Did You Hear That iPhone Debuted?

Years ago, when I first became the editor of a trade publication, I was intimidated for a variety of reasons, but the biggest was, "How am I going to come up with ideas for a column?"

Luckily, I cover the consumer electronics business where that is rarely a problem. There is an embarrassment of riches this week with tons of issues.

For example, did you hear that Apple unveiled a cellphone called iPhone last Friday?

Well you'd have to be on one of Pluto's lost moons not to have heard about it.

Give all the credit to Apple's marketing acumen, design brilliance and rabid customer loyalty for the overwhelming buzz over iPhone's introduction. (Check out senior editor Amy Gilroy's entertaining blog about the hype at TWICE.com.)

Even fellow CEO's tipped their caps to Steve Jobs and his team (see story on p. 1) for the efforts behind iPhone, even if initially it might not be the second coming of iPod.

Of course that's the reason why the media and bloggers of all stripes have covered the debut of iPhone as if it were, well, Paris Hilton's release from prison. The iPod was such a mammoth hit, and few in the general media, business press or product reviewers predicted its magnitude. Everyone is determined not to miss the boat this time with iPhone.

But those who are missing the boat are traditional CE retailers. You can excuse them if they are less than enthused about the debut of iPhone since, as Amy's story shows (see p. 10), CE retailers have been excluded from the party. They want to sell iPhone but have been locked out.

True, the CE industry has been able to participate in the iPhone phenomenon by selling systems and accessories, but the Apple universe is really a closed loop. Apple created its own Web site to sell its wares directly to consumers; started its successful chain of Apple Stores; created iTunes for iPod users to buy content only from Apple; and it has its own trade show, MacWorld, which this year conveniently overlapped a day or two with International CES in January.

I guess if consumers are willing to wear tattoos of your company logo, as Philips Consumer Electronics' president/CEO points out in our p. 1 coverage of the debut, you can probably do whatever the heck you want — as long as you are successful. Maybe your company would do it too, given half the chance.

But what has happened is that there seems to be two consumer electronics industries forming. One is Apple's. The other is occupied with all the other CE manufacturers, retailers and distributors.

What that may mean down the road is up for discussion, and it does bear watching.