Apple makes out like a bandit in the latest round of iPhone mania. By cutting the price of the gadget a whopping $200, Apple ensured a quick and angry reaction from early adopters and a renewed round of media attention that put it in the center of the small-device universe. The subsequent $100 store credit didn't satisfy everyone, but it does ensure something interesting: Legions of users who bought iPhones at AT&T stores will be going into Apple stores intending to spend money.

The holidays are on the horizon, and the benefit to Apple is immense: Does anyone use the bare minimum on a store credit? Not to mention the exposure to new products, a flock of which were just announced at an Apple event in San Francisco.

I read news reports of Steve Jobs' contrition and humility about having overcharged the early adopter faithful, and I just shook my head. Is there any way Apple loses in all this?

Jobs didn't get where he is by being naive. I can only applaud the way he is overseeing the evolution of the small, digital device. That it should be Apple taking this role was by no means inevitable, given the early rise of Palm devices and the strong push by Microsoft in the Pocket PC arena.

It's Apple that dominates the news, while all Palm can muster is a major story in reverse, the demise of the lamented Foleo.

I was a proponent of this device, a small laptop seemingly ideal for situations in which you don't want to lug a larger computer, and a far cry easier to type on than a Palm Treo or any other smart phone. But the early reaction was generally hostile -- people seem wed to the "small is better" mantra, and the Foleo satisfied no one, because it would have required people to carry two devices: phone and Foleo. Palm CEO Ed Colligan says the company needs to focus on its next generation software and the ensuing range of smart phones.

I suspect Foleo will be back, either from Palm or someone else, running the new interface and gunning for a market I think is there, those who think smart phones are too much in too little a space, and who will opt for productivity vs. flash after iPhone mania cools. But with a million iPhones sold and an attractive entry price established, we'll have to see how flexible Apple is in leveraging its market share and letting outside developers into the game.

What I like about what Jobs is doing at Apple is that he's pushing the pace of small-device thinking.

We need to figure out the best compromise between screen size and readability, just as we must settle on optimum input methods. Touch screen? Keyboard? Voice? Watch as companies sort out these issues. The just-announced iPods are part of the process, the iPod Touch being for all intents and purposes an iPhone without the phone.

While we work out such things, the evolving cloud of ever-available information continues to beckon. We'll be more dependent on mobile devices because as we begin to work with online software for everything from word processing to e-mail, we'll want to take advantage of our ability to store and access information anywhere. Store your e-mail online, and you can pick it up no matter your location without working through local e-mail program settings. Or use the cloud as a backup medium for essential stuff.

I always keep data backed up locally, but I also back up ongoing work to Google Docs (docs.google.com), knowing that if I have a few minutes free, I can edit my material from any computer.

Redundancy is the key. We'd like to have enough storage space to back up emergency copies of our work to any device we carry. I have almost 30 years' worth of writing backed into archives, not only on an iPod and various CD-Rs, but on a USB flash drive that plugs into any PC.

The Cruzer Contour, the drive I use, is from SanDisk (www.sandisk.com), and it can be thought of as part of the small-device revolution. I can back 4 gigabytes up to it quickly (8 gigabyte models are available), and its U3 technology means I can run programs directly from the drive without installing them on a computer. That's a big help when I'm on the road and using someone else's machine. Hardware-encrypted password protection adds the security I need, while the whole elegant device fits on my keychain, with a sliding USB connector that means there's no cap to lose.

Flash drives don't get the media coverage that smart phones do, but the point is to take your data with you when you can and get to it online when you need to.

On that score, the iPod Touch offers the best of both worlds: Download music directly to the device or stream video live from the Net (audio streaming via the Safari browser should also be viable). Interesting times indeed for small-device aficionados, with more on the way as Google gets ready to roll out its own phone. We'll see how Steve Jobs handles that challenge.

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