Ajax and the iPhone: great, but what about RSS?

So, Apple announced that the iPhone will be programmable, but only using HTML, CSS and Javascript.

Most people were pretty underwhelmed by this news - it sounds like Apple's quick fix to build a development community, and it probably is.

But this is a massive story. We will finally have a popular device whose developers will have to rely entirely on internet standards. The internet will receive another boost, as developers realise how much they can achieve - even Google Spreadsheets - and, after the kicking and screaming has subsided, I don't believe they'll want to look back to proprietary client technology.

After all, the desktop world is moving away from client applications towards the internet - and it's going to be the same on the smart phone.

Internet Apps, not Client Apps

Steve Jobs mentioned making a call and sending an email via Safari - I assume this means they'll support <a href="mailto:x@y.com">Email me</a> and <a href="callto:+112345">Call me</a> via HTML. At once, seamless integration with CRM and corporate directories will be straightforward.

Of course, this makes the decision to stick with GPRS, rather than 3G, even more strange. Download speeds will be pitiful once you're outside a Wifi connection. Surely they'll produce a 3G model soon, especially for Europe?

Offline RSS

I'd love to see offline RSS in the iPhone. If it synched your RSS feeds every time you hit a Wifi zone, and stored them locally for offline access, that would be a tremendous win.

After all, what is iTunes.com but a personalized RSS feed of music and video files? If your phone wirelessly synched up with iTunes.com, you wouldn't need to touch your PC!

And offline RSS would also allow me to synchronize with corporate files, Google's Picasa, news, and much more.

If that's not a good programming API, I don't know what is!