Written by Liz Gannes
Posted Friday, June 6, 2008 at 10:17 AM PT

Will You Buy an iPhone If It Has Video?

Geeks everywhere who (like to think they) have style are eagerly awaiting Apple’s developer conference keynote on Monday, hoping for an improved iPhone. Rumor has it the phone will be cheaper and better — and most importantly, will use an improved 3G wireless network. And since FedEx is ferrying massive amounts of unmarked shipping boxes to Fremont, it’s a good bet the new version will be on sale immediately following the announcement.

The iPhone, till now, has not exactly been video-friendly. It does offer a pre-loaded link to YouTube, where you can watch agonizingly slow-to-load videos over EDGE. And there’s a nice enough still camera, but no video capture whatsoever. That’s less video than you’ll get from a contract-subsidized junk phone that carriers will virtually beg you to take home. And of course it eliminates the possibility of live video-streaming that startups like Qik enable on competitors like the Nokia N95.

But if the new version has video and 3G? That’s pretty big. I personally haven’t been persuaded by the touch-screen dream machine yet, but I’m thinking this could be my moment. How about you?

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Topic: Hardware, Mobile

Comments (7)

“Nice enough” camera on the 1G iPhone? Not even close. That was the worst feature in an otherwise life-changing object. Here’s hoping the camera in the iPhone I’m going to buy next week is several cuts above, including things like the ability to take close-up shots and video.

Josh McHugh — 10:36 AM on June 6, 2008 Reply
Well, “nice enough” if you like that kind of washed out, light blue tone for all your photographs.

Liz Gannes, NewTeeVee — 10:55 AM on June 6, 2008 Reply
True, true. The anti-sepia!

Josh McHugh — 11:18 AM on June 6, 2008 Reply
actually you can stream/download any internet video on the iphone with http://www.reeplay.it. video on the iphone is awesome!

Joseph — 2:01 PM on June 6, 2008 Reply
What do you mean not video friendly? Camera or Playback? True, it doesn’t record, but between the screen, youtube, and quicktime (video podcasts), it’s the best video (playback) phone I’ve seen…

Austin Wallender — 2:20 PM on June 6, 2008 Reply
I would ONLY consider buying an iPhone if it had video. I recently bought a FlipVideo camera and I love it. I’ve made a few things with it already and it’s a great way to generate “behind the scenes” stuff for our YouTube Content Partner account, “Wicked Awesome Films”. One’s first instinct when using the Flip Camera is “Why isn’t this in an iPhone?”

It should be. And it probably will be. But when?

My contract with T-mobile is up June 22nd. It’s either the Palm Centro or the video-enabled iPhone – we shall see!

Bobby Jennings — 10:33 AM on June 9, 2008 Reply
thanks very much for posting this!

Pitambharadharaya — 4:51 PM on August 6, 2009 Reply

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