Suffice to say my experience, with respect to the relative importance of phone features, has been quite different from yours. For example, I acknowledge that there is often concern as to whether or not a phone has a camera at all. But since there’s no such thing as a “great” camera on a cell phone anyway, I can’t see any degree of greatness being a deal-breaker. But then again, I’m a photography snob – some background on me .

As for the UI, no, I would not characterize it as “Nirvana,” either. However, it was light-years ahead of anything else that was available when it was introduced, and I still don’t know that much progress has been made toward catching or surpassing it in the nearly three years since. I’ll take four taps over playing Menu Monster Mash any day. And how many of these same phone store dwellers of whom you speak bought an iPhone last year when it didn’t even have a camera? In the end the UI was, and continues to be, more important than the lack of a particular feature.

Secondly, the iPhone UI really isn’t actually all that great – there’s a lot of “surprise and delight” (the way that the UI designers have used easing and “weight” in motion, for example), but there’s also a lot of rough edges. Four taps to get from one inbox to another if you have multiple mail accounts? That’s stupid. No doubt Apple will iron those out as it’s already ironed some others out, but the UI isn’t the nirvana you’re painting it.

FYI, I’ve never found an easter egg in a game in my life. Thanks for the assumptions, though. Nice try.

This is a common techno-geek delusion from which you apparently suffer. People like yourself are used to evaluating and purchasing phones based on a spec list. However, you are in the minority, and this is not nearly as big an issue for the “average” person as you would have it. If this were so, the iPhone would not be successful, because its spec list, taken at face value, is nothing spectacular. The UI is what is responsible for iPhone’s appeal – folks are buying it in spite of what individual features it may lack, and even in spite of the boat anchor of a carrier it’s wedded to. The UI is not an issue for you because you and your ilk get your rocks poking around nested menus and “discovering” how features are accessed and utilized. You spent your formative years searching video games for easter eggs, so a retarded UI is no challenge for you. This is not a value judgement, just my stereotypical supposition of who you probably are and why you express the opinions you do.

Speaking of the UI, contrary to Jean-Denis’ comment, the user experience is the primary feature which the competition seems unable to replicate. The app store can be duplicated – albeit not easily. It’s a question of willingness, not ability – willingness to pour the requisite resources into creating a developer community. Of course, having to develop for multiple hardware platforms is always going to be an Achilles Heel for Android. If the UI is attractive and the hardware environment predictable, developers will seek *you* out. Which is why Palm’s seeming antipathy toward a nascent Pre developer community earlier this year was so puzzling.

>Only one advantage?

Of course not the only one. But it can be argued that all the other ones are easy (or at least possible) to replicate.

The app store is *the* barrier to entry for would-be competitors.

Jake: None of those are actually unique to Apple. There’s lots of elegant hardware design around – in fact, when I put the iPhone next to some other phones, I wish Apple would take a few design cues from them. It’s user-friendly… until you try and do two things at once, when it’s just irritating. Some would argue that the Pre’s interface is far more user-friendly for this reason.

And iTunes… well, it’s a double-edged sword. There are people around who really, really hate iTunes. And many argue that syncing music and images isn’t even necessary – mount as a drive, drag and drop is a better approach. I’ll caveat that with the fact that I like the iTunes approach, but it’s worth remembering that just because I like it doesn’t mean that it works for everyone.

Only one advantage? What about all of the others? Elegant design, super user-friendliness, seamless syncing through iTunes.