I don't use my iPhone as a computer

Tuesday, September 23, 2008 by Dave Winer.

I bought my iPhone on June 29 last year, the first day they were available. A couple of months later, I realized I wasn't using my Blackberry and a couple of months after that, I turned it off. I don't miss it, even though I loved it when I was using it because it meant I didn't have to lug around my laptop to be in range of email and Twitter. 

Now a funny thing has happened since I got my Asus, I've stopped using my iPhone as anything other than a phone. The Asus is a much better computer than the iPhone, and eventually I think I will come to use it as a phone too (with Skype). I won't give up much since I have an EVDO modem, so I'll be able to use it anywhere I can use an iPhone. 

I won't miss using the iPhone as an iPod because that part of the iPhone only worked for the first couple of weeks, after that, no matter what I do, even after reformatting the phone several times, and using it on different computers, I can't get it to synch music or videos with the desktop computer. Never mind that synching with a desktop computer is ridiculous for a fully capable computer as the iPhone is, but that's the point -- iPhones are crippled computers, from the start, designed not to function like a computer. So why would anyone think you could happily get it to work like one? 

That's the sad conclusion to the tale of Alex Sokirynsky, the developer of the Podcaster app. He built the software Apple hasn't gotten around to building and as far as we know never plans to build. HIs software works the way I always intended podcasting to work. Go listen to the early Trade Secrets podcasts I did with Adam Curry four years ago in Seattle. We talked about podcast player devices that had wifi receivers that downloaded and played your favorite programs without help from a bigger computer. Synching was never part of the vision of podcasting. You can see it as requirement #1 on my spec for a new podcast player device in the piece I wrote for the BBC last year. 

Anyway, no need to wait for Apple. As Sokirynsky says, there will be other platforms, and it would be easy to make a perfect podcast player app for the Asus. It has such long battery life, and you can configure Windows to keep running when you shut the laptop cover, so there's no problem using it as a player. It's a bit overkill, but then Apple doesn't make a rational podcast player, and willfully shuts one down created by a developer, so it's the best we have right now.  

And today's Asus actually costs $200 less than the iPhone I bought last June.  

Yeah I think I'm beginning to move away from Apple, again. We'll see how it goes.