Have You Seen It?

Have you seen the new iPhone? Scott Kurtz has.

Right now I'm about where I was when the iPod was first introduced. Maybe a little more, because I didn't think then that the iPod would be that big of a deal. This might be a big deal, it just isn't yet. The iPod got my attention when it went to 20GB. I'm not sure when this will get my attention. But it definitely looks potentially nifty.

And the appleTV doesn't mean a lot for me yet. The industry is running at cross purposes at the moment. The reason an iPod is SOOOOO cool is because I can take ALL of my music that I have spent the last 20 years collecting and put it in my pocket. The RIAA might get cranky about it, but the format allows it, and in my case I'm not uploading it to the world. And I can mix, match, shuffle, make playlists, edit tracks, life is awesome! Movies are a different matter. Putting my DVDs on my iPod is illegal. The very act of trying to figure out HOW to write software to do this is illegal. I can do it, but in that shady stupid area of the law that needs to go away. (Excuse me, I need to go watch Star Wars on my iPod for a moment.) The appleTV right now will only (easily) use content from iTunes. I'm not buying MOVIES from iTunes. There may come a day when I do, but it's a LOOOOOOONG way off. I'm still leary of any content that can be switched off. (If I really wanted to I can burn my iTunes purchased music to CD and then it is free of the chains of Apple.) The movie industry is screwier than the recording industry. Seen the original Spider-Man trailer with the World Trade Center lately? (Ok, it's here.) How about a copy of Aladdin with the lyric "Where they cut off your ear / if they don't like your face. / It's barbaric, but hey, it's home!" Now I'm going to give those keys to the Lucas' and the Disney's to content I've already bought? No chance. This is why DIVX died a horrible (and deserved) death. But I digress...

Someday (NOW!) I want an iPod for my movies. I want to be able to dial up the La Marseillaise scene from Casablanca as easily as I call up As Time Goes By on my iPod. When I'm watching Angel and they reference some dumb plot point from three seasons ago, I want to dial over to that, call them on their continuity goof, and dial back to the show. I want the same absurd control over my movies and TV I know have over my music, preferably carried in a dot over my right ear. The appleTV isn't there yet.