The iPhone Nano

Published: 2008-12-17 10:30:30

Rumors of an iPhone Nano have surfaced, accompanied by a visual. Doubts arise due to its absence from Steve Jobs' keynote at MacWorld and the potential issues related to App Store compatibility on a smaller screen. A minimized version may complicate the developer landscape, raising further skepticism about its existence.

The iPhone Nano

So, there're new rumours regarding an alleged iPhone Nano. This time there's even a picture illustrating the new device. I think that this is once again fake. For one, Apple just axed Steve's speech at this MacWorld. If there really was an iPhone Nano, wouldn't Steve Jobs want to disclose it to the public himself, instead of letting Phil Schiller do it?

Another doubt comes with the sole idea of a minimized version of the iPhone. A large deal of the iPhone experience comes from the App Store. These applications have been written for the specific display resolution of the current iPhone / iPod Touch hardware. A new device with a smaller screen wouldn't be able to sufficiently run these applications. I highly doubt that Apple would want a differentiated device landscape, where every developer has to include countless special cases in his code to account for all the quirks of the different devices available (much like with web development). 

So, given that there's not Steve Jobs at MacWorld, and that an iPhone Nano presumably wouldn't be able to run App Store applications, I highly doubt the existence of an iPhone Nano. I hope I am wrong though, as a cheap iPhone would expand the App Store audience even further.