Thoughts about iPhone on Verizon
With the Apple iPhone finally coming to a Verizon network near you, I started thinking about the different features it might have due to the differences between AT&T and Verizon. The more I thought about it, the more questions I had. I’m very curious to see what, if any, will be the pain points for Verizon’s iPhone. Since there’s only a week or so until launch and when we’ll really start to hear how it’s going, here are a few of the big questions, along with my thoughts on them…
1. Is there any impact on the developers?
Several people have asked me whether the Verizon iPhone launch will cause any changes for developers… especially how we will be handling the fact that Verizon does not allow data browsing over 3G and voice usage simultaneously. Well, the good news is, for the vast majority of apps in the App Store, whether or not data and voice usage are allowed simultaneously is entirely irrelevant. The better news is, hopefully at least, that the impact on developers will be … more app downloads.
2. Will people be bummed about the lack of simultaneous data / voice?
What does this really mean anyway? It means, when you are talking on the phone (and you are not on WiFi), then you can’t use a browser to surf the Internet while you’re on the call, nor will you be able use network features of any other app.
Most people I’ve spoken to have indicated that this is not a big deal to them. Personally, I do it all the time — browsing the Internet while on a phone call, using mobile IM or Skype — but, I am also usually doing that while at home or in the office, where I have an active wi-fi connection.
So, my opinion is, all things considered, this is not a big deal, especially for people who are often enough connected via WiFi.
3. Will the Verizon iPhone actually not drop our calls?
This is a wildly speculative hypothesis — what if the problem was never AT&T’s coverage at all? What if the iPhone itself has some problems that causes it to drop calls? If this is not the case, if Verizon’s iPhone does in fact hold calls better than AT&T’s, then Verizon will have a clear case for a lot of consumers defecting from AT&T to Verizon.
However, if Verizon’s iPhone drops just as many calls as AT&T’s, then the battle of the network iPhones will be judged more by other issues that are still to be determined.
4. Can Verizon’s 3G network handle the iOS data addiction?
The test is on — is AT&T’s 3G network really a lot faster than Verizon’s, as they advertise? We’ll need to wait to see…
These questions, of course, will become swiftly irrelevant as people start to get these Verizon iPhones in the coming weeks… food for thought, though. Personally, I hope it goes great, and we get the opportunity to sell more great iOS apps to even more happy iPhone customers.
