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apple is ready to roll out the much-anticipated ipod phone, taking its popular digital music platform into the mobile realm, according to reports circulating in the media. the official launch, expected wednesday, involves a three-way partnership with phone maker motorola and wireless operator cingular.
the new phone apparently will let users download itunes songs only from the pc to the mobile phone, not from a wireless over-the-air connection, although there is speculation that apple will provide an interface for wireless downloads from itunes.
if the phone is able to download songs directly from itunes, it would mark a major leap forward in wireless content delivery and could give cingular a leg up on competitors that still are working on providing digital audio and video over next-generation, high-speed networks.
big boost for digital music
"there's been a lot of speculation about the ipod phone, which represents a trend toward providing handhelds with digital-content playback capabilities," said yankee group analyst nitin gupta.
gupta suggested that just as camera phones introduced more people to digital photography, the ipod device will draw consumers to digital music.
"there might not be a lot of demand among current ipod users, but the real attraction will be among those who don't have the music players but want to try digital audio," gupta said.
the cost of the phone will be critical to its acceptance among consumers, said gupta, who noted that there could be a fee added by the carrier to enable the phones to work with the itunes service.
only a half-step
already, there are several phones with integrated mp3 capabilities. and carriers such as sprint and verizon are rolling out music-download services for their 3g networks. but thus far there has been no major connection with a music service such as itunes.
while apple is banking on its reputation as a music outlet to gain a foothold in the mobile phone content market, without over-the-air delivery of the songs to the handheld, the latest venture is only a half-step, said idc analyst lewis ward.
"most operators see apple as a competitor, and are primarily interested in wireless download services using their own networks that don't involve transferring content from the pc because they can't make any money that way," ward said.
he noted that cingular has been experimenting with digital music delivery but is behind the curve regarding the introduction of high-speed networks required to make multimedia content work on a broad scale. "this takes them one step closer to over-air content delivery," said ward.
yahoo
