Technology is improving constantly, and every company releases updates/revisions to their products. The difference I see between Apple and most others is that while others update software/firmware to add in new features or functionality, Apple updates the hardware. IMO Apple should "think to the future" a bit more with their devices and build in additional power/features even if they aren't immediately used. Though I guess there's a lot more money in "forcing" people to buy a whole new device for several hundred dollars than say five or ten dollars for a firmware update. I realize Apple does firmware updates a lot, but their devices just don't seem to hang around as long as others. Which I guess from an "advancing technology" standpoint is good, but from a consumer without unlimited money standpoint, not so good.
I guess my point is that the original iphone and the iphone 3gs(or whatever the latest version is) look almost exactly the same, and do pretty much all the same things, just the newer versions are a little faster, a little slimmer, couple tweaks to the OS, whatever.
I'm happy with my going on 3 year old "dumb" phone. It takes mediocre (at best) pictures and the battery is starting to crap out so I might have to get a new one soon. It was the first of the "full keyboard" horizontal flip phones. All I do is make calls and every so often text. I really don't think I'd use a smartphone of any brand/carrier. As far as I'm concerned an ipod touch + my regular phone = an iPhone. There's wifi virtually everywhere now anyway.
I heard att is discontinuing the unlimited data plan and forcing all new customers to buy a "x amount of MB/month" plan, with the biggest option being 250mb and then a per-MB fee after that. So download one audiobook and you're done for the month? To me that kills the functionality of the iPhone. If I was a little interested in one before, I'm definitely not going to pay out the butt to use it's features. I'm surprised Apple let them do that...I imagine that would hurt itunes/app sales since you'll have to pay again for data fees to download them.
I've played with the Verizon "droid" phones....I have to hand it to Apple, they still have the overall smoothest, most intuitive device out there(even if they're on IMO one of the worst carriers for price and service) Android is a nice OS, but the touchscreens on the phones aren't as precise or responsive as Apple's. I didn't realize how well my iPod's screen worked until I tried something else.
