But how about a software upgrade for your car or truck?

General Motors cars have had PCMs (Powertrain Control Modules) for a very long time. In fact, the first GM car to get it was the 1990 Geo Storm (why they chose that car and not a Cadillac is anyone’s guess..) This is a programmable module that’s inside your vehicle.

If your GM car or truck is a 1996 or newer, you can easily check to see if there are available updates for the PCM at http://calid.gm.com. It costs nothing to check.

All you need is your VIN.

How to use:

1. Enter your VIN and click the “Get CAL ID” button.
2. From the next screen select “PCM/VCM Powertrain/Vehicle Control Module”, then click the Next button at the bottom right.

You will see any available updates for your GM vehicle. Each choice next to “Module:” is clickable. You only have to click once on each section to see what updates are there.

If you like, you can print out the pages, bring it to the dealership and have the updates applied. Cost varies greatly depending on what needs to be updated.

Can you apply these updates yourself?

Yes but it’s not recommended. While it’s true all you need is a laptop and an OBD-II connector cable, you will need to acquire the update and use special expensive software. Furthermore, if you fail to update properly, the vehicle will literally not start.

Updates of this type are best left to the dealership.

Apparently, I horrified one of our regular readers. Reese (known as reesethepiece) in our PCMech LIVE chatroom, sent in an email on the topic that I thought was good enough to be a guest post here on PCMech. So, here is that email.

Reese here (reesethepiece on PCMech Live).  I read your iPhone article and was horrified.  Just last Friday, I treated myself to a brand new LG Voyager.  The phone is amazing.  It’s an iPhone with all the holes fixed. When I broke it down, there were four main flaws with the iPhone that were keeping me from canceling my current contract with Verizon and switching to AT&T and getting an iPhone:

1. The iPhone’s battery is shit.  I apologize for the language, but there is simply no other accurate way of putting it.  I was in New York yesterday and decided that I had to go to the huge glass Apple Store there.  I talked to the sales guy about this and he said that the only reason that the iPhone’s battery has such a short life is because it has to send/receive email so often, and that with the iPhone 3G, the server will push email to the phone, lightening it’s load and improving battery.  Well, that’s pretty much a lie.  I guess it might improve, but I use email on my LG Voyager and it does just fine.  Yes, I’m sure that the battery will improve, but it definitely won’t be epic.
2. When people make calls on the iPhone, they accidentally press buttons.  Again, I talked to the salesperson and they said that the keypad locks up when you make a call.  Well, he obviously had no idea what he was talking about, because when you make a call on the iPhone, there are seven buttons that you can press: mute, keypad, volume, add call, hold, contacts, and end call.  Can you imagine accidentally muting a call in the middle of it? Or putting your boss (doesn’t really apply to you) on hold?  It would be awful.  On the LG Voyager, as soon as you place a call, the phone locks up (the Voyager has a “touch to unlock” picture of a lock on the touch screen which is equivalent to the “slide to unlock” feature on the iPhone) and then if you press it–which believe me, you can’t accidentally touch it during a call–you get access to those kinds of options, including the keypad.
3. Typing is hell.  How long did you use the on-screen keyboard on the iPhone in the store?  Did you find it easy?  That thing is possibly one of the worst features of any electronic device I’ve ever used.  On the LG Voyager, the phone flips open to give you another screen (non-touch) plus a full QWERTY keyboard that makes typing a flash.
4. 30 bucks a month? How about half that? You can get the same plan as an iPhone with unlimited data (minus the 300 text messages, but I have 5000 and would have payed for it either way) for only $15 extra per month, unlike the 30 that is required on the iPhone.

I guess that I had better tell you the few things that I do like better about the iPhone, though:

• The touch aspect of the screen is a little more responsive
• It uses WiFi when available
• It has a sleeker UI, but there is actually an iPhone theme for the Voyager

Sure, you could go and put multitouch on there, but I think that this is another one of the clunky features on the iPhone. Zooming in the browser is hard because the surface of the screen is so unslick.

Another one of the awesome things about the Voyager is that I can almost guarantee you that sometime in the near future, the browser will support flash.  You see, the phone actually does support Flash, just not in the browser.  So, I would bet you that somewill will write a plugin or something that will unleash the beaty of the web on the Voyager (I feel like such a nerd now!).

I hope you’ll think it over or at least visit a Verizon store to check out the LG Voyager (or similar Samsung Glyde, but I haven’t used it so I can’t tell you how good it is).  I hate to say it, but neither of those phones are available through Alltel, so you would still have to cancel your contract with them.  However, Verizon does let you “Test Drive The Network” for 30 days, so that might be worth your while.  Also, I just wanted to let you know that there really is no bias here, as it’s coming from a pretty big Apple fan.  And as I said, I was about to get an iPhone myself, but I sure am glad that I didn’t!

Thanks for your time Dave.

He later sent in an addendum, making noting that he may be incorrect on the data plan pricing:

I was walking by a store today and they had an advertisement for a plan that gave you unlimited email and web (like I was talking about) for $30 a month, like the iPhone, not $15. Someone at a store told me that it was 15, but she must have been talking about something else.

So, despite the possible inaccuracy on the plan pricing, the overriding point here is that perhaps the Iphone isn’t the best game in town.

The Iphone certainly has more social buzz behind it than any other phone. This is, no doubt, because of the superb marketing skills of Apple. Yes, the phone is revolutionary in many respects, but Apple’s marketing has no doubt increased (or perhaps created) the furor that surrounds the device.

A lot of companies are coming out with contenders to the Iphone. Many are probably going to surpass the Iphone in features. The Iphone has raised the bar of what people expect from a smartphone.

In the end, it still comes down to preference. At this point, I still prefer to go with the Iphone. I have personally used it (albiet in the Apple store) and I thought it was easy to use. I have not tried speaking on it, so I cannot speak to the suggestion that you accidentally press buttons when talking. Any Iphone users out there, is this true?

I welcome feedback from real Iphone users. I posted Reese’s opinion, but I’m still left pondering the purchase. Can you shed any light?

But, all in all, what is the real cost of switching to the Iphone?

As I sat in the mall yesterday with my family, I had about 10 minutes of downtime to myself. So, sitting in the Food Court, I broke out my Palm Treo powered by Windows Mobile. Try to view a regular webpage with Pocket Internet Explorer? Fail. Wanted to find a way to Twitter a photo? Fail. While trying, switching between running applications on the device is, well, failure. All in all, Windows Mobile just DEFINES what it means to be clunky and hard to use. Sure, I like the QWERTY keyboard, but the software isn’t good.

Well, the mall I was at happens to have an Apple store. So, my wife and I went in and checked out the Iphone. Comparatively, the Iphone is just a breeze to use. The screen quality is superior. It allows me to do things which I cannot do on my Palm Treo (or if I can, it is too damn hard to figure it out). The ultimate test is the wife test. I’m happy to report my wife figured things out pretty well. At one point, she showed ME how to do something on the Iphone. My wife isn’t exactly a techie. Far from it, in fact.

So, it is official. I want an Iphone and intend to switch. But, when and how much will it cost?

The True Cost

The new Iphone is going to debut at $199 for the 8 GB version and $299 for the 16 GB version. Now, these phones are probably easily $800+ devices. The only reason you’re getting it so cheap is because of the 2 year AT&T contract that you HAVE to use to take advantage of the phone.

When you go to buy any cell phone from a carrier, you get a steep discount on the phone when you get a contract with it. This is how the carrier makes their money. If you get no contract, you end up paying retail for the phone. Well, Apple isn’t selling the Iphone at retail. You can only get it at the cheaper rate, which means the phone is subsidized.

So, you not only have to use AT&T, you’re very likely going to HAVE to activate the phone with AT&T before you even leave the store with the new Iphone 3G. No more online activation. AT&T is also talking about enacting penalties if the user doesn’t activate the phone within the first 30 days.

The AT&T plans are reasonable. You pick any voice plan you want and then you’ll tack on an additional $30 for the data plan so that you can take advantage of the Iphone features.

Despite the reasonable plans, though, they sure to hustle you in there whether you like it or not.

But, Is the Phone The Only Cost?

If you have a contract with another carrier besides AT&T, expect to pay an early termination fee. I am currently with Alltel. My wife is also with Alltel and we have a family plan. Alltel will charge us $200 PER LINE to cancel our contract. That’s an additional $400 just to switch to AT&T.

What’s more: I didn’t even buy my wife’s phone from Alltel. So, it isn’t like they have costs of the phone to make up for. They’ve MADE their money with us. I’ve been with Alltel for several years now. The fact that they want to stiff me for $400 really rubs me the wrong way.

So, if I picked up an iPhone for my wife and I, that will be $400 for the two phones. An additional $400 to get out of Alltel and we’re looking at a total cost of $800 - BEFORE my first month bill from AT&T.

The War Over Early Termination Fees

There have been a number of lawsuits against wireless carriers for their termination fees. A lot of people have been in an uproar about it. So much so that that there is a bill in front of Congress called the Cell Phone Consumer Empowerment Act of 2007. The bill wouldn’t get rid of termination fees, but it would reduce them. The bill says:

Requires that early termination fees be prorated over the term of a wireless subscriber’s contract in a way that reasonably links the fee to recovery of the cost of the device or other legitimate business expenses.

This would serve to make the fees more reasonable and would tie to the term of the contract which has been fulfilled. AT&T has proactively announced that they will do pro-rated ETFs. Verizon submitted a proposal to the FCC to allow consumers to cancel wireless contracts without ETFs and to prorate fees. Verizon’s proposal wasn’t altruistic, though. They want the FCC to stop the lawsuits. Other speculate that AT&T and Verizon are only doing this because they know they’ll be more likely to benefit as people defect from other carriers.

Unfortunately, the Congressional bill looks to be completely stalled (what else is new, right?).

Let’s Simplify Wireless

Here is the official proposal of David Risley (that’s me):

1. People buy the phone they want at retail cost (no subsidy)
2. People can pick and choose any carrier they want.
3. No contracts. You pay month-to-month, and if you want to switch, you do so.
4. If this invites people who switch all the time and this is a lot of cost to the carrier, charge a small fee to transfer the phone number.

But, the key here is no contracts. Then, even if Apple ties something like the Iphone to one carrier, people are free to make the move if they want to.

In the meantime, I am left pondering whether to (a) wait until April 2009 when my contract expires, (b) reduce Alltel down to some paltry sum and pay it until the contract is out while also paying AT&T, (c) bite the $800 and switch us both.

There is certainly little freedom in this business.

UPDATE 3:20 PM
Just spotted this blog post over on Gizmodo saying that you WILL be able to leave the store with an un-activated Iphone 3G but that you will need to sign an agreement promising to activate a 2-year AT&T contract within 30 days. My response? Heheheehehhe.

In a way, I do this. I blog regularly both here at PCMech and on DavidRisley.com. I am a regular user of Twitter and have been known to send in “tweets” even while using my cell phone when I am not in the office. I use FriendFeed and love the site because it aggregates all of these various activities into a single feed.

One gaping hole for me, however, was in how to take advantage of the camera in my cell phone to post photos and/or videos while I’m the go. Well, I found an easy way to do it.

I am using a Palm Treo 700W. This is a pokey old Windows Mobile powered phone. I’m not too fond of it and the interface is pure crap when compared to something like the Iphone. But, it DOES have a camera and it is a smartphone. So, I should be able to post pictures to my Flickr gallery, right? Well, the answer is yes, but I didn’t know how to make the link easily.

Until I came across Shozu.

Shozu really helps your cell phone become an easy extension to your computer when it comes to lifestreaming. Some of the things you can do with Shozu include:

• Upload photos and videos to the Internet. This includes posting to photo sharing sites, blogs or various social networks. You can even post videos to Youtube from your phone.
• Get your friends photos automatically sent to your phone so you can see what they see.
• Change your statuses across social networks
• Geo-tag your photos (if you have integrated GPS)

A full list of sites supported by Shozu can be found here.

So, here is what I did to get set up and start sending photos to Flickr from my Palm Treo.

1. On your phone, go to http://m.shozu.com.
2. You’ll see a link to download the Shozu software. You will need to choose the model of phone you have.
3. Install the software.
4. Start the Shozu software.
5. You’ll see an option for “Add Sites”. Click it. Choose the site you want to add (in my case, I chose Flickr).
6. Enter your email address.
7. In a few minutes, you will get an email from Shozu. You will need to click that link, set up an account on Shozu and then you will be promoted to authorize Shozu to access your Flickr account.
8. Once set up, just go back to your phone, snap a photo. You’ll get an option to send it to Flickr, with ability to set the title, description and tags.

Shozu also allows you to set up “CC Sites”. CC is carbon copy (just like email) and this means you can set up ways to send the same photo, status update, etc to multiple sites simultaneously.

Have fun!

The Big Three in this field are Google, Microsoft and Yahoo.

Let’s take a look at each.

Google

Site: http://www.google.com/mobile/

This is what you can currently do on mobile with Google:

• Search (duh)
• Maps
• Gmail
• SMS
• YouTube
• GOOG-411
• Calendar
• News
• Picasa (photo sharing)
• Blogger
• Reader
• Docs
• Sync (sync to a Blackberry)
• Notebook

Microsoft

Site: http://mobile.msn.com

This is what you get with MSN mobile:

• Mobile Web (MSN homepage)
• Search
• Hotmail
• MSNBC (news)
• Weather
• MSN Money (stock quotes and so on)
• FOX Sports
• Entertainment (movie showtimes, current gossip, etc.)
• Local (maps, listings)
• Spaces (blogging)
• Messenger (instant messaging)

Yahoo

Site: http://mobile.yahoo.com

This is what you get with Yahoo mobile:

• Go (meant to be used as a starting point)
• oneSearch (search)
• oneConnect (connects different and multiple messenger accounts, instant messaging)
• onePlace (sort of like a bookmark/favorite type of thing)
• Widget Gallery (allows for custom programmed stuff such as MySpace, eBay and so on)
• Mobile Homepage
• Mail
• Messenger
• Local (maps)
• Flickr
• News
• Weather
• Finance
• Sports
• Entertainment

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As of right now, the brand that has the best mobility is Yahoo. It has widget support. It can connect to multiple instant messaging accounts. It has Flickr which is what most people use for photo sharing.

Yahoo Mobile promotes “digital life” better than anyone else at the moment because it shares out what counts. The goal of mobility is to stay connected when you’re on the go. Yahoo is doing that better than everyone else.

I have to emphasize the “right now” aspect of this. Mobile computing is literally advancing almost every 3 to 6 months. In other words, a very rapid pace. The only thing that is slowing everyone down is not the development but the hardware. Smartphones still use relatively slow processors and have a limited amount of memory to work with. The reason? There’s only one - to extend battery life.

Not to worry - processor manufacturers are hard at work developing chips that will consume less power and be faster for tomorrow’s smartphones. Watch for it.

Ouch.

The sales representative then asked me why I wanted to cancel. I told him cost was a concern and I didn’t feel I was getting my money’s worth.

Then I found out there not one but three ultra-low-cost post-paid plans available. These are listed nowhere on the Verizon Wireless web site (and if they are, please post a link because I couldn’t find them.)

These are absolute basic no-frills plans with next to nothing in them, just so you’re aware. And bear in mind that yes, these are post-paid plans, not pre-paid (more on that in a moment.)

$34.99 a month

• 300 anytime minutes.
• Unlimited nights and weekends
• Free long distance in the continental US

$25.00 a month

• 100 anytime minutes
• 500 night and weekend minutes

$20.00 a month

• 50 anytime minutes
• 100 night and weekend minutes

A post-paid plan for $20 a month? Believe it. Verizon has it. Granted, it’s not even an hour’s worth of talk-time per month, but the fact of the matter is that YES, you can go that cheap on a post-paid plan. If you’re the type that only uses a cell phone for calling AAA and emergencies, this is perfect for you.

But you have to ask for it.

I was only informed of these plans due to the fact I mentioned cost was a concern.

A few notes on pre-paid plans

A PCMech reader once noted that the best way to go cheap with a cell phone is to go T-Mobile and buy a 1000-minute card that’s good for 1 year. And he was right.

It is in fact the absolute lowest you can go price-wise for a cell phone. Assuming you don’t go over the 1000 minutes in the year, you get a little over 75 minutes a month. The cost translates to under 8 bucks a month (not including the price of the phone itself or overages if any.)

1. Set route preference for quickest and not shortest

In the vast majority of GPS devices you have two options for route preference; the quickest or the shortest.

One would assume the shortest is better for saving gas.

Not necessarily.

There are times when the shortest route from point A to B includes many side streets filled with stop signs that increase the stop’n'go and waste fuel rather than save it.

Usually it is better to set your GPS unit to quickest route preference.

2. Use waypoints, use them often

In most GPS units these are called locations or favorites. No matter what they are called, they’re waypoints.

You have the ability to mark hundreds of waypoints in any GPS device. Mark all the locations you normally go to including home (obviously), work, the grocery, any shops/stores you visit and so on.

When running errands or the like, use the GPS to go from place to place you have marked even if you’ve been to these places 1000 times before. Being that the GPS is set to quickest route preference it will most likely introduce to you new ways to get to these places in less periods of time; this saves fuel.

3. Try alternative routes

This tip is for commuters specifically that use highways to get to and from work.

Chances are that there is always one specific section of the highway that gets blocked up and/or bottlenecked every day. During this time the highway turns into a parking lot and you’re sitting there with the engine idling and wasting gas.

You can avoid this entirely by usually taking the exit ramp right before the spot that always gets blocked up, then take non-highway roads to get home or skirt around the bottleneck then re-enter the highway.

The way in which to do this is easy. Just use waypoints.

For example, if you wanted to use the method when you exit then re-enter the highway, the first waypoint would be the exit ramp and the second waypoint the entrance ramp after the bottleneck.

Under most circumstances this will save fuel because you’re keeping the car moving. Granted, this doesn’t always work but hey, it doesn’t hurt to try.

But, you want a little more detail, perhaps. Fine, I’ll provide it. Warning: don’t expect me to benchmark this machine. I’ll leave that to the countless others who have already done it. I’m a practical guy. I USE the machine to get work done and it is from that perspective that I review it now.

The Specs

I picked up the “entry” level 15″ model. I call it “entry”, but it is anything but. There is a reason it has the “Pro” label in it’s name. Those specs:

• 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo (Penryn)
• 2 GB of PC2-5300 DDR2 memory
• 800 MHz front-side bus
• 200 GB hard drive
• 8X slot-loading Superdrive
• Nvidia GeForce 8600M GT graphics, 256 MB memory, dual-link DVI
• 15″ antiglare TFT display at 1440×900 native resolution.
• 1 Firewire 400, 1 Firewire 800, 2 USB ports, ExpressCard
• Integrated wireless, Ethernet and Bluetooth
• Backlit keyboard, multi-touch trackpad

Usage

When I first bought this notebook, I cranked it up and ran through the setup wizard for OS X Leopard. No problems at all. Once into the desktop, I was immediately at home in OS X. Since I had been using a Mac Pro for a while before buying this laptop, it was nice to be able to have a mobile equivalent to it. I was using a Vista-powered HP laptop before this (yuck).

When buying this notebook, I decided to get the anti-glare screen. It was a wise move. The glossy screen looks quite nice inside, but outside usage of the glossy screen is no picnic. My prior laptop had a gorgeous glossy screen on it, but it was really hard to use outside (even when I was in the shade on my back porch). The image on the anti-glare screen is very, very nice and I have no complaints at all. And the fact that I can see what I’m doing when I’m out on the porch is really convenient.

I also really dig having a larger screen resolution. Packing 1440×900 onto a 15″ screen is something you would think would make it hard to read. Not at all. In fact, again, my prior laptop only went up to 1280×800 and I wished it could have gone larger. The native resolution on this MacBook Pro provides for plenty of workspace. Of course, combine that with Spaces (built into OS X) and you’re going to have plenty of space.

The engineering of this laptop is great. It is easy and light to carry around (lighter than my prior HP laptop). The speakers sound quite good for being so low profile. The Isight camera provides great imagery while being super small. When I am doing live streaming shows from the MacBook, it really is amazing that so many people are watching me out of what seems like a tiny pinhole on my computer. The omni-directional microphone picks me up quite well (so I’m told) and you cannot even see it.

The speed of the laptop is more than enough. I’ve edited videos on it in Imovie. I’ve done live streaming video to UStream with it. I’ve watched movies. I’ve done some in-depth web programming on it. I’ve run Windows on it inside VMWare Fusion. And, yes, I’ve done some of these things at the same time. It just takes what I dish at it.

A Video

What I Like

When you pay $1,999 for a laptop, you expect to like pretty much everything about it. And I do. There are a few things I’d change (which I’ll go over below), but first let me sum up what I particularly like about the MacBook Pro:

• Nice screen resolution
• Firewire support is handy
• Slim design and easy to carry around
• Backlit keyboard is awesome and keyboard has a nice feel to it. Even my wife commented on the feeling of the keyboard and she doesn’t much care about computers.
• Fast and takes everything I dish at it

What I Don’t Like

I think the price for this unit is fair, however I would like to see Apple offer a more competitive warranty with the unit without additional charges. The AppleCare plan is great, but they charge you more money for it. Out of box, they only provide a 90 day warranty. That just isn’t enough for a laptop. If you’re going to buy a MacBook or MacBook Pro, I suggest you spring for the AppleCare plan.

Secondly, the unit only comes with 2 USB ports. Additionally, the placement of those ports isn’t very good. The one on the left side is fine, but the one on the right side is not well placed. If you use a USB mouse and are right-handed, you then have the USB plug hanging out right where the mouse would usually go. If you use something larger than a mouse in that right slot, it would be even more in the way. The right-side USB port would have been better placed on the left side or on the rear of the unit.

Same goes for the DVI port. Again, if you’re using the trackpad, it is fine. If you want to use a traditional 2 button mouse, anything hanging out on the right side will get in the way potentially.

The Verdict Is…

I suspect you already know. This is an awesome laptop. If you want to use OS X rather than Windows (or perhaps both) and want a laptop powerful enough to keep up with actual work, the MacBook Pro is the one to get.

The MacBook is, too, a great unit. But, I played with it in the store and there was a noticeable performance difference between it and the Pro. You’re also getting a 13″ screen which is something I didn’t want as my primary notebook computer.

This is all going to be changing, though.

The Interface

Cell phones typically have the worse software interfaces ever designed by man. For instance, I am using a phone powered by Windows Mobile 6. The thing is just bad - no other way to put it. Navigating the web is a horrible experience. Pages look unreadable if they are not designed for mobile phones (which most aren’t). Multi-tasking sucks (every programs stays open unless you force it to quit). Aside from phone functions (obviously) and basic web tasks like checking email, I don’t want to use my mobile phone to do much of anything.

Apple’s Iphone represents a drastic sea change. The Iphone is based on OS X and has the slickest interface I have ever seen on a phone. It isn’t just pretty, it is extremely functional.

The Iphone represents where mobile devices are going. But, Apple isn’t the only company thinking ahead.

Google Leads The Charge

Google is playing a large role in more ways than one. A big part of their equation is Google Android. Android is a new software platform for the mobile phone that is completely open source. That essentially makes it the anti-Apple of the mobile world. So, what is Google doing to change the face of the mobile industry?

• Google, along with some other internet companies, convinced the Federal Communications Commission to require that any company which won the auction for the 700MHz wireless spectrum allow consumers to openly use the network with any wireless device they choose. Since that time, Verizon has gone to win that auction and will thus control this bandwidth, however they will need to permit others to use the network. Google, for it’s part, really only made the bid in order to open up what would have been an otherwise closed wireless network. A win for Google and the industry as a whole.
• Google’s Android platform will bring mobile phones into open source - two words which would have never before been in the same sentence with mobile phone. Now, the thing to understand here is that Android is a platform, not an operating system. This means we’re going to see a bunch of different flavors of phones all running Android but looking and acting very differently. Android, though, is being developed to allow open development for the platform, a very different approach than Apple has taken with the Iphone. It is even going to allow developer access to the hardware, such as the built-in GPS, camera, wi-fi, bluetooth, etc. This is going to lead to some incredibly powerful third-party applications which can be freely installed to an Android powered phone.

This is exciting stuff.

Keyword: Open

Take the uber-controlled device you now use and think what you could do if you had the same freedom with it as you do your own desktop computer. That’s openness. And that’s where we’re heading.

This is also going to open up phones to working with other services on the Internet. Again, this is something you just don’t see much of now because mobile companies just don’t want to allow it. For instance, what if you could use your mobile phone to snap a picture or record a video, have the phone automatically insert metadata of where it was taken (using the built-in GPS) and upload to your Flickr account with the proper tags? Or how about easy integration of your full contact list, speed dial, todos and calendar with Google?

An open platform would also lead to more freedom for Internet companies to create web-based services which integrate with mobile devices. For instance, what about VOIP using your cell phone?

On The Lookout For New Hardware

Open networks also mean more potential devices than just phones. We’re going to see other types of devices start taking advantage of the network to make remote connections.

The Amazon Kindle is one such device. Now, it uses a cell data modem to “phone home” using Sprint. This remote access allows you to surf for and buy e-books from Amazon right over the Kindle. Now, they are bundling the access costs for this service into the price of the Kindle, but this represents the potential of where we’re going.

So, what about your Ipod having a modem and allow you to stream or buy music direct to the Ipod? Or perhaps the same for the Zune?

Will Spur Competition

All this openness is going to invite strong competition. It is also going to drive down rates. If you pit service providers against each other on a level playing field, good things happen for you and me.

At this point, I think Apple represents the best of mobile software design and represents where we need to go. Google, for it’s part, is perhaps our best ally in driving all this openness into reality. Ultimately, it all comes down to money. Google isn’t doing this out of charity. They are doing it because they want to get Google apps onto your phone and be able to deliver mobile advertising.

But, in the process of getting there, we’re likely to see some big changes to the way things are done today in the world of mobile phones.

Instant messaging has been a highly requested feature for the Iphone since it came out. There is a version of AOL instant messenger for the Iphone that was demoed when Apple released the SDK for the device, but Iphone owners everywhere are sure to be excited by the idea of a fully native application designed by Apple for the Iphone specifically.

There is no word at all on when Apple might release such an app to the public. Until then, you pretty much need to jailbreak the phone to get IM.

Here are some images from the patent filing which show what Apple has in mind:

Apple is blowing every other phone away with the Iphone. If only they didn’t force AT&T on me, I’d buy one.