What's in a name?

Apple makes great products, but I don't think they always make great names. In fact, they are confusing.

The iPhone: This name makes a little bit of sense because Apple likes to stick a little "i" in front of almost everything (iMac, iLife, iWork, iPod, iBook). So if they are going to make a phone, call it the iPhone.

The iPod Touch: This is the name of the iPhone that isn't a phone. Its way more than an iPod. In fact, the iPod Touch runs almost all of the 135,000 apps in the iTunes App Store.

So if I'm a developer and I write an app for both iPhone and iPod touch, what kind of app is it? Mostly, everybody just calls it an iPhone app, that just a happens to also work on an iPod Touch.

What does Apple call the operating system that runs on both the iPhone and iPod Touch? They call it iPhone OS.

Now, introduce the iPad. (There's a very funny MadTV sketch about a very different kind of iPad - look for it on YouTube.) Ok - it's a pad, so put the little "i" in front.

But what OS does the iPad run? iPhone OS.

One more (I could go on but I'll get to my point soon), iBook. The iPad has a great app that does for books what iTunes does for music. They call it.....iBook. That's ok because what Apple used to call an iBook (a laptop Mac) they now call a MacBook.

To summarize, Apple has an iPhone, iPad and iPod that run iPhone OS. They have an app called iTunes that lets you download and play TV shows and movies, in addition to tunes. And an app called iBook, which shouldn't be confused with the old iBooks which are now called MacBooks.

That last point about iBooks now being MacBooks which allows for a different kind of iBook is important. It means that Apple is willing to change product names and doesn't think the brand is the product name, but the company name.

So, based on that, I think Apple should make some changes:

1. Rename iPhone OS to iTouch OS or MobileOS (after all, iPod Touch, iPhone and iPad are all mobile devices).
2. Rename iPhone apps to iTouch Apps or MobileApps.
3. Rename iPod Touch to iPad Nano.