It's an open-source product, so theoretically they don't have any customers.

But realistically, anyone interested in open source is interested in technology, and anyone interested in technology has a modern browser installed in their computer. So I think requiring a modern browser, which can be installed under any OS, including historic Windows XP, is a reasonable assumption that would rarely, if ever, hurt their market penetration.

D

Nice try but only if you spend all your time in coffee shops!

I seem to remember Google offered some kind of public transport system where you are driven to work in a wifi-equipped bus. If you never go anywhere but home, work and Google, the WiFi-based phone might just work, since you would never be out of range of a wifi network you were authorized to use.

But short of that I'm afraid most cellphone users aren't going to like the idea.

D

I think one problem is that it varies dramatically by geographical area and so it's impossible to say which is best without considering where you live.

I'm in the Pittsburgh area, and my estimate is the AT&T and Verizon are about the same. Verizon might be a little bit better, but the iPhone is (in my experience) a much nicer device than the Droid. I love my iPhone more than I dislike AT&T, especially since many Verizon policies (early disconnect fees, for example) are just plain horrible.

I wanted to try app development for the Palm Pre, so I got a Pre and a Sprint phone. Sprint has almost non-existant data service, at least in the parts of Pittsburgh I visited. On the particularly memorable evening I got my Pre, I was being driven home on Route 51, the main drag sort of equivalent to Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu, and I got no data service at all. Let's just say things did not improve from there, and if the phone wasn't used for development, I would have returned it immediately. If you do have good Sprint service in your area, though, I noticed that the plans are significantly cheaper than rivals.

I used T-Mobile many years ago with the Sidekick. It has the advantage of being GSM, so you can use an AT&T phone with it, or use it with an AT&T phone. Verizon and Sprint use a different technology that I don't think allows you to exchange phones between carriers at all. Once you have a Sprint or Verizon phone, that's all it is. Overall, I don't think T-Mobile service is as good as AT&T or Verizon. However, since I haven't had a T-Mobile account in years, I can't really comment.

I know some Cricket users and everyone says that while it is certainly cheap, service is so awful as to be nearly useless.

Hope that helps. Maybe we should all do this for our individual city and then this could be a searchable index. But of course things are changing all the time ...

D

You still want the device to work as well as possible on web pages not designed for mobile devices.

With its high resolution, the Droid is getting dangerously close to readability for a full web page ...

I have noticed the problem mentioned in the article. It shows up for me as jerky scrolling. I love how the iPhone always scrolls smoothly and precisely with your finger. No other device has matched that, and I think the problem described in this article is why.

I hope Apple improves iPhone's resolution in the next update, but I'm still loyal to it. I tried my friend's Droid, but iPhone has by far the best interface. It's in small details, but Apple really sweated them amazingly well.

D

Because the new C API will not be generally available during this period, only apps using the Web-style API (either hand-coded or through ARES) are eligible.

This is interesting because they claim at present that they will introduce the C-style API in March and that overlaps the period.

See the actual terms for details.

D

Equipment upgrades, however lavish, are only going to cost a few million per movie. Salaries are the big hit here.

I would bet Pixar workers worked for next to nothing making Toy Story et al, and competition from other studios wanting to poach employees ensured substantial pay raises after Finding Nemo et al.

I really doubt that anyone at Pixar is poorly paid anymore, and I would hope most of us would agree this is a good thing.

Don't feel sorry for anyone at Disney just yet. Not only are foreign sales excluded from that list, but home video as well. The reality is that all those movies made a mint, and will continue making money for many years to come.

D

But if you want Internet access anywhere you go, even where there are no open WiFi sites, you pretty much have to pay that much no matter what device you're using.

D

I thought about this for a while and realized that your country of origin has a lot to do with this.

Here in the USA, the iPhone costs US$200 with a two year AT&T contract extension. The monthly cost is about $20 a month more than a regular cellphone. So overall I would say I'm paying less than what I would pay for an Asus + a cellphone.

Here, the data plan is unlimited. I mooch off of a friend's AT&T family plan because I use almost no minutes - my phone use is almost 100% data but there are some times when voice calls are vital. My bill's about $35 a month for the phone and the lowest text message plan. Google says that's about 26.75 euros.

And of course if you don't want an iPhone you can always buy a $229 iPod Touch.

So I stand by my message as being correct in the USA but I will admit that if charges in the US were similar to those where you live, I might well think twice.

D

If we think about the team here, Jony Ive can design the computers, Phil Schiller can market them and Tim Cook can make sure the financials come out all right.

I think we will all miss Steve but Apple itself will do just fine.

I wish Steve joy in relaxation - he has had one of the busiest lives I could ever think of - and a speedy recovery and return to the helm.

D

This is true, but intriguingly, Apple also sells iPhones and iPod Touches, which many people can use as substitute computers. A friend of mine got iPod Touch for his birthday and pecks out his documents with the Notes application and emails them around, instead of using a computer.

iPhones are cheaper than any computers, even netbooks, and are not significantly different in price from other smartphones.

Apple has a pretty big iPhone developer community now, and they are compensated pretty well through the App Store. What do those nice folks who made $100,000 do with their well-deserved gains? Buy 17" MacBook Pros, of course. Tax deductible and all that. And as lovely as a well-designed sports car, just a lot cheaper.

The one huge advantage Apple has is that people love their products, so they will scrimp and save and suffer to buy them. For this reason, I expect them to gain market share, especially in tough times. The enthusiasts still buy, while the pragmatists stop buying. Thus, the total market shrinks but Apple's market share is likely to increase.

D

I wanted to point this out as well and you put it very well. Another thing worth mentioning is that if it really took 750-odd watts (1,500 watt coffee maker / 2) to run a search it would be very expensive to run the computers involved. You are only talking to one computer at Google and you are talking to it for a tiny fraction of a second. So if it uses 100 watts an hour you are going to be using a tiny fraction of a watt, too.

Here's another problem with this theory. The odds are that you would be running your PC whether you were using Google to search or not.

Furthermore, Google has excess capacity in their search system. Every computer that's running at Google's data centers is going to run whether there are 1,000,000 searches going on or 1,000,002.

Therefore, it seems logical to conclude that the impact of our Google searches on the environment is precisely zero. The only way to make a significant difference in the environment is a mass boycott of Google, in which case they might turn off a few servers. But if you just transfer your search business to ask.com, you simply become responsible for the use of more ask.com capacity and less Google capacity.

As others have said, if you stop using Google, you start using resources, such as transportation to the book store or library, that take far more energy and thus far more carbon.

D

People always seem to focus on what's lost by environmental change and ignore what's gained. That seems unfortunate

For example, are there not recreational opportunities in the lakes created by dams?

Are there not more fish in those lakes than in the equivalent rivers?

Since you mention fewer land based predators, how about more water birds eating the fish?

D

I'm trying to learn OpenGL so I can program in Open GL ES for my iPhone, and it seems like you need a book specifically for ES, because OpenGL ES eliminated most of the features used in beginning OpenGL tutorials!

But the iPhone supports only 1.1 and so I'm wondering if this book would even work for me. I'm thinking its rival, Mobile 3D Graphics ... might be better.

Any thoughts from those who have checked out both books? It would be nice to have good information before I blow $50.

Thanks!

D