So there I was considering whether to replace my trusty Sony Clie and W300 phone with a shiny new Apple i-phone. Only one box to carry around plus better MP3 player (the Sony is limited by the size of memory stick that I carry, and the fact that my multi-card reader barfs at memory stick pro - half way through copying files usually) and nice integrated web access (also a bit clunky on the Sony, which does have the Wifi and Bluetooth, but the zoom facility on the browser is limited).

Had a play in the O2 shop, seems like a nice bit of kit so I decide to take the plunge. I'm an existing O2 contract customer so should be fairly straightforward...

...oh no, not with Apple, who seem to delight in finding ways to make it difficult for customers.

All we can do, said the nice woman in the shop, is sell you the box. You have to register it online through Apple to get it to work. But I'm already an O2 customer, can't you just transfer my account. Oh no sir, Apple insist on having your details themselves (so they can sell me more stuff presumably). So what do I have to do. Well you register through i-tunes... Excuse me, you mean I have to download an enormous piece of unwanted softward just to get my phone to work. Oh yes you have to use itunes to configure your phone. But I don't want itunes, I just want to drag and drop MP3 files from my library onto the player, and I want to syncrohnise the address book and diary in the phone with my existing one (Thunderbird). No you can't do that, you have to use itunes.

No sale.

Apple need to free their customers from what looks like an even more oppressive yoke than Microsoft impose. What they are really after is people's credit details I imagine - but I have no interest or desire to purchase music online from Apple using some proprietary digital rights management system. And I have no desire to have yet another layer of bloated middleware interpose itself between me and my files.

So the final outcome - I went and bought a new Filofax instead...and a fountain pen to go with it. It is an absolute delight, easy to use, natural interface, quick to find relevant information. Coupled with the now two year old Sony Ericsson z530i phone and the secondhand iPod Nano I'm sorted