is that data plans will go away. Messaging plans are already disappearing and one carrier in my area (Revol Wireless) offers a $99 / mo unlimited everything package - data, voice, sms, mms - everything. I think we will see more of that in the future.

Just my opinions!

 

[t0mat0]

That's a prety strong statement given triple digit SMS growth year over year for the last few years for carriers and SMS aggregators.

Given the 'options' for phone based applications - things like on-deck and off-deck mobile banking SMS will likely be here for a while. The other options just aren't robust or widely deployed enough. SMS is easy to use and doesn't require a 3rd party application to use.

Another reason SMS will be here for a long time is because not everyone has or can afford an iPhone or Blackberry but nearly EVERYONE has a cell phone. Cell phone adoption will go over 100% saturation in the US at some point as it has in Europe.

When folks have phones with true browsers etc in them and robust data plan options as the iPhone does, then you may see the death of SMS - until then it stays.

I think it's the data plan that will get hacked out thus driving things like SMS away. Remember what a long distance call cost you 15 years ago? Or how about call waiting, 3 way calling etc? At some point data plans will get bundled in with normal calling plans. Business customers may pay more, but my guess is that data plans will go away. Messaging plans are already disappearing and one carrier in my area (Revol Wireless) offers a $99 / mo unlimited everything package - data, voice, sms, mms - everything. I think we will see more of that in the future.

Just my opinions!

Looks like O2 wants a little more data than just a crummy MMS this way and that wrt 9to5mac front page as of now. MMS might quickly become a legacy format.

 

[Sweetbike40]

I think I'm the only one that doesn't really care about copy paste. I just never really had a moment where I was like "Crap, I can't copy and paste." It would be convent in a few areas, but I always got a round it by remembering what it was I wanted to copy.

I'm on the oppisite end. I am CONSTANTLY wishing there was a copy paste. It's SO frustrating without.

 

[thevibesman]

That's a prety strong statement given triple digit SMS growth year over year for the last few years for carriers and SMS aggregators.

Yeah, I put SMS was a parenthetical because it has bigger use and more reasons to stick around that MMS (no cross-carrier incompatibilities, isolation from email inboxes for urgent messages, etc.) and I see that having a lot more staying power.

Without getting into a huge rant off topic, while it may take a little while, SMS and all other media communication we know if is on the way out. As land based and over the air broadband gains a greater hold world wide we will see the way we think about communications and media shift. Boy, I am tempted to really go off on this, but wouldn't the world be a great place if we had access to a single conduit that will provide access to any/and all the media delivery and communications out there.