Archive for December, 2008

For those that know me, I had disparaged the iPhone as being the exclusive province of hipster doofuses who want to give the appearance of being “high-tech”. And yet last week I myself got an iPhone, and I don’t consider myself of hipster doofus. So why did I do it? Read on…

My story begins early this year when my two-year contract with Verizon was up. Those who know me know that I have a tenuous relationship with my brick of a phone, the XV6700 (named the XV6700 because Verizon is incapable of offering a phone with a memorable name). I had had it for two years and I was beyond eager to get something new, something that didn’t throw my hips out of alignment when in my pocket. So I began looking.

I had heard rumors that the iPhone was coming out soon, that it would redeem the sins of the first generation, that it would be 3G, would be faster, sleaker, better, etc., etc. So I held out and waited until July to see what the fuss was all about. But when July came, the long lines, the service outages, and the overall disarray of the iPhone launch discouraged me from checking it out. But lo and behold, Blackberry was coming out with a couple of new phones: the Bold and the potential iPhone killer, the Thunder (now called the Storm). So I decided to wait a little longer.

Of course, a little longer became a lot longer. With delays and technical problems, the new Blackberries went further and further into the horizon. Meanwhile, people with their new 3G iPhones were starting to impress upon the virtues of the Apple device. I saw a lot of cute games and apps. But I wanted a real smartphone. Something for big boys. I wanted Blackberry. And since I had Verizon and Verizon was going to be the exclusive carrier of the Storm, I figured I would wait. And wait I did. It was supposed to launch late summer. The late summer became September. Then September became October. Then October became November. Meanwhile, my spine was crying for something new.

Finally, November rolls around the corner and Verizon starts marketing the Storm. “Coming soon” they say. WHEN?!?! You fuckers, stop taunting me! I’ve been waiting forever. I don’t need this “coming soon” bullshit. My back hurts. Just give me the fuckin’ phone. Well, mid-November, I get this thing in the mail about a Private Sale with a big picture of the Storm on the front. Now officially the Storm was supposed to launch on the 21st, but this thing was going on between the 17th and the 21st. Presumably, this meant us “VIP”’s could get a special sneak preview of the new device. I was excited. So early the 17th I high-tail it to the Verizon store to see if I could check it out. Surely they have a demo or something. No dice. The clerk there said she hadn’t seen one yet. OK, fine. A little false advertising…sure, it didn’t say the Storm would actually be available on the 17th, it just had a big picture of it with Nov 17th by it. Fine. Whatever.

So then I came back on the 21st of November. As I approached the Verizon store, I had flashbacks to when the iPhone launched, the long lines around the block, the fanfare. I didn’t see any of that this time. I just walked right in and told the clerk I wanted to check out the Storm. The first thing out of her mouth was, “We don’t have any in stock.” I just flashed a huge smile. After the months of anticipation, after the massive “coming soon” marketing campaign, after the “Private Sale” bungle, today was the BIG launch of the Blackberry Storm…and they fucked that up too.

Fortunately, there was a demo and I was able to try it out almost immediately. Let me just start by saying I really wanted to like this phone. I had waited months for it, read reviews of it going both ways, kept an open mind, and in the end here it was in my hands. Finally. And I hated it. The whole click screen thing was awkward. You definitely have to put more pressure to “click” a button. That made typing a lot slower. Plus the keyboard in portrait mode was abysmal. I couldn’t even type a simple url in the browser. I struggled for two minutes to type something. After that, I concluded that it was simply unusable. And just when I came to this conclusion, the clerk called out my name. “How can I help you?” she asked with fake enthusiasm.

I told her I was checking out the Storm, to which she responded to with the usual spiel about its virtues. “OK,” I replied not knowing what else to say, to which she motioned me to a register obviously assuming I was going to order one that day. “Oh no, I’m not getting one. Thanks.” And I left.

Disillusionment with the Storm aside, I was also disillusoned with Verizon Wireless. Apparently, I had heard that the Storm didn’t have WiFi because Verizon asked them not to include it. Verizon has something against WiFi. Remember old my brick of a phone? The XV6700? It had WiFi. But when you turned on WiFi, the phone would turn off. You effectively had one or the other, not both. I figured there was a reason for this. But then a friend had gotten the same phone from Sprint and upon telling him how this “feature” sucked, he said he didn’t have that problem. Sure enough, he had WiFi and phone running concurrently. WTF? Apparently, Verizon had put in some sort of software restriction (hackable by changing a registry setting). Why? I don’t want to know because I’m sure it’s bullshit. After the debacle with the Storm, I came to the conclusion that Verizon will never offer a great phone.

So time to switch carriers, right? I was interested in the G1, but T-Mobile’s coverage is not that great. That left Sprint and AT&T. Although not quite as bad as Verizon, Sprint doesn’t offer a lot of great phones either. So that left me with AT&T Wireless. And that meant either the Blackberry Bold and the iPhone. So I went to the nearest AT&T store and checked both out. Going back and forth between the two for almost an hour, it finally came down to the the web browser. The Blackberry browser didn’t render some sites correctly while the iPhone rendered them beautifully. So my decision was made. Mind you, I’m not a hipster doofus although I still contend that hipster doofuses go ga-ga over the iPhone. Believe me, I still haven’t drunken the Apple Kool-Aid. But I do like my iPhone. And so does my back.