mike_barton
Editor

iPhone: Finger-lickin’ good?

news
Jun 28, 20072 mins

I’ll come full clean here that I have just ordered a Moto Q, and will receive it the day of iPhone’s launch.

How can it be? Pogue and Mossberg may have learned how to use, and be able to look beyond the touchscreen-based input for all things iPhone, but I see it in a different light.

I’d be willing to swipe my fingers across this beautiful new gadget, if the world were a cleaner place and I did not have two young boys.

In response to me explaining to a colleague that I would not buy one for technological reasons — lack of EVDO/HSDPA/3G connectivity, expansion card or even a carrier that is reasonably priced (Sprint has unlimited EVDO data plans for $15 a month) — she said:

“iPhone looks pretty to me. That’s about the extent of my knowledge.”

And agreed. It is a beautiful piece of design work. And not everyone needs more than a status symbol with e-mail and iTunes.

But how about when you get a call while eating an Al Pastor burrito (elbow deep in salsa with a chip in the other hand)? So much for the million-dollar, Prada-killer finish.

No way am I keeping a truckload of KFC wipes at hand just to keep up with the elite iPhone-set, with their freshly chamoised tech nuggets.

I’ll keep my screen free of pork grease with the Moto Q’s BlackBerry-like scrollwheel — and get my e-mail pushed and EVDO internet for $15 a month to boot.

Think about it. Is the iPhone the finger-lickin’ all-in-one gadget you had in mind?

My colleague: “Hmmmm. Sounds kinda good, actually. But being seen licking one’s phone wouldn’t be good for one’s reputation … And would probably damage the phone.”

mike_barton

Mike Barton started out in online slinging HTML for CNET.com in the late 1990s and began his editorial career at New Media magazine shortly thereafter. In his early days, he was an editor at Ziff-Davis's PC Computing and ZDNet.com before heading Down Under, where he produced and edited the business and technology sections of The Sydney Morning Herald online. After returning to the States in 2006, he has worked for IDG's Infoworld, PCWorld, Computerworld, and CSO Online. He currently edits and produces WIRED.com's Innovation Insights, and is a contributing editor at ITworld.

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