Wednesday, June 18, 2008

iPhone Video Conferencing

One of the things rumored to be in the new 3G iPhone was a forward facing camera to allow video conferencing.

Alas, it was not to be, and we are left with the sub par camera that is already on the device.

A couple of days ago, I came across a posting on one of the many Mac rumor sites that I read ago that someone had found an entry in the QuickTIme files for an iSight HD camera. I bought the original iSight a long time ago (a beautifully designed slim aluminum tube that sat on top of your monitor) and was a little disappointed that they stopped selling it, but it got me to thinking about a potential solution for the iPhone web conference

If Apple release the new iSight HD with a compatible iPhone dock, you could have a portable iChat compliant web conferencing tool with significantly better video quality without the need to have a camera in the phone, especially if the dock had A/V output capability.

A portable video conferencing solution...

Probably never happen, but it makes you wonder how many crazy things are going to show up on the iPhone 3G when it eventually launches on July 11th

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Ahhh..iPhone with 3G

Finally....

This has been enormous news everywhere in this country, and I am sure its been mentioned a few times elsewhere too, but the new iPhone is coming in July. The 11th to be precise.

As a user of iPhone v1 (which I paid almost $600 for a year ago.... now worth about $100 on eBay if I'm lucky), I have to say that the new updated software looks fantastic, and MobileMe will help me out a lot as I have 3 computers that I am constantly trying to keep in sync. I can finally hand back my Windows Mobile brick to IT as I won't need it anymore.

The interesting thing for me on the phone is the GPS functionality. I was in the market for a GPS for the car, and now I don't need one. I can just use the phone. I'm wondering how long it will take for a car manufacturer to incorporate the iPhone into the screen of the car to replace having an in car system. People of Volkswagen..... I mean you. I can have GPS, iPhone and iPod all on the same screen, using a screen layout I am familiar with... Utopia, plus it would be cheaper for the car manufacturer as they wouldn't need the GPS stuff. Just a thought.

In addition to that, I've already seen some interesting news about location aware applications, such as Omnifocus for location aware To Do lists (at the grocery store, list all grocery items), and some of the games that were demo'd looked great. I think I was more impressed by the graphics than the actual games though... I think even though the screen and graphics are streets ahead of other mobile devices, what types of games are going to be the best sellers?

Location aware, community type games have a very interesting platform to come forward and fulfill the promise for the casual gamer. Poker with people in the same city. Meet fellow iPhone Facebook friends who are in the same city.... Interesting applications. I would like to see the phone itself make use of the GPS for things like Weather, Address Book. I land in a new City, weather defaults to new City, address book has a smart list of local contacts, things like that.

Needless to say, I don't really need one, but July 11th, I'll be in line with the rest of the mock turtle neck crew. 16Gb in White is the way to go. Anyone need a v1 phone 8Gb ??