iPhone 3G: To Buy or Not to Buy

UPDATE:  A follow up post about my five reasons not to buy an iPhone 3G can be found here.  

It’s almost one week since the announcement of the iPhone 3G. With the excitement leveling off and being able to think straight, I am taking a deeper look to see if I really should buy the iPhone 3G.

My reasons to not buy an iPhone 3G
So I first came up with reasons for not getting an iPhone 3G:

• No stereo Bluetooth (yet) – It doesn’t look like the iPhone 3G will let you listen to music or watch your videos in stereo with a stereo Bluetooth headphones. However, that could change with a software upgrade in the future. 
  
• No front camera – Not only will you have a hard time of taking pictures of yourself, you can’t make a video call considering you are on a 3G network. Having a front camera also opens up the possibilities of using iChat to make video calls to other iChat users on their Macs. That would be really cool, and I’m sure this front camera will be in a future version of the iPhone. 
  
• The data plan – Right now, I only have a voice plan that costs me 1,000 yen (around 10 bucks) every month in Japan. The plans and rates in Japan aren’t announced yet, but if I’m forced to have a data plan that will set me back more every month, that’s a very big reason for me not to go for an iPhone now. 
  

How will the iPhone improve my life?

• Go online with iPhone apps anywhere – Being able to connect to the Internet everywhere with iPhone apps, that sounds really appealing. 
  
  Workaround: I configure my Sharp EM-One as a wi-fi router, and connect my iPod Touch to it. It hiccups sometimes, and the process isn’t all that smooth, but if I really needed to get online with my iPod Touch, I can.
  
  
• Built-in camera of the iPhone –The iPhone would be great for taking casual photos, and it would be a breeze to manage them with iPhoto and the upcoming MobileMe service over the air. 
  
  Workaround: I use my Nokia 6680 to take casual photos. Since the Nokia 6680 can’t use wi-fi, I would have to email pictures to online photo services (i.e., Flickr or .Mac Web Gallery) using my cell phone plan, which will cost me. So to save, I take out the memory card and export it to iPhoto. 
  
  
• Contacts Integration – I usually add a lot of new contacts through my cell phone, so being able to easily sync my contacts between my phone and Address Book is a big plus. I can’t do that now because my Nokia 6680 doesn’t sync up very well with my Address Book. 
  
  Workaround: I force myself to add all contacts to my iPod Touch. Then I sync it back with Address Book, and export that to my Nokia 6680. What a hassle!
  
  
• iPhone’s input interface – Having to get accustomed to typing using the iPod Touch, I just can’t go back to using the phone pads of my Nokia. I’m eager to use the iPhone input interface to text. Unlike the above points, this one doesn’t have a workaround. Either I stick to the clumsy phone pads, or I go with the iPhone. 
  

Conclusion (for now…)
The low price point is very tempting, but the extra data plan costs is pulling me back. For Internet, email, wireless syncing, and managing photos over the air, I’m perfectly happy to use it with wi-fi when I am at home or at the office.

I won’t get an iPhone 3G in the States, and for Japan, it all comes down to the rates and plans, which should be announced in the coming weeks.  If I can get away with using the iPhone without a data plan, then I might get it.  If not, I'm going to hold off this time.

So there’s a probability of me not getting an iPhone 3G. In that case, I wouldn’t mind picking up an old iPhone from my friends and use it as an iPod Touch with a camera.