Drizzle’s Policy Musings

Well this is my first so called product review. Let me first proclaim that I’ve gotten nothing free from any party. In fact, I’ve been charged a bunch by one specific party.

I’m going to say it now: the iPhone will fail you.

I’m not going to say it doesn’t work. It usually does. And when it does, it is awesome. So much of it is well designed and well conceived. I wish the screen was a little less prone to getting covered in dirt but other than that I only have one complaint. Unfortunately that complaint is a doozy.

The iPhone will fail you. It will not work when you really need it to work because it is fundamentally unreliable. The most recent episode that sparked this griping was when I went shopping. The plan was to buy groceries and then rent a ZipCar using the fancy new ZipCar iPhone app. That’s awesome, you can rent a ZipCar through your iPhone? Can if the damn thing works. It didn’t. Unreliable signal prevented me from getting what I needed. Much frustration later I had to take a cab back due to an inability to rent a ZipCar and far too many groceries to try to walk or use Metro.

I’ll bet that 4 out of 5 times I try to use the iPhone ZipCar app it will work. The iPhone usually works and when it does, things are sweet. However, it often doesn’t, not just in this case but in a number of contexts where it was really important for me to have reliable phone or data service. Moreover, as the iPhone becomes more popular, I bet it will continue to lose reliability. That’s because, as Slate’s Farhad Manjoo points out, all these iPhone users (myself included) are swamping the network. So, my dear readers, if you haven’t already, please don’t get an iPhone. Not just because I, your gentle author, care so much about you. Also because I don’t want you crowding my network. Thanks in advance.

Love,
Drizzle