This is what using an iPhone Plus 6 for a phone call feels like on the first day.
Disclaimers and notes:
• For younger visitors, that black thing is an old telephone (that’s where Apple got the iPhone ringtone)
• Old rotary telephones weren’t really (quite) that big (but they weren’t exactly small and light, either)
• Disregard the East German officer aspect (it’s integral to the film’s plot), focus on the size instead (using an iPhone 6 Plus doesn’t make you feel like an East German officer)
• If you haven’t seen Top Secret!, I do recommend it
Without further ado, this is what using an iPhone Plus 6 for a phone call feels like on the first day:
Here’s the scene from the film:
It’s a good thing I don’t really use my iPhone to make phone calls or I’d feel pretty silly. I mostly use it as an Internet Communicator, as Steve Jobs would say.
In closing, I’m keeping my iPhone 6 Plus! I love it! If you use your iPhone frequently for phone calls, especially in public, consider an iPhone 6 instead!
[UPDATE: 2:40pm EDT: Changed third bullet point to “East German officer” from “Nazi” as per “SamLowry” below. It seems that my memory slightly failed me likely due to the fact that the last time I saw the complete film was 30 years(!) ago.]
SteveJack is a long-time Macintosh user, former web designer, multimedia producer and a regular contributor to the MacDailyNews Opinion section.
It’s true. You have a tendency to use an iPhone more for other things than actual calls. Calls eat up more of your time and most don’t like or need to sit on their phones for an hour with other social media ways of communicating regularly available. So less need to “catchup” on a lengthy call.
You are always obliged to call Mom regularly though…
I use a Ouija board to contact Mom.
Respectfully disagree.
The iPhone 6 Plus is the best phone of the 8 different iPhones that I have owned (yes I have owned each generation). I have not felt self conscious at all. It has many advantages over the iPhone 6 such as the better camera, landscape icons, split screen for emails just to name a few. I don’t use my iPads nearly as much as the screen is just the right size and the display is amazingly clear.
Couldn’t be happier.
On the first day, using iPhone 6 Plus as a phone, you didn’t think, gee, this thing is a bit large? Even a little bit? Not a thought at all? Really?
The rest of your comments — “many advantages over the iPhone 6 such as the better camera, landscape icons, split screen for emails just to name a few. I don’t use my iPads nearly as much as the screen is just the right size and the display is amazingly clear” — actually agree with what SteveJack is saying in the article. The way I read it, the article is only about phone calls (holding the iPhone 6 Plus to your head) in public.
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it’s not bad in public unless you have a small head. I use the phone with headphones, so I rarely hold it up to my face, but when I do, the 6 plus works better for me than my 4S because the mic and the earpiece are exactly where they should be.
“the 6 plus works better for me than my 4S because the mic and the earpiece are exactly where they should be.”
Great point. On previous iPhone models either I could hear well and not be understood as well or I could not hear well and better understood. I don’t know how the iPhone 6 does though.
“The way I read it, the article is only about phone calls (holding the iPhone 6 Plus to your head) in public.”
True. I was just pointing out that there are advantages to the Plus that make it desirable and may overcome what might be considered a “minor” negative aspect of the Plus by some. Anyway let’s see what he has to say about the phone after he has had it for a while. Hopefully he will give us a report after a reasonable amount of use. Remember “Rome was not built in a day.”
Too big compared to what, large Android phones? Many of them are even larger than the 6+. And people seem to be able to use them without any problem.
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Good point.
The fact of the matter is that the first mobile phones were gigantic compared to every mobile phone made today and back then users of them didn’t seem to be embarrassed by using them as phones. Of course most of you probably weren’t born at that time. If the utility is great, and IMHO it is, it will eventually be accepted as normal by the vast majority of the population.
Same can be said of the Apple Watch which, again IMHO will be as significant as the iPod, iPhone and iPad products have been.
Yeah, the 6+ isn’t quite as big as my old Motorola Brick (dynatac) 🙂 It costs a helluva lot less, too. IIRC, the brick cost me around $1,000.00 – in 1980s money. Plus $45/mo. for the line and $0.45/minute for the calls. Not exactly the good old days 😉
And, as it happens, my 6+ finally shipped today!
“Disregard the Nazi aspect (it’s integral to the film’s plot)”
uh, don’t wanna ruin your day, but there were no Nazis at all in that movie – it plays in East Germany long after WW2.
No it does not.
It involves the French resistance and Nazis.
It is a parody of WWII spy movies and Elvis films.
you’re wrong. It involves the NVA (“Nationale Volksarmee”) of East Germany during the cold war, and some French resistance, which together makes no sense in itself (on purpose).
My favorite line in the entire movie was when they first met in the salon and asked each other’s names.
And what is your name?
Hillary.
That’s a beautiful name; what does it mean?
“She whose bosoms defy gravity,” she delivers the line deadpan as she gazes out over the dance floor.
I think you may be wrong about the picture of Jeremy Kemp with the big phone. The uniform he is wearing is that of a Nazi, note the double SS lightning symbols on both sides of his collar. The Top Secret movie in IMDB shows Jeremy Kemp in a different uniform which indeed may be East German after WWII.
The film has parodies of 60s surf music, the Blue Lagoon, Hammer Horror, World War 2 spy films, and even an appearance from the Wizard of Oz’s Scarecrow and you’re worried about historical accuracy of the uniforms? The script says it’s set in Cold War East Germany, therefore that’s where it’s set, regardless of in which universe.
BT headset. Problem solved!
Amen. Tech was invented for a damn good reason.
The 6+ is a super phone. It feels comfortable to talk and the sound quality is superb. Frankly it feels good to have a phone of some substance. Of course on my first telephone I had to place a call through the operator (rotary dial was a few years away). It all depends on your age and perspective.
I tried a buddy’s 6+. It felt like I was holding a DVD box next to my head. Nice screen though.
Does anyone hold a phone up to their ear any more?
Yeah, if you are efficient & actually do some work, holding a phone is more than a pain, it simply doesn’t work.
It makes me think that the reviewers writing these articles really don’t use the tech in the most productive ways.
Not everyone likes/uses Bluetooth.
Not everyone CAN use Bluetooth at work etc.
Some people leave/forget the Bluetooth at home/work/car and just have to use the iPhone.
And some people… actually use a landline.
I’ve been to football games and watched a guy walking to his seat, with one of the big ass phablets to his head talking. *Everyone* was looking at him like he had the phone from the movie pictured.
I understand the article, and i’d agree with it. A few months down the road you will think it’s normal.
Take a subway ride in Seoul sometime. Nearly half of the women are using the Note and couldn’t care less what people think of them holding it next to their small heads. My wife’s best friend has a Note 2. She’s about 5-3 and 100, real petite, as is my wife. My wife said that she may get the 6 Plus as well. Why do guys care more about how they look holding a phone than fashion-conscious women?
Samsung phones/phablets/tablets are derivative pieces of shit.
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I agree but we’re only taking about the size of the screens – specifically the 6 Plus’s 5.5″ size against similar sizes of the SameDung’s Notes.
“Why do guys care more…” is the really interesting question, I agree. And I also suspect that guys pay more attention to footware than they are willing to admit; and to hair styling, and accessory placement. We’re on to you.
I have a 14-year-old boy and I know exactly what you’re talking about. He seems to dream of owning a different pair of shoes for every day of the *month*, let alone the week! And the amount of time he spends on his hair… Don’t even get me started. He has the 5S, which has been taken away for a whole month due to grounding (to cure his addiction to texting and Instagram) and he has a neon pink case. I’m like, “Dude… What’s the matter with you?!”
I personally love the size of my iPhone 5, primarily because I use it as a phone and my iPad most often for all the other things that iOS 7 and now 8 are capable of delivering.
I would love to see Apple launch an 6 Plus featured iPhone in an iPhone 5, and as a second choice 5s case.
If they don’t, and I had to, like you said, a “BT headset. But rather, and not until after the launch of the Watch* would I get an iPhone 6 Plus.
It is interesting that after all of the screaming for a ‘must-have’ larger iPad screen, that so many have fallen back, to now what one could consider what is really a micro-screened iPad with a phone.
* As on the Apple’s Watch site, “Phone. Use the built-in speaker and microphone for quick chats, or seamlessly transfer calls to your iPhone for longer conversations. You can also transfer calls from Apple Watch to your car’s speakerphone or your Bluetooth headset. And silence incoming calls by covering Watch with your hand.”
The difference in size between the 5/5s and 6 isn’t really that dramatic. I could get used to that no time. On the other hand the 6+ feels like a roofing shingle. 🙂
I’m pretty sure you need a more modern comparison.
That should do it!
Alright, I’m gonna solve this for you all so we can stop:
1. Take a picture of the side of your head, centered on your ear.
2. Superimpose onto this picture a shot of your phone resized to what you think should be appropriate, or more likely, to what size “people” think is appropriate. Position over the ear area on your head shot where it would be while on a call.
3. Use this combined photo at life size, ensuring that it is properly rotated to exactly align with your real head while on a call, to order a custom case for your 6Plus.
There! Now you can enjoy all the benefits of a large display, while simultaneously impressing all the world, whose opinion drives your every decision!
Funny how large Samsung phablets paved the way for
iPhone FAB-lets(?) to look acceptable in public.
Haha
“I don’t really use my iPhone to make phone calls”
What, are you 16?
I’m always surprised by how many iphone users, even at this forum, care so much about what people think of them. “What will people think of me using this slightly larger phone? Perhaps I should feel silly or ashamed because they might think it looks weird!”
I’m surprised other people’s opinions matter SO MUCH. “How will I look?!” is a weird question to base your behavior around.
I must admit, when I first started seeing people use the Galaxy Notes and other mega-size phones in Asia several years ago I thought it looked funny. But then, I saw that constantly over the years (including people around me here in the US – at work and amongst personal friends and relatives) and it just looks “normal” now. In Asia, it’s so common now that it seems large-screen phones make up the majority and the iPhones look out of place.
The 6 Plus will be huge in Asia. I vacillated between the 6 and the 6 Plus for a while after checking both out at the local Apple Store but decided recently that 6 Plus is the way to go. If I was living in Seoul, Tokyo, or Hong Kong commuting by subway, bus and on foot most of the time, it’d be a no-brainer to get the 6 Plus. Even holding the iPad mini standing up in a crowded train isn’t convenient. And most people are using BT earpieces or headphones anyway for phone calls anyway.
I’ve been hooked on headsets since my days in tech support – I can no longer tolerate have to HOLD a phone while I use it, any more than I could tolerate now being tethered to the wall while I talk…I use my 4-year-old in landscape preferentially. With both hands. Big hands.
As for feeling stupid(?) holding a phone to your ear, so what?