Forgive me Steve, for I once had sinned, and I come to you in confession to admit I had wronged you. For more than a year after iPhone was available to the public, I held off on buying one. I made all these excuses - that my BlackBerry was "good enough", that work was paying my monthly bills, that I was concerned about lackluster Exchange support, or switching to AT&T. I now know that I was naive, for my time as an iPhone owner has convinced me that there is no need for any other phones to be on this market. Be they Blackberry, of the Android persuasion, Nokia or any other, they simply aren't the iPhone, and they never will be.The world can't pull the wool over your eyes the way they once did, can they, Steve? You once trusted others to work with you to expand your market share, and deliver a top-notch customer experience, but they stole from you and later, tried to kill you. And when you made the rare mistakes, to not find friends, your market share was eaten alive.
You won't make that mistake again, now, will you, Steve. You have learned that you can never stop making sure your product is the best. You have learned that it takes creating an ecosystem of applications and developers that cannot be matched. You have learned that you have to not neglect the enterprise, but instead, offer a better, differentiated alternative.
As an iPhone owner, your little device follows me both day and night. It reads my e-mail. It puts me in touch with friends and family. It stores pictures of my kids. It entertains me during downtime, and stores my music, and my browser bookmarks. It is no ordinary cell phone I want to put down on a desk, or leave behind on a table, content to let its batteries run out. It's something I have near me, at home, at work, on the go. I look at the iPhone while driving, while pumping gas, while shopping, and while rocking kids to sleep.
I've tried the others, Steve. I've held the T-Mobile G1, Steve. I've seen the clunky Nokia N95. I've tried the Palm, the Windows Mobile, the BlackBerry. But they aren't iPhones, and no matter how big their screens get, or how much they try to look like they run a ton of apps, it won't be the same, Steve.
I was stupid, Steve. Foolish. I thought I knew better. I thought I was strong, and yet, I was weak. I will never make that mistake again. I will tell everyone. It's iPhone or No Phone.