Our long national nightmare is nearly over...

And by that, of course, I mean the endless breathless wait for a Verizon iPhone.

Oh, shut up.

I am an Original Mac User, buster. I was Mac when Mac was for nerds. Not geeks - NERDS. Everyone complaining that we Mac users just follow the oh-so-cool trends can shaddup, because I had Macs when they were boring beige boxes that noooobody had but me.

And I still have never in my life needed antivirus software. So there.

Everything I use is Mac. My laptop, my work laptop, all my software, every file I've created since I was fourteen years old and my dad brought home the Apple SE, all of 1 mg RAM and an external modem for that wacky new AOL. Therefore, if I'm to get a smartphone that talks to my computer, it would be nice to have a smartphone created by Apple.

Hey, I wanted an iPhone when they came out. I could replace three devices I must carry on a daily basis with one gadget. No more digital camera (which has an overbright flash and eats batteries like my son attacks Oreos), no more iTouch (which is very nice as a PDA but sort of doesn't make phone calls) and it would replace my hand-me-down cell phone, which was perfectly good... in its day. Which was many days ago.

However, I did not get an iPhone in 2007. Or 2008, 2009 or 2010. Because Apple, for a company run by and employing literal Geniuses, doesn't always learn from its mistakes. In the 1990s, Apple nearly died because it insisted on proprietary everything, and its market share was approximately that of the Yugo.

But when Steve Jobs came back, he did two big things. He made the computers multi-colored and awesome, and he stopped the proprietary bullshit. Suddenly Mac was cool again, then they created the iPod and the rest is history.

iPhone looked awesome, and it currently holds about a 59-percent customer loyalty - as in, iPhone users intend to stay with iPhone in their next purchase - while smartphones overall enjoy about a 25-percent loyalty. Which kind of doesn't speak well for Android, no matter what market share they have.

But my love for Apple notwithstanding, I ain't going AT&T. Not no way, not no how. I'm Verizon, and so is most of my newspaper, and all of my family. That means our calls are free. I had no intention of switching to AT&T no matter how much Steve Jobs begged me or how many emails he sent me. 

So after three long years of waiting patiently, Verizon gets the iPhone. And it's the 3G iPhone, not 4G, but since I never had a smartphone before, I really don't care much about the difference. They say I can't go online while talking. Well, I can't do that now, unless I'm using my laptop while I talk on the phone. They say the 3G network is actually less crowded than the 4G at this point because of all the people leaping onto iPhone 4. They're welcome to it. They have to pay AT&T.

Verizon iPhones go on sale next month. Current Verizon customers get to go first. I'll be first in line. Well, I'll be first in line behind the guys who set up their tents in the parking lot waiting to be first in line. So I'll be first in line among people who have lives.

And my dear old Razr... well, it can go into storage next to that old Mac SE. Wait, I gave that to my Mac Genius friend. Seems he can still make it work, 22 years and still ticking. Take that, Microsloth.

Comments

[Anthony Mathenia]

I love my Macs (with the exception of the previous MacBook power cables - those defective bastards can go to hell). As a Sprint customer I've looked at envy at iPhones for years. I know the feeling. But I have to say my love affair with my Android phone is really swinging me over to Team Google.

[Faith]

It's still proprietary as far as I'm concerned. Why should it matter whose phone we use with whose phone service? I don't use either AT&T or Verizon, so I won't have an iPhone. I'm delighted to have a phone that gets internet, so I can check to see that I already have that book before I buy it again!

[Angelia Sparrow]

I was programming Macs back when they were 512K Apples. Didn't like them then, either.
We're penguinistas. Mudd occasionally feels the need to buy eviscerated computers, rebuild them better than they were before, better, stronger, faster. With software that needs recompiling every twenty minutes, because that makes him happy.

[CultureGeek]

Faith: It's not so much proprietary as AT&T and Verizon use totally different, um, thingamabobs. AT&T phones use a flux capacitor and Verizon uses the Heisenberg Compensator. Okay, I don't know internal tech, but I knew there was an actual technical reason why AT&T phones don't work on Verizon and vice versa.

[Kat Tales]

I guess I'm hopelessly old. I like the fact that my phone flips open like a Star Trek Communicator and will take a picture of my dog.
That's it. I can't text decent on a regular phone pad and won't pay extra for it. I do enjoy my one extra purchase: my ST:TNG theme ringtone. It's the easiest to hear that I've ever had and distinguishes my phone from my hubby's ( who just finally got on the plan)who had to have the Star Wars theme ringtone.

[Elliott Bellaire]

I don't see any difference between AT&T and Verizon. I've been on Verizon and have tried AT&T on my Sidekick. I have to say, each has its pros and cons. Yeah Iphones are good, but for me they are not perfect. I'd still stick with my Sidekick. Even though it's a bit, it can still do the things I need. And it's got a QWERTY, hehe.