Editor’s Note: RCR Wireless News has made many questionable decisions over the years. One of which is agreeing to let a long-time industry observer provide commentary on what is chapping his hide across the wireless industry. His name is Hunter Gates. We call him the Mobile Martyr. We also attempt to make this column suitable for most to read, but despite our best efforts, it still received a “PG-13” rating. You have been warned.
In the early days of the iPhone era, owning one was the phone equivalent of owning a shiny red Corvette. You stood out; your phone was a stunning design, and it was faster/better than anything else around. And you were probably a bit of a smug jerk too. It’s okay, you can admit it: You looked down on the masses that had not yet discovered the perfection known as the iPhone and your emotions were equally divided between pity and gloating (yeah, mainly gloating, the rest of us still recall).
Bubba, you were unbearable. Seriously. I sat next to one such person on a flight to Vegas for some tradeshow or another. He spent most of the flight trying to get a signal while 30,000 feet in the air and was confused to discover that even the iPhone had its limits. And yeah, when the flight attendant asked him to turn off the cellular part, he acted dumb and claimed it was just an iPod. Oh, how I still dream of shoving that phone so far up his … well anyway, time moves on.
These days, my iPhone feels more like an East German Trabant. There are far too many of them out there to claim any sort of differentiation, and frankly, it no longer feels like a Corvette. No sir, it stutters and stumbles along with the best of them. Maybe iOS 8 is to blame, but I don’t think so. I suspect that somewhere along the way the phone just stopped being quite so good. I have to re-boot it occasionally when it locks up. It LOCKS UP! That, my friends, is heresy. IPhones do not freeze; we leave that to the likes of Android and Windows.
But it’s true. And really, when we think about it, the shine started to fade a while ago. Apple is not the unflappable, do no wrong company we all like to think it may be. The mapping product proved that. But they are usually good at fixing things quickly and somehow convincing us to keep on loving them. And we do, don’t we? Even now, while my iPhone 5S argues with itself over whether to use Wi-Fi or LTE – end result, it gives me neither – I still forgive it. Which is more than most of us do for the other phones out there.
So be it. But I will leave you with one worrying thought. Place your black iPhone 6 on a table and step away from it. Look back, and tell me it is not beginning to look like every modern-day Android phone out there, and I don’t mean just because the screen has locked up … again.
Photo copyright: mshch / 123RF Stock Photo
