What's missing from iPhone 3G?

Do you feel like there's something missing from the upgraded iPhone software and the new iPhone 3G? You're not alone.

Some analysts at the Apple developer conference said they were disappointed that the iPhone 3G wouldn't come with a built-in video camera.

Another was hoping he could use a SIM card to stretch out the battery life if needed (Apple says the iPhone 3G will handle up to five hours of talking, six hours of Web surfing, seven hours of video watching or 24 hours of audio listening).

And our readers are finding plenty of things to criticize. Their biggest gripe: The iPhone still doesn't let you copy and paste text, an oversight that has annoyed lots of people since the gadget went on sale almost a year ago. Like the analysts, our readers said they wished Apple had included a video camera. But they also wanted a stylus (for those who have long fingernails) as well as the ability to send MMS (aka picture messaging) and view Flash-based Web pages.

Sound off in our poll below about which omission bothers you most.

What else do you think is missing? Post suggestions, serious or fanciful, in the comments below.

Speaking of comments about the iPhone, our compadre David Sarno (aka Web Scout) sounds off on the frequency of iPhone-related messages on the microblogging service Twitter. Don't they have anything better to write about?

Yeah, we don't either.

-- Michelle Quinn

Photo: Apple CEO Steve Jobs unveils new iPhone software and hardware. Credit: Robert Durell / Los Angeles Times

Comments

What about offering the ability to use foreign SIM cards? (i.e. unlockable option) My BlackBerry allows me to use, say, a French card that has a local French phone number. Extremely valuable option for frequent travelers.

[sandy Saemann]

no voice command for auto dailing

[rp]

this will not be the savior Apple needs it to be, AT&T only???, no support for Adobe Flash???, crap camera???, a minor fix at best and reduced to the price it should have been all along, should have been 3G from day one, huge disappointment.

[EWC]

Stylus option, definitely! Considering ergonomics & user testing studies indicated men & women use their fingers/nails differently Over TEN YEARS AGO, why does Apple persist in this misogyny?

[Laurence White]

Here's my lst of what should have been included here:

1. The ability to wireless sync PC/Mac - iPhone. In the interests of maximizing revenue, it seems the only way you will be able to wirelessly sync contact and calendar info between your Outlook/iCal application and the iPhone will be via MobileMe, at a cool $99 a year. It would be SO easy for Apple to build this into iTunes if they wanted to...

2. More memory. At least 32GB. It seems the only way to buy even a 16GB model is to go for white, which may well be a dealbreaker for me. What's with that?

3. Upgraded camera. The camera was behind the times a year ago, now it's little short of risible. A forward-facing video camera would have been nice.

4. True third party apps. The whole controlled SDK environment where you can only buy native apps via iTunes store (no doubt at a considerable cost) is very Apple. Some 'inconvenient' applications (read: unprofitable for Apple) no doubt won't be allowed - such as wireless podcasting (see MobileCast for a working version) and wireless internet radio (iRadio ditto). Many users (like me) will continue to brave the world of hacking and jailbreaking in order to free their phones from Apple's greed.

5. Skype support. Only kidding.

[Charles]

Still no "search" function? I have thousands of contacts and looking alphabetically is time intensive. As far as looking for information within
those contacts, it is not possible without "search."

[Mark Komrad M.D.]

I am a psychiatrist with over a THOUSAND appointments yearly. What I wouldn't give for a searchable calendar? I had the first iphone for 5 days and returned it because of this ONE missing function, and bought a Palm/Treo instead. Seems like such a basic simple need, I can't believe its not in the top 10 list of "missing features" noted above. A searchable Contacts list is good, but a searchable calendar (or everything--e.g. Spotlight) seems like a no-brainer. Many of my colleagues have the same criticism.

[Sidhant Pamnani]

I don't understand why no one found that iphone is not holding radio!

[FPW]

The top 10 should definitely include the ability to move contacts between groups, and to easily assign a group to any new added contact. It drives me nuts that I have to export Outlook contacts to excel, import to Outlook Express, then iPhone sync them to the iPhone. If you don't have a business server, why should a user have to buy a business server and Exchange Server to handle email contacts. And even that is still not as convenient as competitors like Palm/Treo or Blackberry on Verizon, etc. Besides the inability to cut and paste, this is my biggest gripe on the iPhone and it doesn't look like either missing feature will be getting any serious attention from the Apple iPhone OS development group in the foreseeable future.

[Iphoner]

The ability to hold onto a 3G signal???????