Blackberry vs. iPhone, in the office

Ars Technica, my favorite tech-related news source, ran a sharp piece by Don Reisinger titled "How RIM Can Stop the iPhone Onslaught." The headline is on the emphatic side, but the point is clear: will businesses swap their Blackberrys for iPhones?

People who know me recognize my affinity for Apple products, but it’s not an allegiance. I just think that in many areas Apple makes the best tech goods. But here, I think RIM is positioned to make the better smartphone for businesses.

Apple’s main, built-in audience is consumers of personal electronics. They’ve captured that market pretty handily (people are still trying to make "iPod killers"), and expansion into enterprise is a new but inevitable step. The recent introduction of enterprise-focused features on the iPhone, namely interfacing with Microsoft Exchange, shows that Steve Jobs is edging into RIM’s market.

But unlike the iPhone, the Blackberry isn’t designed to be fun. It’s designed to be serious.

I think RIM has potential to better satisfy enterprise needs, and not just because it uses a physical QWERTY keyboard (though that’s important too). Every model of the Blackberry is geared specifically for businesses, which allows the experience to remain (excuse the pun) strictly business.

If RIM keeps their products focused, it’ll force consumers to answer a single question when they go smartphone shopping: business or pleasure?

This will drive a hard wedge into Apple’s ability to penetrate the enterprise market.

What Reisinger understands is that while RIM has several key advantages – physical keyboard, battery life, carrier independence – future versions of the Blackberry will have to innovate to keep up with the iPhone. American companies often create a winning product and sit on it for years. Tech companies are notorious for letting their breadwinners go obsolete (cough, Palm Pilot).

Reisinger’s best suggestion is for RIM to open a competing App Store. It’ll be hard to beat Apple’s software user experience, especially with iTunes integration, but I don’t think it’s asking too much to offer a worthy rival.

Hopefully, RIM doesn’t innovate in the wrong direction either. Matching Apple’s "fun" features toe to toe, RIM doesn’t stand a chance and, even worse, will worsen the user experience in places where the Blackberry already succeeds. (Another common misstep: more features means better product.)

I think the Blackberry is still at a huge advantage in the workplace. It’s got a QWERTY keyboard (not as sexy as touchscreen typing, but far more efficient), a loyal base of customers (Crackberry addicts), and most importantly, an association with business itself. As popular as the iPhone is for the college-aged, I see as many students with new Blackberrys, usually in the hands of business majors and other kids "serious" about their career.

Admittedly, I’ve spent more time with the iPhone than the Blackberry, but really, that says more about me than the smartphones.

Idea: Let's make useful iPhone apps

There are a bunch of nice tweaks in iPhone 2.0, and there’s a plethora of fun, free downloads on the new App Store. But other than maybe NetNewsWire, an RSS reader, there’s not much that’s useful yet. Here are some apps I would like to see:

Voicemail
One of the iPhone’s best features is visual voicemail, which allows you to see who called you and listen to messages in whatever order you please. You also don’t have to listen to an automated intro to each one. ("You. Have. Six. Teen. Messages.") It’s not complicated technology, and really, I think every cellphone should’ve had this feature five years ago.

For some reason, voicemail is still accessed by satellite rather than downloaded straight to the phone. Why? This means you can’t access voicemail when you’re out of service area, and as with all carriers, your messages get deleted after a certain period of time. Instead, voicemail stored on the device.

While I wait for that, I hope someone writes an app that allows you to save voicemail. I’m a strong proponent of never deleting anything, especially communications like email (Gmail users--hit archive, not delete!), so I’d like the ability to save voicemail messages on my computer. You may need them again someday.

Also, syncing voicemail with your computer would grant the ability to access messages from other places. Say you forgot your phone at home, and you were waiting for an important call. At least you could check your voicemail remotely.

Outpost
Nick and I manage The Bygone Bureau through Basecamp, which is an online project management service that I’ve complimented in the past. Without it, I don’t think we’d have had the same success or consistency with the Bureau.

That’s a long-winded way of saying that I’m excited about Outpost, which is an app with a Basecamp interface tailored for the iPhone. It’s not slated for release until August, but I’d rather have a polished copy than one rushed for the App Store launch. Being able to manage article edits and set deadlines when I’m not at a computer would be invaluable, rather than reminding writers via text message.

Outpost will also justify my owning an iPhone for reasons other than wanting to look pretentious.

Of course, Outpost’s usefulness, at least for me, is contingent on its ability to open Word documents. (I’m not sure how that’s handled on the iPhone, whether Mail and MobileSafari have exclusive system-level permissions to open them or if all apps can access that feature.) I emailed David Kaneda, one of the app's developers, who promptly and politely responded that they have not dealt with message attachments other than images yet. He also said that pricing is still to be determined, but will be under $20. If Outpost can open documents, that, to me, would be very fair price.

As for other Bureau-related tools, there’s a Wordpress app coming out soon, which, if well done, will be extraordinarily useful. I’d also like to see one for stats tracker Mint.

Games
I do wish I was able to play more videogames (it’s secretly killing me that I can’t play Metal Gear Solid 4 yet), but I’m not willing to drop $9.99 for Super Monkey Ball on the iPhone. All I really want is a good puzzle or word game, something more exciting than Bejeweled. The available offerings aren’t so bad. I considered a Sudoku game, and I could see myself buying EA’s Scrabble title if it didn’t have one fatal bug.

Even better than those would be an app with access to daily The New York Times crossword.

According to Ars Technica, the iPhone has roughly the same power has a Sega Dreamcast. I’m holding out for Metal Gear Solid on the iPhone. What? It could happen. Maybe not...