Too Absent Herald

Anyway, the iPhone, as I and a few others are suspecting, could very well be the One Device to Rule Them all.

At the very least, I think it will show consumers the way forward toward real innovation. This is the problem with our current Domestic Product system: Once things are good, no one wants to try for anything better; at least not until it requires a massive reinvestment by the consumer (HD DVD).

That’s why cars still get the same mileage they got 15 years ago.

When the rare little points of light can shine through the fog (Netflix, Google-everything, and Apple TV and, next, the iPhone) it is worth getting excited about. Because it represents a real innovation.

And by “real innovation” I am emphasizing the “real” in American usage, – that is, – I can feel it. (Like the shampoo on Letterman’s head: “I can feel it tingling.”) This is not a sort of vague announcement from Bush about “heading to Mars” or “hydrogen fuel cells, that could…” That’s (perhaps) innovative and helpful thinking. But it is not real.

The most heartbreaking part of the movie Singles, for me, was not the story, but when Bridget Fonda addresses the camera in frustration:†

“I’m 23. Do you remember how old 23 seemed when you were young? I mean, I thought people would be living in airlocks and I would have 5 kids… well, here I am… 23… things are pretty much the same.”

And that was 1992, not to think of 2001, etc.

This innovation is what Gruber and Michael Mulvey are getting at — and this is so exciting to me that I’m writing about it now.

“The iPhone is the floating car we imagined we’d be drivin in the future.”

It’s an actual step forward. The biggest complaint and naysaying about the iPhone so far has been from Blackberry users (or, actually, from some sort of Blackberry users’ lobbying group). The complaint is that “People are used to typing with their thumbs on a keyboard. They won’t want to change to a touch-screen.”

The absurdity is repellant. People are also, in no particular order:

Voting against their own economic self-interest in most of the country;
Paying more for drugs than any other industrialized nation;
Getting worse fuel mileage than their parents did;
Working longer for less money than ever before, etc. etc.
Oh, and we still have cancer, AIDS, TB, Typhoid, Malaria, and, wait for it, – Fucking POLIO roaming around.

Maybe a touch-screen is better, maybe it is worse. But saying it’s stupid because it is different, well… Why doesn’t Fox and the NY Post do an expose on how Lead paint and asbestos are actually better, and we’ve been tricked into leaving them behind?

So if I have to explain to someone why I “follow” or “worship” Apple Inc. it is simply the fact that they are releasing a product like this. THEY ARE BUCKING THE MARKET SYSTEM!

There is no real DEMAND for a device like the iPhone. The other companies (and their evil overlords, the cellular carriers) would happily have you continue to shell out $$ for essentially the same device year after year.

Instead Apple takes the step forward that is possible. Introducing a new demand, and, hence more innovation. That is what Google did, and they are reaping the benefits of catching the giant sleeping.

So whether I get one or not; whether I ever have any use for email in my pocket… I will support the effort.

*(Say what you will about Tolkien (and I say plenty), it’s remarkable that the books so implant themselves in the culture.)

†That frustration is forgotten pretty quickly (which is Cameron Crowe’s problem, as he gets more complex narratives, he is unable to support them. What is more simple than Say Anything? The characters say, -out loud,- what they care about and that’s all they care about!)

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 26th, 2007 at 12:59 pm and is filed under the small stuff. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.