The Serendipitous Beauty of iPhone Use Cases

It seems not a day goes by that I don't discover a new use case for my iPhone.  My latest happened driving home from San Mateo.  It was 1:30PM,  Terry Gross was wrapping up her interview with James Cameron and I caught the last 5 minutes.  Having just watched the Avatar I really wanted to hear the whole interview.  Then it hit me. I could use the new NPR iPhone App to listen to it.  So I went to Programs - Fresh Air - James Cameron - Listen Now, connected my iPhone to the car stereo and VIOLA listened to the entire interview.

How cool is that?

When iPhone users meet, the conversation inevitable turns to "What cool applications have you discovered?".  That exploration is even more compelling as the apps can be downloaded and tried right there and then. It's hard to imagine how the iPhone challengers will ever catch up.  Efforts by Sony Ericsson, LG Electronics, Samsung and 21 others to create an App Store for all their divergent phones will be lost in complexity and fraught with political land mines.

As I noted in "Goodbye Laptop - Hello iPhone" the iPhone experience has changed the way I use computers in many profound ways. Now I can't wait for my next serendipitous iPhone-user meeting to learn another life changing use case.