In case you are an iPhone user living on another planet, Apple is having a big announcement on Tuesday, St. Patricks Day, about version 3.0 of the iPhone software.  I have no idea what they will say.  And I wouldn’t even try to predict it ahead of time.  Apple is just as unpredictable with hardware as they are with iStore admissions.  But I do know what they should do if they want the iPhone to still be considered a next-generation device.  Here is my list:

  1. Global Cut-and-paste.  Failure on this point for this long is pure incompetence.
  2. MMS – Having a phone that can take photos without letting you send them via a widely-accepted standard just shows that Apple pushed this thing out before it was quite ready.  Time to fix that.
  3. Teathering.  I can understand not offering this when AT&T’s 3G network was still young, but come on guys, it’s time!
  4. Background processes.  Without them, the iPhone will never meet its potential.  It’s time to turn apps like Pandora and alarm clocks loose and let them soar.   
  5. Flash.  Need I say more?
  6. In addition to background processes, if Apple was really smart and wanted to give users some real control over their devices, they would purchase  IntelliScreen, MyProfiles, and QuickGold and build them into the OS.  After using these, I’ll never go back to a non-jailbroken phone.
  7. The iStore definately needs some work.  For one thing, it needs to stop telling me that there are updates when none are available.  Second, it needs a wish list.  It already tracks when purchased apps are updated.  It’s a lost sales opportunity to also let me know when an app I am interested in goes on sale or is updated.  As much as I love AppSniper, this needs to be build into the store itself.

Apple could make me a very happy camper with these mods.  Or, they could continue to offer a lot of unfulfilled promise.  Guess we’ll see….