It’s tough when you’re the world’s best maker of any damn thing you want to put your mind to and an ‘i’ in front of.
You’ve already got zillions of customers using current and older versions of your technologies, many of whom you’d love to have upgrade to the latest and greatest version when it next becomes available, while being delighted users of what they've got now.
That means the next version has to be a big improvement on the last one, a release that delivers all those improvements in a consistently easy to use manner, as happens with with every new OS and hardware version.
When changes are seen as evolutionary, rather than revolutionary, as was the case with the iPhone 4S and 4, or the iPhone 3GS and 3G, there’s always some disappointment that there isn’t some awesome new case design or shape, and then when that new design comes, there are those who love it, those who don’t, and those who wish it was more like the old design.
However, when we come to what is the new iPhone 5, up against quality smartphones like the Galaxy Note, Note 2 and Galaxy SIII from Samsung, or the HTC One series, the fact is that whatever Apple launches, at whatever screen size (be it 3.75-inch, 3.95-inches, 4-inches or 4.surprise!-inches), that new iPhone must be equipped and programmed with some cool, "only Apple-has-it" or "does-it-best" iPhone software and hardware features.
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And because people have this expectation they’re going to be sent into an iGasmic frenzy of eCstatic proportions by whatever Apple releases - and even more so if it’s universe-altering-ly and ultrasonically amazing beyond expectation and imagination – at least by some – this is the reason why there has been a pause in new iPhone sales.
This is because people are waiting it out a bit longer for Apple’s next amazing device, rather than bite the bullet on an iPhone 4S now that you might well be stuck on for the next 24 months while everyone else is on iHappy St, and your iHappy St is it a teensy bit sadder that it’s now last year’s model because you were impatient.
Marketwatch quoted Apple’s earnings call, where Apple CFO, Peter Oppenheimer, acknowledging anticipation over a new iPhone, along with “speculation” and “rumours” was causing a slow down in current iPhone model sales, stated: “We are reading the same things as you about expectations for a new iPhone. We think this has caused some pause in customer purchasing.”
Apple CEO Tim Cook also referred to Oppenheimer’s comments, showing that both men fully understand the situation, and while neither was willing to prematurely confirm any new iPhone details of any kind, Tim Cook did state that: “I am fairly convinced that there's an incredible anticipation out there for a future product”, with both looking forward to the new iOS 6 arriving “in the fall”, which is the Australian spring.
The thing is, in general, a future better product is always coming in the next model, so Apple is only admitting the barest minimum of the absolute obvious and the already announced when it comes to its “future iProduct”.
Clearly, until there’s an iPhone 5 announcement, there’s no iPhone 5 on sale – only the 4S, 4 and 3GS, and given the fact many are waiting for the iPhone 5, there’s naturally not as many existing models selling fast as when the iPhone 4S was first released.
However, Marketwatch points out, as it looks at things from a financial point of view, and which is the reason why we’re looking at Apple’s Earnings financial call with analysts – this means an entire quarter of “slumping iPhone sales”.
It also means the rumour mill could go into overdrive, pumping up the iPhone 5 to get some unbelievably AMAZING new features like the following, which we probably won’t see until the iPhone 7 or iPhone 10, if we’re lucky...
These super-advanced features could be like a:
- hive-structured-giga-core processor with sensory field distorting “hyper-reality" graphics engine,
- built-in holographic projector of the “Help me Obi-Wan” variety but in, like, IntraViolet NanoScopic 3HoloD,
- the ability to transform its shape in three revolutionary ways:
- 1) an arm band snap-on configuration that lets the iPhone be easily portable without a pocket, which can...
- 2) with a twist, transform into a pair of wrap around and somehow very cool looking info-glasses to make Google Glass look primitive
- 3) with yet another twist turn into large screen smartphone/tablet of an achievable and convenient size that merges with delivering the two other transformations this revolutionarily adaptable device requires
- and powered by a new positronic battery chemistry that harnesses the raw energy of electrons as they spin around the nucleus through a revolutionary new technique called “Tachyon Tunneling”.
These and other features that can be easily dreamt up clearly won’t be arriving with this year’s iPhone 5 no matter how hot the rumour mill runs, but three months is a long time for rumours to build before the new iPhone is available.
That said, everyone raises the bar high on Apple products in the first place because of Apple's track record, yet Marketwatch points out the danger that Apple might end up with “the bar higher than even it can achieve”.
The thing is, unless Apple does something completely unexpected that flops spectacularly, which has about as much a chance of happening as the universe’s first genuine attempt at swimming across the surface of the sun, Apple knows this and has prepared something really special.
After all, Apple kicked off the iRevolution with the first iPhone in 2007, and everyone else has been scrambling to catch up since.
While Google has made great strides in catching up to iOS with its Android OS Jelly Bean 4.1.1, which is a very smooth operating system on what is absolutely the very best Android tablet I’ve ever tried, (and I’ve tried a few), and while the Nexus 7 and JB 4.1.1 are a real testament to the amazing power, skills and resources at Google’s disposal, Apple's iDevices are the ones the world is madly iDreaming about owning!
Meanwhile, iOS 6.0 promises to be incredibly amazing too, with secret features presumably still to come along with iPhone 5-only capabilities, and this coupled with the lead Apple still has in the quality app stakes, let alone the quantity apps stakes – while competitors may well be undoubtedly catching up, "Kermit the Apple" is leapfrogging ahead once again!
“The iWait might not be worth it”, some will say, “buy now a 4S or SIII or HTC or something else instead!”.
Well, you could do that. Indeed, you can do anything you want. The question is, what do you want?
Does the foreknowledge of a future Apple product and the desire to own one, while needing or simply wanting a new phone now needle your brain like a splinter in the mind? Or has your mind broken free of the iMatrix, only to be in the gMatrix of a Droidish brother from a Googlish mother?
The iPhone 5. At this stage it’s a smartphone with specs that loosk like it'll match all the NFC bits and quad-core bobs other Android smartphones have with what Apple fans say is a “superior” OS and app environment.
Unless Apple goes one step further somewhere swish, the next major smartphones will all have quad-core processors, multi-core graphics, at least 1GB RAM, NFC, GPS, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, multi-touch, Facebook, Twitter, Voice, video, apps, wallet, browser, Cloud integration, 4-inch+ screens and anything else I’ve missed that all modern smartphones have.
How Apple reality-distorts all that along with its case design and everything else into a pan-galactic, hyper-dimensional, transfat-free event is all part of the magic, along with the magical surprise of that highly expected iPad Mini announcement too - let alone new iPod Touch models, new iMacs, new Mac Minis and a new MacBook Pro 13 with Retina.
So, until it all starts in late September or early October, we’re just going to have to keep on enjoying all the amazing pre-iMatch entertainment!
