'You' Is iPhone's Secret Sauce

Apple put a little bit of "You" in the secret recipe. Perhaps that's why Mobile Me could replace .Mac next week. Apple understands the importance of "You"—and that ingredient is missing from most other cell phones trying to compete with iPhone.

Competitors have tried to imitate iPhone's success by focusing on the touch screen. But it's the wrong feature. Touch screen isn't new. For example, Treo users have had touch UIs for years.

Apple caught onto something more fundamental about the cell phone and baked it into every iPhone feature. The cell phone is a highly personal device, perhaps the most personal anybody carries. Behind that "personal" quality, there also is emotional context, which Apple drew out by the way people interact with the device. People indifferent to flip or candybar phones love their iPhone. Apple's mobile means something to them.

Other successful cell phones share similar attributes. Take the T-Mobile Sidekick, a fav of teen and twentysomething texters. Sidekick is very personal and fosters interpersonal relationships. Most Sidekick users I know are very attached to their mobiles. BlackBerry is another example. It's called Crackberry for a reason. The device allows people to stay connected through e-mail for business or pleasure. BlackBerry users have a sense of purpose, of belonging through their connectivity.

RIM understands. The Economist arrived in the mail today. One full-page ad begins with tagline: "Life on BlackBerry." Other marketing text: "Connect to everything you love through the power of a BlackBerry smartphone' and "BlackBerry: The object of your desires." The emphasis is You.

Both cell phones have huge shortcomings, which many of its users simply ignore. Sidekick is bulky, and it's heavy at 7 ounces. While Blackberry is great for e-mail, other connectivity features are acceptable but not as good. That's just the shortlist.

The first-version iPhone is chock full of shortcomings that many of its fanatics also overlook:

• High price, with no carrier subsidy, but two-year contractual agreement
• Glass screen is easily damaged but AT&T offers no insurance contract
• 2G connectivity is too slow; Wi-Fi isn't good enough alternative
• So-so 2MP camera and no video capability
• Fixed battery
• No Flash support
• No wireless sync option

That's the shortlist. In more than a dozen ways I can identify, iPhone 1.0 features fall far short of many competing devices, like the AT&T Tilt, HTC Touch Diamond or Nokia N95. But what features Apple packed into iPhone work exceptionally well and in intimately personal ways. Apple chose to offer less, but done better, and more meaningful features. Many competing devices pack in more features, and too many that aren't necessary. For example, my N95 has a barcode reader. Like I really need that.

With iPhone 1.0, Apple made personal content the priority: Music, photos and videos and the Web. Pictures and music are highly personal. A friend of mine bought an iPhone about six weeks ago. Last week, he told me about going to a trade show and showing off pictures of his wife and kids on the iPhone. "I just love it," he said. He replaced the AT&T 8525 with iPhone. "It was just too hard for me to use," he said.

Google Maps, weather information and YouTube videos provide information or entertainment that also is personally relevant—and Apple made the stuff drop-dead easy to get at. Comparison: To get weather information on my N95, which is unlocked and not service integrated with my carrier, I must click the Web icon, choose AT&T Internet from a menu, click Bookmarks and choose AT&T MediaNet. On iPhone, I tap a weather icon to get the same information. The iPhone emphasizes important things to You and makes them easy to get at.

Apple also gave iPhone personality—semblance of life by having it respond to the user. Flipping the phone sideways turns the screen horizontal. The UI sleeps when the device is brought to the face. There's a magical, endearing quality about these features.

Then there is the multitouch screen, which significance isn't just touch. Human beings are tool users, we instinctively use our hands and fingers. Look at how people respond to beautiful things. They look, and then they immediately reach out and touch. The iPhone goes farther with touch because of what people manipulate: Things that are personally important to them, such as photos and music, or even Google Map directions to some place they want to go. Resizing a photo of a lover or child with the fingers is intimate because of touch. The interaction helps to make the device more personal; it endears people to iPhone.

Perhaps iPhone's deficiencies are part of the reason there is so much ridiculous hype about v2. People want more. My prediction: Whatever else Apple does, iPhone 2.0 will be more personal than the original. It's all because of You.

Posted by Joe Wilcox on June 6, 2008 6:53 PM