• The New York Times, Monday, June 25, 2007 11 AM

With the iPhone, Steve Jobs and Apple will take their second stab at reformatting an industry-mobile phone, which requires striking an even trickier balance between three distinct entities: wireless carriers, mobile phone makers, and increasingly, Hollywood.

Apple enters the market as a handset maker in the unique position of having strong ties with Hollywood and Web content providers through its other consumer electronics devices. Because of this, the iPhone marks a significant power shift in the dynamics between the three disparate entities, uniting content owners and cell phone makers on one side, leaving big telecom on the other.

Many attribute the lumbering pace of the U.S. cellular wireless market to the close control carriers like Verizon and AT&T Wireless keep over their networks. Everything from the browser to the actual content that appears on the mobile Web has to be approved by the carrier. In striking its deal with YouTube, Apple showed that the iPhone, which can attach itself to a faster Wi-Fi network enabling users to view broadband content, is moving away from carrier dependency. Nobody -- consumers, handset makers, Hollywood, Web providers --likes the way the carriers run the mobile phone industry. Thankfully, Apple's entry into the market could spark a big change.

Read the whole story at The New York Times »