Being Connected by Ian Fogg

The initial bunch of (mostly) US iPhone 3G reviews have missed the point. Almost all of these reviews have been written from the point of view of existing US iPhone owners that are considering upgrades. That’s not what this launch is about.
The iPhone 3G’s main goal is to grow Apple’s share of the global mobile phone market by attracting new buyers.
For an existing iPhone owner the only reason to buy the 3G model is the new 3G hardware and GPS satnav, as the version 2 software is available for free to existing iPhone owners.
For a potential new buyer, or an existing owner, the v2 software is a really really big deal: it adds Exchange sync, the application store and lots of little improvements. As my colleague Michael Gartenberg has been saying all week this is as much about software as hardware. Exchange support and the app store will open up the appeal of the iPhone to a much wider audience.
Then there’s the hardware. 3G offers a pile of benefits beyond the mere headline download speed. 3G enables a phone to receive or make a phone call while email or another application is connecting to the Internet in the background. HSPA offers better latency, which combines with that faster headline speed, to improve the web browsing experience. Anyone that has used ISDN (slow speed, great low latency, good browsing experience) or EDGE (OK’ish speed, terrible latency, poor browsing experience) or analogue modems (poor speed, poor latency) will understand what this means. 3G networks also routinely deliver better voice quality, and enable handsets to sidestep saturated 2G networks in busy city locations.
In countries where 3G coverage is good, like most of Europe, the 3G network will also have less of an adverse impact on iPhone battery life than the US reviewers found. From what I hear, AT&T 3G coverage is very poor indeed, even in urban areas. In situations where a 3G signal is weak, the handset has to work harder… result: the handset needs charging more often.
The GPS location finding should also work better in cities that lack the tower block canyons of New York, or Chicago. In European cities the handset will be more likely to see satellites and experience less signal echos. Again, this means the GPS should work better outide the US.
Then there is pricing. In many European countries iPhone 3G pricing is significantly below the original model. For example, in the UK, the iPhone 3G is available for free on a number of tariffs. The 8Gb iPhone 3G is now just 100ukp on the lowest tariff, compared with 269ukp previously. Unlike AT&T in the US, O2 has kept the monthly pricing the same, or better, than before.
This combination of 3G, lower handset price, the application store, and Exchange sync should dramatically increase uptake of the iPhone in Europe.
The 3G iPhone launch is Apple’s big play to kick start iPhone uptake outside the US. That’s a key reason for Apple’s ambitious simultaneous multi-country launch. Looking at the offering on paper — I’ve not used the 3G model yet — Apple have a good chance of succeeding and hitting their end of year sales target.