Few products have been launched with such a blizzard of publicity as Apple Inc.'s iPhone.



To its many fans, Apple is more of a religious cult than a company. An iToaster that downloads music while toasting bread would probably get the same kind of worldwide attention.

Don't let that fool you into thinking that it matters. The big competitors in the mobile-phone industry such as Nokia Oyj and Motorola Inc. won't be whispering nervously into their clamshells over a new threat to their business.

The iPhone is nothing more than a luxury bauble that will appeal to a few gadget freaks. In terms of its impact on the industry, the iPhone is less relevant.

If column inches and airtime guaranteed commercial success, Apple would already have a global hit on its hands. For the past week, it has been impossible to open a newspaper or look at a Web site without reading something about the shiny new phone.

Certainly, it looks like a nice piece of equipment. The iPhone combines Apple's iPod music and video player with a mobile phone as well as having wireless Internet access for e-mail. Instead of lugging around a phone for making calls, an MP3 player for listening to music, and a Blackberry for checking your e- mail, you can do all three on one device. Even better, you only need one charger.

On top of that, its rivals will be pulling out all the stops to prevent the networks offering iPhones. Sure, a big operator such as Vodafone Group Plc would like an exclusive deal to sell the iPhone in, say, the U.K. market. Against that, how much does it want to annoy Nokia -- and what kind of incentives will Nokia be offering not to go with the Apple product? There will be lots of tough conversations between companies that know each other well. Apple will find it hard to win those negotiations.

Lastly, the iPhone is a defensive product. It is mainly designed to protect the iPod, which is coming under attack from mobile manufacturers adding music players to their handsets. Yet defensive products don't usually work -- consumers are interested in new things, not reheated versions of old things. Likewise, who is it pitched at? The price and the e-mail features make it look like a business product. But Apple is a consumer company. Will your accounts department stump up for a fancy new handset just so you can listen to Eminem on your way to a business meeting?