Apple slays the dragon – Never Odd Or Even LLP.

Surprisingly enough 85% answered with “anything but iTunes”. Seems like Apple didn’t find the right solution for consumer satisfaction. On the other hand they don’t have to. Since every site dealing with apps and reviews and the like can put a deeplink to the AppStore, Apple can easily just wait and let third parties do their job for free.

On the other hand, as Iliumsoftware says as well, 200 people are not that much if you consider the millions of iPod/iPhone-users out there…so this might be misleading information. Espescially if you consider how a high ranking in the Top 100 apps increases your sales many people somehow *must* be using iTunes.

Anyway, I’m looking forward to more results.

Anyway…even if it’s coming June next year I was statring to wonder what I would like to see in a new iPhone. Am I really missing something? In my day to day usage of the iPhone 1G I don’t really miss a lot but then…well…read on if you want to know what the next iPhone might bring…

A better Battery
First thing that almost everybody seems to need is a better battery. People often suggest that Apple should just make the battery replaceable but I for one am so glad they didn’t! Think about it for a second. The charme of an iPhone is that you can leave your luggage behind. It all fits in your pocket. Now think of a second battery or even a third…well…better make sure you have some cargo pants on! I don’t like the idea of carrying seperate batteries and more than that keep all of them loaded at all times. The stick-on juice-packs from Mophie and the likes are a good option.

My prediction is that Apple will most certainly never release an iPhone with replaceable battery. The never did so with an iPod, now they are turning away from this with the MacBook Pro. It’s a wise move, if you ask me. With a fixed battery you can make much better use of available space and increase battery life with this. Furthermore, the avaiable technologie is advancing and so, the next iPhone will have a better increased battery life by factor 1.5 or 2. That’s pretty much for sure.

A real Keyboard
No, I’m not a die-hard Crackberry-User. I’m a former Treo-Veteran. I have been in war with this gadget a long time! But…a real keyboard has it’s charme. It’s not accuracy or speed or tactile feel or anything else that has been discussed up anddown and up again.

The reason why I would love a flip-out keyboard is much more simple: You can hold the gadget with a finger on the keys without actually typing! Usually I type with two thumbs on the keyboard while holding the gadget with my fingers…I guess most people do this at least while standing. Now, with a real keyboard it’s possible to hold the device with one thumb while the other types and – most important – the holding
thumb can be placed on the keyboard. Not so on the iPhone. You have to put your second or any unused finger anywhere outside the keyboard to hold your iPhone or iPod without typing. And THAT’s a real challenge if you ask me! The outer rim of the iPhone is so tiny that you have a hard time.

I ended up holding the phone in one hand and picking on it like a bird with one finger of the other hand. That looks stupid somehow and it’s not efficient, it’s slow and uncomfortable. On the other hand, a hardware keyboard will make the iPhone more expensive and localization will be an even bigger problem. Maybe the nice aluminum bluetooth keyboard would be a good compromies… :)

Smaller is the new Bigger
Of course everyone will say: “Well, if nothing comes to mind just make it thinnner”. I hope they won’t do this. This trend led to freakishly small phones in the 90s where you barely see the phone while someone was using it, burying it completely in it’s hand. And don’t get me started on dialing those…cartoon-thingys. Nope…smaller isn’t good and you certainly need some depth to a device to comfortably hold it. If anything, the iPhone should get a bigger brother…some sort of a tablet-netbook.

One more reason why it wont be thinner is the above mentioned enhanced battery. Just make the iPhone 1mm thicker and youget about 1 day more in standby time… I think that’s a good deal!

No more Dock-Connector
People on the web are saying Apple is to drop the dock-connector in favour of USB3.0. That would be a bad idea. Just after they established the “Made for iPod”-Programm they kill it by vaporizing the dock-connector? I don’t think so…The Dock-Connector is a good thing, if you ask me. USB might be able to establish more and more standards, get faster and faster and even connecting a display or a beamer will become standard in a few months or years time.

But I don’t think Apple will follow this trail right away. The dock connector is established and trusted. Many people complained that their 3 months “old” add-ons wouldn’t work with the new iPod or iPhone purchased the other day. Furthermore a new standard for display connection from portable devices to TV-sets, beamers and displays was recently introduced by Apple with the mini display port. There is just no need and even more important: There is no benefit to get rid of the dock-connector!

An extra mini-usb-jack might be agood idea for charging and syncing but for anything else I would like to wait a few months more.

More more more
More RAM, more “diskspace” for music and fotos, faster processor, better graphics chips inside…all that is a no-brainer. I think it’s 99% sure that a new iPhone will be bigger better faster than the previous models.

Bluetooth could be the showmaker
With all the above said, whats left and what could be the real big improvement is bluetooth! I’m dreaming of a bluetooth chip that has a *really* low power consumption. Right now I have BT almost always off, WLAN always on and I get up to 4 days of standby with 4 hours on the phone and 4 or more hours on the web and usual on/off-usage as a PDA. With BT I’m lucky if I make it ’till the end of the day.

So, with that improved we could *really* use BT-Stereo-Headphones, a BT-Keyboard for larger texts like this one, BT-syncing (which was a given on my 10 year old Palm-Devcies!?) and many things more…if…yes if…Apple would implement some more BT profiles in the next iPhone.

So, there’s always something to enhance, no matter how cool a gadget allready is! :-) I am really looking forward to the next iPhone!

Best thing is: If you’re willing to fill out the survey and punch in your e-mail-adress you may win an iTunes-Gift-Card…best thing for you to get a copy of TouchScan…or…or..Skippy XL or the Penguin Timer ;)

And that’s all because of you TouchScan-Users out there!

Thank you all!