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The Significance of 3G in Apple’s new iPhone

Image via Wikipedia

As the launch of Apple’s new revision of the iPhone is approaching, there has been growing amount of criticism towards Apple not introducing anything really revolutionary with the new product. This critique is normally heard from U.S. and that is understandable, given that U.S. is still lagging behind Europe when it comes to mobile infrastructure. As an iPhone 2G user, however, I must contradict some of these arguments. There are some unique selling points from European perspective:

• 3G. European 3G coverage is getting near 100% and for example in the Nordics, subsidized contracts are only allowed for 3G devices.
• iTunes & AppStore. Try to find as usable for any other mobile handset. You won’t.
• Cocoa Touch. Yeah, there are loads of Windows Mobile phones with touch screen, mainly in the U.S. market. I actively use Samsung SGH-i780 for my corporate tasks and I can only say that there are touch UIs and then there is Apple’s touch UI. Try to guess which one works.
• Mobile Safari. Only desktop grade mobile browser. Don’t even try to mention Opera, it is not even close.
• ActiveSync. While RIM rules the U.S. market, Europe is still wide open for corporate solutions. This might give Apple a chance.
• Battery life. Reviews say that iPhone’s battery life is bad. Well, compare that with any Nokia N-series phone, which are common in Europe, in similar usage scenario and iPhone is not that bad at all.