Cell phones forum: Poll: Time naming the iPhone "Invention of the year"

"First of all the iPhone has patented innovations which are legally considered to be inventions."

You're talking about several small parts of the iPhone, not nearly the iPhone in its entirety. Saying the iPhone is an invention because its OS is an invention is like saying the first car that had a catalytic converter was an invention. The catalytic converter was an invention, the car that used it was NOT.

You'd really think it wouldn't be so hard for people to understand this but apparently it is!

Calling the i-phone a new invention is like calling the florecent light bulb a new light source. Calling the i-phone a new invention is like calling the flat screen TV the new invention of a TV. The subject has already been invented. Sure everything has its' modification and in it's own wright, be declaired as an improvement but not to be declaired as the inventor of something that already existed. The television has already been invented but through the years, modifications has been made to see it in color, then distortion free, then more pixeis has been added then it was boosted to the plasma level. But no one person declaired it to be a new invention or declair it a television again. It was just modifies. So as for the i-phone, all that was done was improved its' service. No new invention was made, or it would not have still been called a "PHONE".

Time magazine is not the sole arbiter of the "Invention of the Year", but they are being treated that way by those who are pleased/upset by their desigation of the iPhone as such.

After all, Time named both George W. Bush and Bill Clinton men of the year not once, but twice, so their track record on this sort of thing is pretty poor.

Invention of the year? NO!
Product of the year...Ok.

Invention of the year winner should require tougher criteria.
Palm has been doing all this with Treos for years. Treos do have touchscreens. When I got my latest model almost a year ago; I immediately downloaded a program called iphony that totally makes my treo look like an iphone. For months, some folks thought it was a special Canadian iphone.

Also: With 60 and 80 gig ipods; how come the phone is so limited?
No, not invention of the year. That apple has a worm.

sorry, Blackberry didn't put the cell phone and PDA together, either. Handspring did that back in 2000 (or earlier) with the VisorPhone module for their Handspring Visor PDAs. (You could call it the Treo's grandfather). I'm still using my VisorPhone. The main reason is I don't want to part with the Graffiti interface for text messages, organizer and other input. I don't do thumb piano, thank you. I just wish Treo would bring back a model with a Grafitti interface like the 180g was. Unfortunately, Handspring sold out to Palm and Palm punked out on the Graffiti interface for cell phones (or whoever it is that's making the cell phones that bought the Palm O/S for the organizer part...)

This whole debate is hair-splitting at best, unless legal liability can be established.
Wast of time!!

The iPhone with Files2Phones and other remote computing applications is amazing. The ability to launch large applications such as AutoCad or view large medical x-rays with the iPhone on my remote PC is awesome.

Al Gore invented the iPhone years ago.

Hey Mike Cary,
Don't get exited and remember this:
"5% of the people have hemorrhoids and 95% of the people are Perfect AHoles".
Many of the posters fall in the 95% category.

Deniseellen, what are you doing that you're worried about NASA collecting info. I suggest you find a VILLAGE as there is one somewhere missing an IDIOT.
NASA can listen to all my calls, but I warn them that they will be so bored they'll fall asleep.

Saying the Apple invented the iPhone is like sayint McDonald's invented the Big Mac. Sure, in the most literal sense it's true, but the Big Mac is just another cheeseburger, and the iPhone is just an MP3player, cell phone, and touch-screen PDA stuck together sans duct tape. If slapping pre-existing inventions together is enough to get recognized as an innovator of new things, then I've been missing out on lots of money making opportunities.

Now pardon me while I go whip out the duct tape and get inventing.

Of course, Apple did not invent the cellular phone. However, the iPhone is significant in the way it changes the game for the rest of the cellular industry. No longer will brands like Nokia and Motorola get away with the crap they've shoved down our throats for years and years. Apple designed the iPhone to be upgradable, just like Mac OS X itself. New features will be added, new applications will come. Because the device relies purely on a software based user interface, the user experience can be changed and refined over time, something that cannot be done with traditional phones. Sure, other mobile phones are capable of a firmware upgrade, but until now, there's never been a compelling reason for these companies to be bothered with fixing their firmware. They've never cared about the end user. That mentality will no longer be acceptable. The iPhone changes everything. Whether you love it or hate it, you will benefit from the iPhone. It raises the bar. It will encourage competition and spur innovation. I've owned a number of high end mobile phones and they've all been absolute crap in comparison to the iPhone. If you think the iPhone is good now, just wait until Apple opens the flood gates and allows the developers into the iPhone. It's not just a device, it's a platform, and already, it's a successful platform. No matter how much you hate Apple and love Microsoft, the iPhone is here to stay.

"Right. No other cell phone has upgradable firmware"

I addressed this in my original post. Didn't you read it? How many cell phone manufacturers actually release firmware updates for their phones? How many of them actually improve the end user experience? Of the number of phones I've owned, not once did I receive a firmware update. Not once did Motorola refine it's UI. Apple's already added new features and refinements to the UI.

"At the behest of Apple. Where's the innovation there? Closing your platform? That seems like a step backwards to me."

Hello! Where have you been? Under a rock? Apple is opening up the iPhone to developers. There will be a native SDK soon. This whole "closed platform" FUD won't apply much longer. Run with it while you can.

"What, because it has a soft keyboard, it's more modifiable than any other smartphone?"

Yes, it is. The possibilities are endless.

"You make it sound so seamless, but when a simple firmware upgrade can wreck every other 3rd party piece of software on the phone, that's pretty lame coding."

Hm... Maybe it has something to do with the fact that Apple, for the moment, doesn't support 3rd party software or even intend for it to be installed on the iPhone. By using such hacks, you do so at your own risk. Myself, I can stand to wait for the official SDK and officially support applications. Yes, it will be seamless. Why is it lame for Apple not to support hacked iPhones with 3rd party applications? How does it make any sense at all for Apple to support them? It doesn't. It's impractical and retarded. Apple's not going to stop iPhone development dead in it's tracks for a few hacked iPhones.

"They're stifling innovation, not encouraging it."

Whatever helps you sleep at night. Nothing could be farther from the truth. If they were stifling innovation, there wouldn't be so much drivel written about an "iPhone killer."

"But it's far from an invention."

It's not an invention, it's an innovation. They might not have invented every single piece of technology in the iPhone, but they did a damn good job putting it all together and giving it a great interface. That's what Apple does. It's the same thing they did with the Macintosh and the iPod. They just build a better product with a better user experience. Get over it.

Ok, i have an iphone and i take it with me everywhere. I have my movies, tv shows on it. my email is always with me. safari is great.
BUT...the iphone is apple's first entry into the mobile phone world. What about 3G data speeds?? yeah, people want a 3G iphone. steve jobs announced back in january that a 3G iphone would come in the future.
Some things I would like to see included in their next model:
-more memory. say, 25GB??
-High speed data
-Better battery life. It's fine now but it could be better.

I think those are the things that consumers are looking forward to.
TIME can name the iphone "invention of the year". but what if apple releases the next generation of the iphone at macworld in january 2008? this time next year, will the newer iphone be the best invention of 2008? Cell phone manufacturers are taking note of the iphone's strengths and weaknesses. Though they may not replicate the multi-touch interface. there are phones out there right now that rival the iphone. If apple keeps on truckin, they'll keep being loved.
I say iphone should be invention of the year. i wanna see the cover of that magazine.

Never seen one in person but the technology for this was out there. I think it is awesome, cool, but not greatest and there was a lot of deception in the initial release leading many to disappointment. No points from me on incredible marketing. Very glad I didnt get stuck with the ones whose battery doesnt come out, what a step backwards. A magazine like Popular Science or even deeper, Scientific American, I would like to see what they would pick or if there even were any outstanding developments this year, 'that your average Time reader would understand'. I dont look to Time when I want an evaluation of technology and insights into developments in Pure Science. The most amazing thing that happened this year concerning Apple is they actually dropped the price on something in the course of a year. To me that was totally unexpected and the first time Apple ever behaved like they were a normal company. This may be an even greater move than releasing the phone itself. I will now look to Apple for products in the future, I never would have before just as I have always tried to avoid anything Sony.