The funny thing about being a technology guy is when people meet you, they tend to ask for advice, just as I am sure doctors experience. The latest question I get a lot is, ”what phone should I be getting next?” An example from last night… I was at a client dinner and a 50-ish looking executive saunters over and says, “hey technology guy, why does my IT department tell me I have to use a Blackberry, and what do you think I should get next?” Two questions and oh so many answers.

I am old enough to remember when the decision between phones was wall mount or desktop, and black or beige. Then it became a Motorola, or Nokia, and those were not that different. Now a “phone” is really handheld computer and the answers are getting complicated. Actually, if all you want is a cell phone, the answer is simple because you have no business having an iPhone or Android device. Just get whatever the providers offer for free and get on down the road. If you really are asking what handheld device should I have in order to be more effective and productive, then my answer is iPhone or Android based device. Don’t make me choose between these two because I do not like that Apple is locked to AT&T at the moment, and am equally nervous about Android because it is young as an operating system.

Anyway, he then says to me, “my wife has a Palm Pre.” And he raises his eyebrows as if to ask if that might be OK because she seems to like it. I comment that it is a nice phone, will work for many people, but it does not have the adoption rate of Apple or Google, and nowhere near the applications available. That did not mean much to my Blackberry toting friend. Thank god he did not ask me about a Windows platform phone. That always sends me into a tailspin of mystification as to how a company that big and with that much of a lead in the operating system market could possibly blow the opportunity to own the hand-held market.

After having to explain my Palm Pre answer to him for 15 minutes, I came back to his original two questions and told him this… Get the iPhone if you are choosing between that and a Blackberry, and the reason your IT people keep telling you that you have to use a Blackberry is because they bought a Blackberry server last year and now have to force everyone to use it in order to justify the expense. Sorry about that. I suggested he break from the herd, defy IT, and go Apple. He frowned at that, and I thought I was done with my duty. However…

I got on the elevator the next day to head on to the next event and he stops me and says, “but I hate AT&T’s service!” I struggled with what to say next because I could tell him to jailbreak his iPhone and run it with anyone, but he did not appear to me to be a jailbreak kind of guy. So I offered that the rumor is that Apple is going to allow the iPhone to be sold by some other providers soon, and AT&T was not really that bad. He frowned again. As he walked off into the sunset (actually the shade and traffic of downtown Chicago) I could see he was muttering to himself. I think he just wanted me to tell him the Blackberry was the way to go…

Scott Klososky
Scott@klososky.com