I know Ive had my gripes with Apple’s iPhone. I actually said that I hate the phone but you know what? I’m taking that all back right now. I’m not changing my mind about the problems I have with the phone, I still think the touchscreen keyboard is horrible, I still think it is a crippled device. I’m just taking back my complaints. I’m going to keep them to myself from now on. You know why?

Apple deserves to monopolize the cell phone market.

Apple should make a version of the iPhone to fit every category of phone and put everyone else out of business.  What brings this thought to mind tonight you ask? I’m sitting here watching Heat and browsing Joystiq.com when I notice an ad banner for Alltel wireless. The only reason I even noticed it is because my wife has Alltel and she wants a new phone. Well the ad was for the LG Glimmer. I click on it cause LG makes so many phones that I cant keep up with them anymore. What do I see?

Another fake iPhone wannabee lookalike.

FailedOn January 9th 2007 I wrote a blog post talking about Apple’s iPhone announcement at CES. That was over a year ago. And to be honest, Apple fumbled out the gate with this phone. Its tied to AT&T’s slow data network, it was overpriced, then reduced by $200 2 months later. Its crippled and you have to hack it to really make good use of the phone (which I haven’t done to mine yet). When they finally do announce that they are going to ad 3rd party support, that end up being crippled. The way Apple has handled this phone would’ve brought about cries of damnation if it was any other company.

After all that, it is a year later and no other cell phone company has even came close to competing with this phone. As a mater of fact, the only phone that I would put up against the iPhone is a phone that was already out when the iPhone was released, the Nokia N95. What is wrong with everyone else? Why is it that every cell phone manufacturer is either doing nothing at all or making some fake iPhone lookalike out of their already existing phones. Do they think slapping a screen with icons on a phone is competing with the iPhone. Its a year later, there should be something else other than the iPhone to talk about.

What is Motorola doing? What is HTC doing? What is LG doing? What is Palm doing? Well I take that back about Palm, people think they are dead but they do have that Centro that I’m starting to see a lot of people with. I just don’t understand how Apple can come into a market that they were never in, and create a device completely unanswered and win everyone over. Has everyone given up? The iPhone was suppose to push creativity out of the other cell phone makers and we should be seeing some amazing phone from everyone by now. But we are not. What we have instead is the LG glimmer, the HTC touch, the Voyager. They don’t even want to compete. To me it seems like all they want to do is make a "pacifier" for people that aren’t on AT&T. They are basically sitting back and handing the market to Apple.

 These other companies need to step it up, or every phone in every persons hands will be an iPhone. If that happens, they all deserve it.