The Apple phone flop

I just looked at the calendar and realized that:

(a) It's only a few weeks to Macworld, where Apple Computer is expected to release a smart phone similar to the BlackBerry, and:

(b) I haven't antagonized Apple fans in a while. It's my birthday this week, after all, and I need to get more fun out of turning 45 than just counting the new moles on my back.

So, anyways, Apple is slated to come out with a new phone. Reports say that it will have a slide-out keyboard, 4GB or 8GB of storage, and work on CDMA or GSM cellular networks. It will start at US$249 before subscription rebates.

And it will largely fail.

Initially, of course, it won't look that way at all. As with any Apple product release, it will be ushered into the world on a wave of obligatory gushing. "It's the greatest advance in communication since cave painting," some will proclaim. "Like Star Trek, but without the clingy Qiana shirts."

It's predictable. If Apple got into medical devices, people would come out of Steve Jobs' speech proclaiming "The iBag is the easiest, most user-friendly colostomy device I've ever encountered."

Sales for the phone will skyrocket initially. However, things will calm down, and the Apple phone will take its place on the shelves with the random video cameras, cell phones, wireless routers and other would-be hits. Remember the Mac Mini? It was supposed to ignite a revolution for small computers. It didn't. The flat-panel iMac? Some predicted that Apple's price tag would drive other prices higher. Whoops.

Why won't the Apple phone succeed? It will be a great piece of hardware that, if I wasn't the cheapest man in North America, I might buy. The entire strategy, however, is based on what I call "iPod magic." Apple succeeded with the iPod, the theory goes. Therefore, they can break into other categories and turn them upside down.