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trash trash trash.
How many times do we have to be subjected to this garbage rumor?

Move along people. There's nothing to see here.

My keyboard already slides out... on screen!

Jul 02, 08 - 08:38 am Comment from: Tommy Boy

By far the dumbest rumor I've read in a long time.

Jul 02, 08 - 08:40 am Comment from: PowerPhone

Reports suggest......a Pez dispencer. Or whatever.

Cough (bullsh**t) Cough

The article is a contro-claim. Physical QWERTY keyboard is THE problem... While it will need different keyboards manufactured for all other places using QWERTY and other international keyboards.
Apple is wisw enough not to invest in such useless efforts, as a touch virtual keybord AUTOMATICALLY is the correct one by the OS's language.

This idiot actually thinks that the whole world thinks, speaks and writes English.

Apple's soft keyboard works with every written and pictographic language known to man at the click of a soft button.

Jul 02, 08 - 08:47 am Comment from: HMCIV

Kenny's argument for trying the keyboard free iphone sounds a lot like Mom's argument for trying broccoli/cauliflower.

All the same, I didn't have to try it to know I wouldn't like it. And that's why vegetables like Kenny depend on keyboards.

Apple buys rights to windows 7

will roll out windoze moble on next iphone

Freedom of the press has turned into personal gain

or maybe freedom of the press was always a "bullshit story" as my late friend carlin would say

Jul 02, 08 - 09:00 am Comment from: Mr. Reeee

Talk about clueless.

"Business" phones need physical keyboard? When these phone appeared, what were the alternatives?

A. Use a stylus to tap an on-screen keyboard.

B. Use Palm's Graffiti to "write" characters on screen, where it would often register the incorrect character and need correction (long-time Palm user here).

C. Or use a keyboard with an itsy bitsy keyboard, designed for lilliputian fingers.

So, they opted for a keyboard.

Jul 02, 08 - 09:02 am Comment from: iWill

Why don't we just strap it onto an old Underwood typewriter? Now that's a slide out keyboard!

The poor little competition trying to spread FUD to make sure people think twice about switching....

Just wait till you see the Chinese and Japanese version

One four letter word...BULL!!! That would be like adding a floppy to the next iMac.

Jul 02, 08 - 09:13 am Comment from: DLMeyer

I've heard rumors that stylish lady's nails don't activate the current keyboard properly. Not knowing any smart-phone-using stylish ladies, I can neither confirm nor deny this. Then there's grubby-fingered teens ... how quickly do their screens become unreadable? Able to send (something) but needing a quick wipe before checking the spelling (HAH!) or the reply?
There's a large market out there for keyboard models. Of course, there already are many keyboard models out there to fill that niche. The one for the grubby-fingered (!) or stylish (?). And, until the purchasing agents can be convinced, lower level managers.
The question is, does Apple feel any great need to target those niches? I rather thought they were comfortable with the numbers they are selling to date. Well, the numbers they expect to be selling in a month or so. They will want (need?) to add new "features" as time goes on, maybe (or maybe NOT) a keyboard will be one of those. Lack of a keyboard has never kept me from sending text from my phone ... I'm one of those who has never felt such an urge and who has asked others to stop sending them to me! So. I'm off the demographic charts on this. And not even a little ashamed of my perverted self over it!
So ... there!

Way to try to freeze the new iPhone release! Start a rumor about an even newer hardware version.

MW: "talk" is cheap

Jul 02, 08 - 09:25 am Comment from: ElderNorm

What a goof ball!
What a nerd!
What an ultra maroon!

OH wait, I get it. Its a joke. A pun (the lowest form of humor, right?)

A slide out keyboard for the iPhone. Ha Ha Ha. ..... I get it now.

Actually a real keyboard is a great idea. As programs become available to use the power of the iPhone and its real OS, a keyboard will be a great idea. ...... Just not one of those puny tiny things that the BlackBerry uses. Sheeezzzzeee.

Take a look at the bluetooth keyboard that you can get with the Apple units. Its full sized, auto registers , is battery powered and is only slightly larger than the iPhone. If I need to type, I would hope someone (Apple anyone??) updates the OS to allow syncing an apple bluetooth keyboard to the iPhone. And since the iPhone can play movies on a tv, you could set up a small portable 9 inch screen lcd tv to be your screen. They already have those that sync to an iPhone. I have one that works with my iPod Touch to play dvd movies or movies off the Touch.

Its a mostly done deal and much better than that stupid crackberry thing.

Just a thought.

en

The on-screen keyboard is still annoyingly difficult to work with. I'm about 7 or 8 months into my iPhone ownership, use the thing for email all day every day, and HATE the keyboard.

I used to walk and happily type email on my Treo -- didn't need to look at the screen at all, as I was physically familiar with the keyboard and could negotiate it by touch alone. The iPhone demands that I stop and stare at it while I type, constantly backing up and re-keying the letter that I missed and dismissing the thing's wrong word suggestions.

If I correct my own mistakes, then I waste time backspacing and backspacing and ultimately having to dismiss the iPhone's suggested (wrong) word. If I "just trust the intelligence" and try to type through it, then I end up having to backspace anyway because its suggestion is wrong.

BOOO the iPhone keyboard. YAAAAY any prospect of a real keyboard.

And search.

And sort.

And.... man, they REALLY couldn't be bothered put the basics into the 2.0 software release? I think we've been more than patient.

Jul 02, 08 - 09:32 am Comment from: Macromancer

Apple isn't a sliding panel kind of design company. They probably would come up with some cooler implementation.

...like a tactile holographic keyboard. One could, of course, think of a few other uses for tactile holographic interaction...

Jul 02, 08 - 09:37 am Comment from: Cubert

DON'T DO IT, UNCLE STEVE!!!

Stick to your guns. Just add tactile feedback.

Just add a USB port. Then any dumbass who wants a keyboard can haul one around.

iPhone doesn't need to be all things to all people to be hugely successful. I personally think that typing on it is just as easy if not easier than my Treo. However, the rest of the iPhone experience so pales any other phone i have ever used that I could never switch to something else. It would be like going back to a rotary dial phone mounted on the wall.

Yeah right. Lets go back to the 20 century. What crap. If anything, the keyboard should be available in landscape mode for those with fatter fingers perhaps. Leave physical keyboards to 3rd party developers. Apple doesnt need to sully their inventory with this sort of dross.

Just gimme a landscape touchscreen keyboard, okay Apple? Let it make the keys just a scootch bigger, okay? Not all of us are blessed with slender, tapering fingers. Spread the word!

This guy doesn't just write rumors... It's a subtle attempt to negatively impact iPhone sales/adoption.

Jul 02, 08 - 10:20 am Comment from: Andy

This article makes no sense whatsoever...

Can could Steve deride keyboards so much at MacWorld 2007 and somehow concede Apple's Multi-Touch wasn't practical, afterall? Steve doing an about face is nigh on mythical... he's what, only done it twice? (The PowerBook G5 and the Apple TV).

I'm sure Apple experiment with all sorts of tech combinations within Cupertino's walls, but most of them will never see the light of day - and certainly not the consumer's eye. It's possible Apple DO have an iPhone with a keyboard, but guess what, it's only a testbed! (Read, not for sale!).

Given that iPhone interest and sales are off the charts, it stands to reason that guess what, Multi-Touch is actually a practical useful feature.

Afterall, aside from the usual suspects (Microsoft propagandists...), who's complaining?

This article is nothing more than one man's envy. "The iPhone is too revolutionary for me to handle - let's make people want those gimmicky little keyboards again! My Nokia with crippled, backwards software is obviously better than a phone that has its own fully fledged OS and a multitude of practical functions to boot!"

The best course of action is to simply let people see the iPhone for itself. That alone will render articles such as this, irrelevant.

Jul 02, 08 - 10:35 am Comment from: Jubei

I heard the Brooklyn Bridge is on sale also. Better hurry up and bid on it now.

Apple may do a phone with a keyboard, but it won't be because existing phones have them, existing corporate phones that they're CURRENTLY not competing with due to software, software that is being revised shortly.

In a year or so, if the iphone has made no penetration into the business market then they may change their mind - at which point they'll likely have something ready just in case. They're certainly not going to make any decision on it anytime soon.

Jul 02, 08 - 11:14 am Comment from:  Genius

Who needs a hunk of bulk slide out keyboard when you have one that comes on when you need it!

Jul 02, 08 - 11:26 am Comment from: Grifterus

OK, here's a rumor for you all:

Apple will release Boot Camp Mini, a new option for the iPhone, which will allow your iPhone / iPod Touch to boot from OS X, Windows Mobile, Palm OS or Symbian, creating virtual partitions on the mobile device.

I just made it out, but, how about spicying it out and making it roll? Call it a social experiment. Perhaps Dvorak or Thurror will by it, hehe!!

There's one simple reason Apple will not sell an iPhone with keyboard.

THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE OF APPS SOLD ON THE APP STORE WOULD NOT WORK ON SUCH A PHONE. Is any one of those developers developing for both virtual and hard keyboard? Of course not.

Instant obsolescence. Are they going to make a touch iPhone with a redundant keyboard? Don't be absurd.

The only reason to do this would be to sell a cheap, non-multi-touch "texting" phone for the teenyboppers- the kind they give away free- and Apple could care less about trolling those waters.

Give me a break.

Jul 02, 08 - 11:39 am Comment from: Andy

@ M.X.N.T.4.1

As I said, Apple probably has an iPhone with a physical keypad as a testbed (amongst other weird and wonderful combinations), but it doesn't seem much likely they'll ever include a physical keyboard on the saleable phone.

Why?

Well, given the huge amount of time and effort invested in perfecting a keyboard-less phone, conceding that some number of users 'need' a physical keyboard would render useless the entire concept behind the iPhone itself.

Apple thrives on overturning current industry dogma, and to include a keyboard would imply they have no confidence in their assertions that a physical keyboard is/was unnecessary.

Remember what Steve said? Keyboards are like crutches to phones, an interactive touch screen gives the user a more pleasant experience, and gives the developer much more scope to create applications to suit their needs and not be constrained by phone hardware.

And at the end of the day, nobody is forcing anyone to have an iPhone. If those so called corporate types are so married to their Nokias and Motorolas, let them keep them! The iPhone has plenty of an audience elsewhere.

Jul 02, 08 - 12:15 pm Comment from: PowerPhone

Bluetooth foldable keyboard as a third-party option.

Jul 02, 08 - 12:36 pm Comment from: Andy

@PowerPhone

Perhaps, but it's still antithesis to the iPhone. The iPhone's virtual reason for being is that it quite deliberately lacks a physical keyboard.

I mean, if a physical keyboard is so doggedly important to some people, then why are they even considering the iPhone? To whine? To complain? To be bitter? To condemn Apple for actually lifting the cellphone industry out of a self-imposed technological stagnation?

There are plenty of phones out there with physical keyboard galore, and the iPhone isn't, and doesn't need to be, one of them.

hey 'eldernorm' are you one of those lsd people?

Jul 02, 08 - 01:46 pm Comment from: PowerPhone

Andy

It's not up to you to decide what people want or need. I am quite happy with the onscreen keyboard, but since last Sat. I have been away from home with my son, who is in ICU with a head trama. My iPhone has been my main contact. After each visit I can email a lot of people with updates. For situations like this, I would welcome a larger keyboard for my big fingers.
I feel sorry for your co-workers if you are in charge of the kitchen.

I don't know about Kewney's sources, but his logic is shaky.

a) The iPhone does not have a physical keyboard, but it does not follow that no iPhone will never have a physical keyboard.

b) Current middle-class corporate smart phones have physical keyboards, therefore all middle-class corporate smart phones must have physical keyboards.

He uses completely opposite lines of reasoning in those two pronouncements without supporting either.

Hopefully the slide-out keyboard signals the adoption of Safari code that doesn't crash just about every session.

Safari mobile is highly incompatible with:
- espn.com
- macdailynews.com
- engadget.com
- sherdog.com
- newspaper websites
- etc...

The only reason phones with QWERTY keyboards sold more than those that didn't is because no one had a phone with a virtual keyboard! They ALL had QWERTY keyboards. Duh!

This has nothing to do with the style of keyboard offered on the iPhone. The reason the iPhone hasn't made big strides into the corporate world is twofold:

1. Apple marketed it at consumers because it knew the iPhone wasn't business ready yet;
2. The iPhone had no true Exchange support or other corporate communications needs to rival Exchange or RIM.

Apple is adding Exchange support to iPhone 3G, and is going even further to offer an Exchange system (MobileMe) for those who want Exchange-style features without investing in Exchange.

Let's see the numbers in 6-12 months.

Jul 02, 08 - 02:41 pm Comment from: Andy

@PowerPhone

What I want and need? It's about what Steve wants and needs.

Apple set out to design a phone to his specifications and requirements, one facet of which was the deliberate lack of a physical keyboard. As such, it follows... why does the iPhone need one ever? The iPhone has a bigger software keyboard than the keyboard of any BlackBerry or what have you, that I've seen.

Again, there are so many phones out there. The iPhone doesn't suit your tastes or needs? Then buy something that does!

Demanding that Apple cripple their own pride and joy with a feature they hate is like asking them to make all their MacBook Pros and Mac Pro in Dell black plastic and run Windows 95 instead of OS X.

Part of the iPhone's charm is its complete lack of stupid tacky buttons festooned all over the device. It's a complete shift from the ingrained handset design, and a good one.

What next, is Apple going to be condemned by people with no hands?

Jul 02, 08 - 03:02 pm Comment from: Martin

Apple would never send prototypes to execs.

they would only send them to engineers, en never this early.

and, there is no reason to send a prototype to an operator just because it has a new keyboard.

this claim is not just stupid, it's a lie

Jul 02, 08 - 03:06 pm Comment from: Martin

@Andy

i completely disagree, the iPhone is not AT ALL about lacking a keyboard, your computer has a mouse AND a keyboard, i don't see why that should be different on a phone.

a hardware keyboard will not make the multitouch UI less interesting or efficient.

Jul 02, 08 - 03:26 pm Comment from: PowerPhone

Andy
do you know what a Bluetooth keyboard is?
Either you are joking, which is kind of funny
Or you are seriuos, which is kind of pathetic

"... whatever Steve Jobs does, is Right. And so, since the iPhone currently has no keyboard on it, ..."
Hmm. The iPhone has no keyboard?!
What have we been typing on?!!!

Jul 02, 08 - 07:38 pm Comment from: ken1w

Steve Jobs made a remark during the recent 3G iPhone intro keynote that the software-based keyboard is what allows Apple to release the exact same hardware across dozens of nations speaking many languages.

That's a significant advantage over phones with fixed keyboards.

Jul 02, 08 - 08:18 pm Comment from: Petey

WTF!

Why on earth would Apple design a phone with any physical keyboard when they have the best touch screen interface in the world???

This is absolute rubbish - Apple wont go back to the stone age and put a plastic keyboard on their iPhone.

If they do I certainly aint gonna buy it. Why should I when multi-touch is so great.

Jul 02, 08 - 08:22 pm Comment from: Petey

A message to 'grubby teenagers' and stylish 'ladies' with an iPhone.

1. Grubby teenagers - learn to keep your hands clean by using something called soap and hot water.

You will be amazed what happens when u mix the two!

2. Stylish ladies - Get your nails cut of even better take off those fake nails.

Jul 02, 08 - 08:36 pm Comment from: Petey

Since owning my iPhone from the day it was launched in the UK not ONCE have I ever thought I wish this phone had a physical keyboard.

Infact the opposite came to mind, the touch screen interface is so great that I didnt even realise until recently that I needed a keyboard on a mobile phone!

I have never missed not having plastic keys and its something I wont go back to either.

Mutli-touch is perfect for my needs, and you will find almost every other iPhone owner will say exactly the same thing.

Whenever I see a mobile phone with plastic keys the first thought that comes to mind is "God thats an old looking phone. Why does it have keys?"

And I think like that even when I see the latest models as well.

The iPhone is a design enigma, a device that makes every phone look ancient and a testament to genius level industrial design.

"but since last Sat. I have been away from home with my son, who is in ICU with a head trama."

Well that' good. At least he wont call social services when you ass rape him.

Get real people.

It's not just the iPhone, it's a mobile OSX computer.

OF COURSE someday, there will be keyboard options. And of course Apple is experimenting with them.

And no, the touchscreen isn't going away, and you're not going to have to have a keyboard. They don't just make one model of ipod, why would they make just one model of iPhone?

But Apple is playing to WIN here... in a way that they never did in the early mac days (and they absolutely DID do with the ipod.) There are going to be lots of sizes and lots of options.

Me... I have been continually amused by the smug statements of competitors about the closed system, no SDK... and now about the keyboard. Because Apple can easily add physical keyboard options. And push email. And of course there was going to be an SDK when it was ready.

But BB can't exactly add OSX...

Now why does anyone here care if a model eventually gets released with a physical keyboard? Just don't buy that one!