New customers and people who are comfortably within AT&T’s upgrade territory — you bought in before November of 2007 — can gab the phones at the above pricing. Anyone who bought in after last November however can opt for the early upgrader’s rates, which will require you to fork out $399 and $499 for the phones, plus an $18 upgrade fee on a 2-year service agreement.

As for the plans, here’s the skinny:

Notice that the unlimited family plan is cheaper than the highest tier family plan.  This is offset by the much higher per-line add-on cost, which is essentially the same as signing up for an individual unlimited plan.

Text plans for individuals go for $5 for 200 messages, $15 for 1500 messages, and $20 for unlimited. For the family plan, you can only choose from $0.20 pay-per-use messaging, or a $30 unlimited plan.

Their enterprise rates are expected to differ, but it doesn’t look like their enterprise iPhone pages are ready for prime time yet.

So there you go, Americans.  Your plans await.  Just know that we Canadians are still green with envy.

(Source: AT&T, via Engadget)

The game is rather like the traditional labyrinth game where you must tilt the floor to move your ball around.  In Neverball, the object is collect a set amount of coins as determined for each level, and then guide the ball to the exit.  Throughout each level there wll be fences, moving platforms, and other obstacles that will get in your way or make navigating the level difficult, as well as bonus coins that are worth higher amounts to get you closer to your goal faster. If anything, this is a lot like a Super Monkey Ball variant.

Having played the Windows version of the game I can say that the control mechanism takes some getting used to.  Tilting the floor is simple enough, but since the camera swivels around to point more or less in the direction the ball is travelling.  Worse, your tilt direction (but not its pitch) changes with the camera direction, so it’s really easy to get very disoriented, since most of the time the camera will be pointing in a direction other than the one you’re tilting the floor in, and the changes in tilt make it difficult to get things under control again. What’s more, your ball is pretty bouncy, so when you’re moving with some velocity and you bounce into a fence or obstacle, the sudden shift in direction can leave you scrambling to get your bearings.

An option to play the game in a fixed, possibly zoomed (or zoomable) 3/4 view with swipe controls to rotate the board would make it much easier to control.  Perhaps we might see something like this in Lazrhog’s version — one can hope anyway.  Just the same though, the graphics look to be superb and pretty faithful to the original (though with lower poly counts) and since you can use the touch to really tilt the board (rather than a mouse to tilt it for you) it ought to make the game much more intuitive.

Lazrhog expects to release the game in about two weeks, but until then you can enjoy a couple of videos below.  You can also grab the original game for your computer here so you can get a feel for the game.

(via iPod Touch Fans)

The object of Kusari is quite simple.  You are presented with a 5×7 board populated with round counters.  Each counter has an arrow on it.  Your task is to move your token to each arrow.  As you do, your token will follow the path of arrows until it reaches a counter pointing to an empty space.  Then you pick your next counter in your immediate vicinity to move to and continue on until you have reached that level’s goal — or get trapped without doing so.  You can move in any of the 8 cardinal directions, with valid moves indicated with green-coloured tiles, but you cannot move to an empty space, so you have to follow the arrows and pick your paths carefully, lest the arrows lead you to a dead end you can’t move from.  Once you’ve reached your target and have either cleared the board or can’t move any further, you move on to the next level.

There are 20 levels in all, and each level has a target and a time limit.  The time limit starts at 100 seconds and subtracts 5 seconds on each subsequent level until it reaches 35 seconds, when it will reduce no further.  Each level also requires you to clear a set number of counters, starting at 16 and increasing by one each level.  You must clear the target number of counters in the alloted time or you forfiet a life and start the level over.  You have three lives in total, so make them count.  Scoring starts at 1 point for a tile, but each counter’s value is squared for each sequential token in a chain that you move to.  The longer a chain of tokens you can clear with one move, the higher your score will be.  A bonus of 200 points is given if you can clear the board, and you also get a 2,000 point bonus if you manage to pass all 20 levels.

The gameplay here couldn’t be simpler.  Simply tap on a counter to move your token and it will follow the arrows until it comes to a stop, lather, rinse and repeat until you’ve completed the level by whatever method that takes.  There are some nice afterthoughts that really make the gameplay though: When your token only has one possible move that it can make, the game will automatically advance your token to that counter until you’ve got more than one possible move to make; when the time limits get shorter, the gameplay gets faster, and the token movement increases in speed too, to help you clear the board faster.

Graphically, Kusari is polished to a shine.  The game pieces are detailed and gorgeous, and each level is given its own distinct background, which adds some incentive to keep playing, just to see what the next level is going to look like.  There is also a high score table to keep track of your progress — however, it is not net-enabled, so the scores are all local, and there seems to be an issue with the #1 scoring position simplaying both your score and the level you achieved; the level gets ellipsed (”…”) because there’s not enough space to display it all.

That’s about the only complaint I can make for the game though, because otherwise it is a deviously addictive casual action puzzler that will keep you coming back for one more game.  Give it a shot and tell me I’m wrong. You can find it on the Ste Packaging repo (http://blog.psmxy.org).  Check out the screenies below.

[Show as slideshow]

(via Installer)

If I seem like I’m focusing on the iPhone in Canada situation a lot, I apologize — but obviously, this is a topic that hits where it hurts for both me and Jody, and for millions of other Canadians from what I’m reading.

Virtually no one is happy with Rogers’ rates, and the displeasure ranges from disgruntled comments to corrosive venom, with the only “what’s the big deal?” comments from data neophites and people who don’t understand the full scope of what kind of data-hungry apps iPhone 2.0 engenders. The day that Rogers announced their plans was the same day a petition site with a harshly-worded URL went up. E-Mail addresses of Rogers execs and links to a report page to the Competition Bureau of Canada flew (and the Competition Bureau has subsequently stated that they’ve been getting many reports). The blogosphere is humming with derisive articles.  IntoMobile, iPhone In Canada, macQuebec (en français), p2pnet, andPOP, iPhone User and others feature pieces on Rogers’ highway robbery.  The forums are similarly hopping mad, with threads on Howard Forums (and here), The Computer Mechanics, MacRumors, iPhone in Canada forums, the Engadget thread, — even Digg commenters.  Canadians are not happy with Rogers.  But what choice to Canadians have?  Rogers have a virtual GSM monopoly in Canada, and even with the wireless spectrum auction looming, Rogers won’t see any potential competition come from that for a few years yet.  Our voices are a faint buzz in Ted Rogers’ ears, barely able to penetrate the fingers he has inserted into them on a more or less perpetual basis, and what sound leaks through is neatly drowned out by repeatedly shouting “lalalala I’m not listening lalalalala!“  They even went so far as to defend their pricing plans amid the consumer outcry — and they didn’t even get their cites right.

Petitions don’t go very far unless the number of signatures is enough to cover Ted’s entire field of vision.  Complaining with our wallets — not buying into Ted’s outrageous rates — is a good way to get the message across, but provides little instant gratification, especially since we’d be depriving ourselves of a coveted device.  What we need are voices that carry more weight than our own.  Perhaps the news media can help with that.

In browsing the media this morning I’ve come across a number of articles from reputable sources that echo our despair, albeit in a much calmer, more media-friendly manner.  Reuters Canada had a rather non-committal article that spent a paragraph or two echoing the sentiment.  The Toronto Star starts off more optimisic, positing that these plans put the iPhone “in the realm of reality” for many Canadians, though its position seems to come from comparing the current rates to last year’s even more astronomical ones, rather than comparing our overall rates to other countries.  It does delve into the disappointing aspecs of the rates though, citing market research firm KDC’s Kevin Restivo as saying that the rates are aimed at people who treat web browsing as a novelty rather than a core function.  The Winnipeg Free Press is fairly neutral on the issue, simply stating the basics.

The Globe and Mail’s article lands more firmly on the pessimistic side, offering up Info-Tech Research Group senior analyst Michelle Warren’s quote, “These rates are just another indicator that Canadian cellphone rates are really high and that essentially the carriers feel like they can charge whatever they like. Rates should be going down, they shouldn’t be going up, and these are expensive rates.”  Amen, sistah.

C|Net Crave decided to get downright scathing.  “In its press release, Rogers does provide a convenient chart to gauge your data usage–apparently, 2G amounts to 16,000 Web pages (who knew?)–but we don’t approve of such an arrangement at all. The iPhone’s Web browser is one of its top attractions, particularly on a 3G network, and asking users to limit their data certainly isn’t putting the “Internet in your pocket.” Rogers is offering unlimited Wi-Fi access at all Rogers and Fido hotspots, but that in itself is limiting if you have to be in one place.”  Yeah, they know what’s up.

So with all of this negative press, both small-time and mass media, will Rogers pay attention?  It’s hard to say.  We are all painfully aware that the Rogers collective lives in its own universe, separated from the hoi polloi by mile-thick steel walls that nothing short of the CRTC’s Regulation Cannon can penetrate, but can the massive consumer backlash that is building fast and hard create enough ammo to threaten these plans with the death of a thousand paper cuts?  We’ll have to wait and see — but if I wouldn’t go holding my breath.  Even if the riots break into Ted’s world, they’ll still have to contend with Ted’s fingers.

Notice any conspicuous absences here? That’s right. No unlimited plan and a 2GB cap on the highest tier. As if it’s any consolation, you do get free WiFi at any Rogers hotspot.

To say that I am disappointed is a weapons-grade understatement. It is abundantly clear that Rogers has absolutely no interest whatsoever in “driving adoption” — either that or they have an incredibly unclear concept of what it takes to do so. These pricing structures will likely drive adoption — to the Blackberry, which has better plans with much higher data caps despite not being a device that engenders over 70% data usage on.

Rogers clearly does not understand the iPhone’s market. If they did, they would understand that plans which have at the very least data caps that are double that of the Blackberry for their current pricing structures would be required to even attempt to “drive adoption” — and ideally, following in AT&T’s footsteps if they were truly serious about getting an iPhone into the hands of as many consumers as possible. But apparently Rogers doesn’t give a damn.

Just par for the still-disgustingly-overpriced Canadian mobile data course.

Full press release here, in case your stomach wasn’t churning hard enough.

UPDATE: Here is Rogers’ official page with all of the details.  Here is a comparison of the total cost of the iPhone for the life of the contract between Canada, the US and the UK.  Note that while the year-over-year cost is lower than US, they have unlimited data and call display is included, more anytime minutes, more text messages, and shorter contracts. And that’s just for the BASIC 400MB plan.

Here is an online petition you can sign (language warning), though I doubt that will do any good.  What might do some good is to give some of the bigwigs a call.  Here are a few contacts:

Liz Hamilton, Director of Corporate Communications: elizabeth.hamilton@rci.rogers.com,  (416) 935-8710
Ted Rogers, CEO: trogers@rci.rogers.com
J. Innes, VP: jinnes@rci.rogers.com
Jane Haitsma, Customer Relations Executive: jhaitsma@rci.rogers.com

Seriously, keep it civil and well-reasoned.  It won’t help the cause if you’re just nasty.  There’s also a general “contact us” form for Rogers here.  Want lower rates?  Contact them and let them know by any and every means necessary.  Let them know that this will not stand and that we’ve been abused by Rogers’ GSM monopoly for far too long.  If we don’t speak out — and most importantly if we don’t let our dollars do the talking by not buying into their absurd rates — Rogers will never get the message.  Let’s make sure they do.

(via Engadget)

As always it’ll cost you $25 for a full-body shield and a bottle of applicator fluid, but it’s the last skin you’ll ever have to buy for it and they do offer that nice lifetime warranty where they’ll replace it for free if ever it needs replacing. If you need more details though I’m currently working on a skin showdown video going head to head (to head) with the invisibleSHIELD, Bodyguardz, and Best Skins Ever, so you’ll be able to get some virtual hands-on with the popular skins and find out what the real differences are.

ZAGG’s 3G skins begin shipping tomorrow, but if you pre-order today you’ll get yourself a nice 20% discount. Might as well take advantage of it while the discount still applies, right?

(via Fox Business)

The good news is that the iPhone 2.0 firmware will now securely shred your data when you tell it to erase all content and settings.  The only noticeable difference between the current firmware and the forthcoming 2.0 when you tell it to reset is that it now warns in the confirmation box that the process will take about an hour — which sounds about right if it’s going to go through and zero out all of the storage memory.

Those of you who have not yet flipped your first-gen iPhone may want to wait ’til firmware 2.0 comes out before you reset and sell, just to make sure that all of your personal data is well and truly scrubbed from memory.

(via Apple Insider)

vlc4iphone is the work of our illustrious ZodTTD, and it is currently still in heavy beta testing, but I’ve had the opportunity to play with it for the past week and change, and while there’s still work to do, it is coming along very nicely.

The application is pretty huge by iPhone standards — currently weighing in at a heavy 24MB installed size (about 9mb download), so you’ll need to make sure you’ve got some free space before you install it. The bulk of its size however can be attributed to the absurd number of codecs it currently supports to varying degrees. Check it out:

- Video codec support for MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, Flash Video (FLV), DiVX, XViD, Quicktime (MOV), H.264, 3GP, and Windows Media (WMV - video only right now, but he’s working on audio).
- Audio codec support for the above video formats (except WMV right now) as well as MP3, Ogg, and FLAC.
- Streaming internet radio, including support for Shoutcast, M3U, MMS, RTSP and HTTP streams. Just feed it a URL and let it play!

Sorry. I should have told you to put on a bib before reading this.

As it stands right now compatibility and speed is still being heavily worked on. I’ve been testing numerous videos covering multiple audio and video codecs, containers, resolutions, bit rates, and frame rates, and the results with the latest beta have been extremely mixed, but are a vast improvement over the previous beta, so things look very promising for future versions.

There’s no word on a release date — like I said, this thing still needs work, but Zod is on the case, and I’m sure you all know by now that he does good work, so give it some time and hopefully we’ll finally have the last media player we’ll ever need on the iPhone and Touch.

As you’ll see in the gallery below, it currently only plays in portrait mode (speed considerations for now) but that is expected to change, as is the UI.  Hopefully, the ginormous ad block in the file list will also be trimmed to a more sensible level.

[Show as slideshow]

This would be good for 3G hopefuls to get their grubby hands on the firmware before camping out in front of Apple stores and carrier outlets across 22 countries to prepare for the Jesus Phone’s second coming. It’s unlikely the App Store will be live at that time, and existing iPhone users obviously won’t have access to location services, but you’ll be able to fiddle with everything else so you know what you’re getting into on the 11th.

(via Gizmodo)

In the mean time, I came across an interesting article on Fortune’s Apple 2.0 blog on the trials and tribulations of the iPhone vs. Android debate. It pointed out some significant hurdles Android has to overcome if they are going to truly become a worthy competitor to the iPhone, and it made some very interesting points that run parallel to other, similar situations I have followed in the past.

Its two most interesting talking points when it came to Google’s hurdles were: 1) Developers have complained that Android can be difficult to program, especially when Google is constantly updating the SDK to add new features and such, and their development tools aren’t as robust and feature-rich as Apple’s. (Apple has had the same problem too, but their development environment makes it a lot easier to retrofit new code into existing projects.) 2) Apple controls the entire iPhone platform from top to bottom, hardware to software. Google’s Android is simply a platform and they have no way of accurately tracking what hardware it’s going to be used on, the screen dimensions, the chipsets, etc.

The more I think about it, the more I realize that we’ve kinda been here before. There are some familiar parallels being drawn all the way back to early to mid-90s and the 5th generation video game console wars. Let me tell you a little story.

It started in 1991. Trip Hawkins, former CEO of Electronic Arts, started his own video game company which he was to call The 3DO Company. His idea was to create a video game hardware platform that would be licensed to third party manufacturers. It was called the 3DO Multiplayer, and the idea was to create an ecosystem of compatible video game systems that multiple companies could profit from due to the shared software base. Released in 1993, only Panasonic took significant interest in releasing a console, and release they did with the Panasonic 3DO Multiplayer FZ-1. 3DO had managed to wrangle a number of decent software houses to develop games, in addition to their own in-house development team, so there was a respectable base of games available upon its release. In 1994, Goldstar released their own version, and in ‘95, Creative Labs released an internal ISA card for PC compatibles called the 3DO Blaster, which could play 3DO games right on your PC.

The problem was that it ended up not doing so well. While Panasonic made some pretty nice hardware, Goldstar’s version was a bit cheap, prone to breakdowns, and suffered some compatibility issues due to difference in some of its support chips. Creative’s 3DO Blaster didn’t do very well at all. No one else seemed interested in the platform, and the mishmash of hardware developers that did jump on board, plus some of the issues they suffered confused and frustrated people, and the 3DO platform as a whole suffered for it, especially when the big boys came out to play.

Then there was Atari. In 1991, Atari started working on a new video game platform called Panther, a 32-bit system. They were partway through R&D when a British company called Flare II came along and asked Atari if they’d do something with this 64-bit video game hardware they’d developed. Atari liked it. A lot. Thus, they developed it into a new platform and, in the late fall of 1994, rolled out their console, called Jaguar, in two limited markets for Christmas, and in a larger roll out in early 1995. On paper, the Jaguar’s hardware blew everyone out of the water. It was viciously powerful for the time and theoretically could have pumped out some awesome games. Unfortunately, it was notoriously difficult to program for, with a massive learning curve made even more frustrating by weak development tools. Although the Jaguar turned out a few “killer apps” it, like 3DO and even Sega, was ultimately eclipsed by Nintendo and then-newcomer Sony.

Multiple hardware vendors. Difficulty finding more than a handful of vendors. Occasionally dodgy hardware. Lack of control over final products. Difficult programming environment. Collectively, much of this is now being mirrored in Android, which could be worrisome. There’s an important difference here, though. In the 90s, 3DO was a relatively small startup by a former software house CEO. Atari, though legendary in stature, was nevertheless on its last legs; the Jaguar was its last hurrah — one which they couldn’t even afford to properly advertise, sinking a mere $25M into its US campaign — and its failure would drag Atari down into a reverse merger with JTS Corp., which itself would go Chapter 11 soon afterwards.

Google on the other hand is at the top of its game, with billions in liquid assets, and they can afford to drop however much is necessary to make Android a success. There do seem to be some stumbling blocks they’re going to have to negotiate, certainly, and Apple is a formidable opponent right now, but Google is in a very good position to deal with the problems they face.

But can they beat Apple? I still say no. The home court advantage Apple has in designing everything from top to bottom allows them to create a seamless product where everything works and works very well. They don’t need to worry about device chipsets and capabilities, screen sizes or anything of that sort. They know every nook and cranny of the hardware their OS will run on, because they designed both. Android must be written for a much broader base of hardware, capable of handling multiple screen sizes and resolutions, ordinary and touch screens, hardware chipsets, video chipsets (where present), the presence or lack of GPS devices, and the carrier-specified software and features that will ultimately be bundled on each phone. There are a lot of variables, and there’s no guarantee that very phone manufacturer is going to get it right, which could ultimately hamper Android’s adoption to a degree.

Even worse, the first Android phone isn’t likely to see the light of day until the latter part of Q408 at the earliest, and more likely Q109. By that time, if analyst estimates are right, Apple will have already sold some 20M iPhones worldwide, which is just that much less market share Android-based phones will have immediate access to at launch.

Android has a steep hill to climb. I don’t doubt that Google have the energy and resources to climb it, but the real question remains, will Apple still get to the top first?

(via Fortune’s Apple 2.0 Blog)

Compu2000 is a brand new Apple product selling retail store located in Richmond, British Columbia, Canada. It is also an online store for customers who do not reside in or around Richmond, BC. The good news about the newly upcoming online store is the fact that shipping is free if your order is over $300.00. Shipping is also under $10 for most other purchases, as said by Price Network (.ca).

Here are more in-depth details about the contest:

Who can enter the contest

Any PN member can participate in the contest.  The prize contest is exclusively for our members so we will do the draw and announce the winner here on PN.

How to enter the contest

Visit this thread and do the following explained below:
http://www.pricenetwork.ca/showthread.php?threadid=187324

You need to do 3 things:
1) Heat up this thread (via “heat it up” link)

2) Sign up to Compu2000 newsletter at:
http://www.compu2000.com/index.php?…&p=giveaway

3) Reply to this thread and say “Compu2000 rocks!  Give me an iPod Touch please!”

We will select a random winner from all the members who heated up the thread.  Then we will cross reference with the replies in this thread and contact Compu2000 to double check the email you subscribed with.  You MUST know your email address that you subscribed with and you must reply to this thread … all before the deadline for the contest.  If a selected winner does not meet these criteria, we will re-draw from the members who heated up this thread and repeat the process.

Deadline to enter the contest

Wednesday July 2, 2008.

So, what are you waiting for? Go on, sign up (if you haven’t already), and claim that iPod as your own! Good luck to you all.

This is pretty much right on schedule for a September(ish) iPod refresh period; if you’ll recall, reports of iPhone shortages began to pop up right around the end of march/beginning of April, starting with 8GB model shortages, a little over two months prior to the WWDC keynote announcing the next generation of the device. That’s right about where we are now in relation to the next iPod line refresh, with the same low end model being the one to kick off the stock clearance. If this is the start, then the pattern should hold; the number of places selling out will grow, and the 16GB vesrion will start up next, followed by the 32GB model.

There is the possibility however that Apple’s Back to School promo is also having an effect on stock levels, though shortages large enough to cause delays at retail stores — especially big box electronics outlets like Best Buy — seem to indicate something a little more significant than than that is going down.

Furthermore, Reitzes suggests that Apple are going to need to restructure pricing on the iPod Touch in the wake of the new lower-priced iPhones which, even though subsidized by the carriers, still represent a significant enough price threat to the Touch to cannibalize a significant portion of its sales, carrier costs aside. Reitzes says in his report, “We believe Apple will need to reposition the iPod touch product by September now that the iPhone acquisition price is lower. We expect the iPod touch to experience significant cannibalization from lower-priced iPhones.”

Might we start to see price slashing on iPod Touch models as we approach September and remaining inventory needs to be cleared? Might be a good time for you holdouts to pick one up, assuming you’re not particularly keen on seeing what Apple’s got up its sleeve for the next iPod generations.

(via Apple Insider)

RingFree (RF.com) is a new PBX service provider targeted at the iPhone. Their service is designed to connect your own IP-based telephone connection (Skype, Google Talk, MSN, etc.) to your iPhone, allowing you to use your iPhone just like you would your IP-phone, but over your ordinary mobile connection, allowing you to use the minutes on your own iPhone plan and without worrying about your data connection speed. No need to connect a SIP device or install a piece of software; RingFree is entirely web-based, so its servers do all the hard work. You just make the call and yak it up.

The service is currently still very beta, so there will likely be some growing pains you may experience. It’s also completely free to use, and will remain that way for teh forseeable future; RingFree monetizes their assets by reselling their services to VoIP providers, and may introduce premium services in the future. In the mean time, feel free to give them a try and let us know how well it works.

(via TUAW)

Seems that a Rogers Wireless retail employee received a voluminous tome of “customer scenarios” today — it’s sort of like a book of contingencies full of “If customer X asks question Y answer with Z.”  In other words, a book of scripts, much like their level 1 techs read from.  In it, there is evidently some “customer scenarios” regarding the iPhone 3G.  I’ll let him tell it in his own words:

Tasty news.

I received a phonebook-sized book of “customer scenarios” today for training. Upon a look on the plans, it would SEEM the $30/$45 is true. All of the total MSF (monthly service fees) seemed to be a voiceplan + either the $30 or $45 dollar option.

What I mean here is that the scenarios did not explicity label “$40 voice plans” and “$30 iphone data plan” for “$70/month”. Instead, it was just “$70/month”.

Here were the prices listed for plans:

“$60, $65, $70, $75, $80, $85″.

What I gather from this is as long as you have atleast a $30 voiceplan, you then pick your poison of either $30 or $45 iphone data, and youre golden.

What’s more, Global News this evening shoehorned in a little 15-second blurb about these same rumours between longer segments — presumably based on the same “leak” below.  Not that this lends any further credibility to the rumour, but when it makes the TV news, one does tend to think a little harder on it.

Further evidence of the $30 Rogers plan? Well, not evidence per se, just more grist for the rumour mill, but if I’ve learned one thing through all of the prolonged gossip sessions surrounding forthcoming Apple products, it’s that, on the whole, the greater number of rumours that tend to agree with each other pan out more often than the solitary ones.  We’ll see.  Despite having a cynical streak as wide as Hillary Clinton’s tales are tall, I have numerous appendages crossed in hopes that some gold turns up in all of this panning.  My voice plan, with the extras I have tacked on (unlimited evenings after 6, voicemail, visual call waiting, etc.) runs me $60/mo for each phone, so if true, the data plan would tack on only an extra $30 each, which is something I can definitely live with if it means mobile 3G broadband wherever I am.  I have only ever used Rogers’ data connection once (over EDGE when I got my first cell phone) only to browse their own WAP site — and it cost me $18, just to tool around for five or six minutes.  Since then I haven’t even dared to touch it.  This plan could change the whole game.

(via X1Zero @ iPhone In Canada forums)

She believes that Apple should offer a compatible stylus as a free pack-in with the iPhone just on general principle. That’s probably not such a bad idea, and had it not come from the betaloned, blood-red fingers of a shrill, entitled misandrist with transferrence issues, I might even be tempted to back her up. (After all, who else but a drama queen with man issues would call Apple misogynist simply for choosing to use a capacitive touchscreen instead of a resistive one as if it were a deliberate backhand to the fairer sex?)

The article goes on to spread the issue to those with pudgy fingers, who would also have trouble touching the smallish virtual keys — as though the same people would have no trouble whatsoever mashing on a real Treo or Blackberry keyboard. Somehow though, it’s all discriminatory, which suggests, if we were to use the industrial design standards of these people as a baseline minimum, that all mobile phones should be at least four inches wide, sport resistive touchscreens, feature UIs with sizable icons that can easily be skewered with a nail, and have keys large and comfortable enough to type on with a pair of bratwursts.

Look, we’re not dealing with the disabled here. Long nails and pudgy fingers are not handicaps and both of them require that you do certain things just a little bit differently — including how you shop for a mobile device. If this or that device has keys that are too small or a screen you have trouble stabbing with your fingernail, may I humbly suggest you move on to the next device in the pantheon of mobiles? Perhaps one which has features that, I don’t know, cater to your particular requirements? Because no matter how much you wish the device you did end up buying would work with your relevant physical attributes, it isn’t going to bend to your mighty will no matter how hard you stamp your foot, so may I make the bold suggestion that just maybe you made a bad purchase?

No, I suppose that would make me a misogynist. But for what it’s worth I do think a pack-in stylus could come in handy for certain tasks.