In my career, fast personal networking is as important as fast computer networking. I've set up my BlackBerry with a hot button to jump to my contacts in midcall or mid-email. The iPhone's home screen, on the other hand, includes YouTube and Stocks but not the Contacts app. When you do find it, you can't do a quick search—you can only browse your contacts by last name. This looks fantastic if you have 24 contacts but falls apart when you've got 240 and aren't good at remembering people's last names. Really, anything beats having to scroll through 300 names with my finger.

That's Paul Boutin in Slate, ostensibly comparing the iPhone to the BlackBerry. But the real lesson here is that Paul Boutin is much, much, much more important than you. And don't you forget it.

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