Say it ain’t so Ted, Say it ain’t so!

By Submitted Article

submitted by Trish Clark

After waiting for over a year while our American counterparts drooled over the iphone, Ted Rogers announced Apr 29^th that Rogers would be bringing in the iphone sometime this year. 

Nothing has been announced as to officially when or how much it will cost but techies have been waiting for this for a very long tme. Rumor has it that part of the delay was caused by Apples pending release of a newer faster 3g  Apple iphone (note 3g allows for faster data but does not impact calls). Data speeds and packages have long been a sticky point with Rogers they tend not to like the unlimited data that Steve Jobs and iphone desire. Rogers has long had very expensive data plans and with a phone geared to data use like the iphone that has made it hard to bring in.

But Rogers has also had time to wait being the only carrier for now capable of carrying the iphone. But as customers get more and more impatient and unlocked black market iphones becoming more popular the time was now for Rogers to jump in. 

Apple has already faced an uphill struggle as the name iphone was previously trademarked by another company Comcave telecom out of Toronto. But that was soon dealt with.   

So be happy Canadian’s we will soon have the coveted iphone. The iphone first came to the United States June of 2007 and the lineups for it were massive. Its fancy touch screen interface made it a hit with the techno crowd. The biggest advantage the iphone has is its data capabilities.  Data usage on the iphone is thought to be 30 times higher then on any other phone. With its Safari web browser full html web surfing is easy. So imagine being able to watch those Youtube videos on your phone in amazing clarity and colour. Or get your email (yahoo or gmail) and view those excel files or PDF files without being in front of your desktop computer, with full synchronization with your Microsoft products. Blackberry users can already do a lot of this but there is no doubt this will give them some strong competition.  A 2.0 mega pixel camera and full picture viewing makes this a very fun phone.

It does have its down side though; the headset is not unlike those you find with the ipod but of course with a microphone. Making it hard to use like a regular phone held against you ear. There is a 3.5mm headset jack and of course Bluetooth is always an option. Of course Apples lack of a decent battery is still a problem with this phone and many people in the States had to get it replaced in the first few months of use. It is built in similar to the ipod so replacement is not easy. But there is an external battery available after market. There is also no place for a memory card but does come with 16GB.

The iphone comes with a sim card that is only activated through itunes so you can not put in another sim card when you travel overseas. Forcing you to use your Rogers sim card while traveling wracking up heavy roaming fees when calling.

But even the drawbacks have done little or nothing to squelch the popularity of the iphone,  within 30hrs of being on sale in the States over 270,000 had been sold and big numbers were also seen in Germany and the UK when it launched there so it is going to be nothing but popular when it comes to Canada whenever that maybe.

Trish Clark is the owner of North Central Communications.  You can reach her  via e-mail: Trish@northcentralcommunications.ca or visit  their website http://northcentralcommunications.ca

Email | Print | Facebook | Twitter | Digg | Del.icio.us