The i Phone 3G goes on sale this week, and you'd think the picture couldn't be brighter. Six million iPhones already in consumers' hands and it still makes the competition look second-rate. As NYT's David Pogue says, "Clumsy touch-screen lookalikes from rival phone makers line the shelves."
Even better, John Markoff and Laura Holson note what may be an even more important development than the 3G version of the iPhone: an abundance of 3rd-party iPhone software ready to jazz up an already jazzy device. This is important because, as Mr. Markoff writes, "Mr. Jobs failed to make his personal computers dominant, in part because software developers did not write as many programs for Mac-based machines as they did for Microsoft Windows PCs."
Jobs did not make that mistake with the iPod (lots of tunes available) and he is not going to make it with the iPhone.
Except for one thing. Jobs has made a second mistake, and it once again has to do with compatibility. The mistake is called AT&T.
I will not buy an iPhone because I will not settle for lousy phone service. And now the iPhone 3G buyers will have to settle for lousy 3G service. As Mr. Pogue writes, 3G gives you fast internet on your phone, but "you don’t get that speed or those features unless you’re in one of AT&T’s 3G network areas — and there aren’t many of them."
There is a reason software developers flocked to Windows PCs. There were more of them. Dozens of companies made the hardware, competed on price and used a single operating system that made them all compatible. They did so even though Windows was a clumsy Mac lookalike. Only one company made the Mac.
If Jobs had made the iPhone software available to all manufacturers and all carriers, he would have established an industry standard by now that no one would have been able to touch. By giving AT&T exclusivity, he has automatically limited his customer base. Not as badly as he did for the Mac, but still limited.
And he left an opening. Every non-AT&T customer has to settle for a clumsy clone. But eventually, even a sloppy imitation will gain more market share than the iPhone. I don't know if it will be Google's Android, but at least it has the right business model.
Just as, a generation ago, Apple had the right design while Microsoft had the right business model. As it is, you have to illegally unlock the iPhone to get it to work on a non-AT&T service. What kind of a business model is that?
The competition has four more years to get its act together. The iPhone is reportedly exclusive to AT&T until 2012. Yes, Apple has a lot of developers creating apps for the iPhone. But just watch how fast they fly to any halfway decent imitator that gets accepted by multiple manufacturers and carriers. If no competitor has established a strong contender by then, the iPhone can still set the standard.
What are the odds?