The Rumor Mill

Too Close to the Mark?

- 2000.02.01

2/1/2K: I was blown away to see MacOS Rumors publish the following story (reprinted under MOSR's Open Content License):


Apple developing "iPhone"? [13:14 1/27]

According to Network Solutions, Apple registered the domain "iPhone.org" in mid-December. www.iphone.org now redirects, as with all inactive Apple domains, to Apple.com.

iPhone.com is a long-dead page protesting the "unfair" access of computer users to free audio communication around the world while those who don't own computers must still pay long-distance, and iPhone.net redirects to InfoGear, an information appliances company who was registered the "iPhone" trademark.

What are Apple's intentions with this domain, when another company already claims ownership of the trademark? Ask around in Cupertino, and you'll get a fair number of blank stares.

Those few who were familiar with the project that Apple hopes to ship as "iPhone" reported that the project is an Internet "phone" that utilizes QuickTime's A/V capabilities to transmit and receive streaming multimedia to any other iPhone user. For an operating system to ship with the ability to real-time conference over the Web at no additional cost is revolutionary enough, but with QuickTime's superior image and audio compression algorithms, this could be a very big deal indeed.

The real question is, while Apple is developing a software product rather than a hardware device, and it does have a long track record of prefixing its product names with a lower-case "i," is it really worth the legal struggle to ship this product as "iPhone"? At the time of this post, Apple sources had no answers.

Stay tuned; we'll be covering this story closely in the coming days!


Wasn't it just five or six weeks ago I wrote iPhone Includes Video here on The Rumor Mill? I wrote about a video phone built around the Mac OS, one optimized for the internet but also able to function over standard phone lines.

MOSR seems to think Apple is working on a software-only solution. I wouldn't bet on it. Expect the iPhone to be hardware that handles streaming QuickTime via a codec, not just software.

And with a USB gamepad, it could lead to a whole new level of internet gaming!

- Anne Onymus

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