iPhone Brouhaha

So this past Friday the new iPhone 3G came out, and while everyone and their mother was excited about it, I admit, I was not even remotely thrilled. Here's why:

1)It's on AT&T
I'm not a fan of AT&T. I used to have it and their monthly plans were through the roof. (They're actually not so bad now). But the main reason I hate AT&T is 'cause of their reception. I have a few friends with AT&T and they have no reception in places where I do. Don't get me wrong, I hate my carrier (Verizon), but I'll give them this — NY, NJ, RI, CA, AL, DC, CT, FL, PA, MO — no matter where I go I've always had a near-perfect signal.

2)It's not the first phone with 3G
3G is cool. It's an improvement over EDGE, but it's not as fast as they're hyping it to be. And not for nothing, but the iPhone isn't the first phone to include a 3G radio, so that whole "cutting edge technology" bit — sorry, it's not breaking new grounds. I like Apple. Their products are superior to their competition (most of the time), but the iPhone 3G is so far behind the times that I can't help but laugh when people treat it as the best invention ever. (For the record: Samsung, Nokia, Palm, etc all had 3G phones before the iPhone was even a twinkle in Steve Jobs' eye). The iPhone has a great interface, probably the best I've seen on a phone, no doubt about that. But it's not "the" phone to end all phones. You can't even picture text (MMS) on it!

3)Battery
Once again Apple is screwing up by not giving users access to the iPhone's battery. Time and time again people have asked for this, but Apple still refuses. I have a Motorola Q (which I'm not a big fan of), and I always carry a spare battery with me. They're smartphones. Smartphones suck up battery life rapidly and people don't always have immediate access to a power plug. Give us access to the battery compartment so we can swap batteries when they die on us. And while you're at it, give us a memory card slot too so we can expand the iPhone's built-in memory via card instead of having to buy a new phone with more memory every year.