Greetings. Before you even think about rushing out to buy the new iPhone, you might want to read this interesting story about continuing negative reactions to the iPhone 3GS' battery life.

Of course, all smartphones are power hungry, and we use these Internet-enabled phones for so much more than just talking. But the iPhone is a particularly egregious case since the battery is sealed inside and not considered to be a "user replaceable" item.

My G1 phone also sucks a lot of juice, but I can pop in an extra charged battery anytime, and I have an extended duration battery (bigger is better!) to use in there as well.

With the iPhone, since battery life sucks, you're really stuck.

There are, however, some comparatively ugly workarounds. One person responding just now to a tweet of mine on this topic says that he uses a solar charger. I guess that's OK if you don't leave the iPhone itself out in direct sun, and don't keep smashing your head into the solar array (OK, so the solar array isn't really that big ...)

A more practical way to deal with the problem may be something like this external battery pack (only $20 on sale -- 50% discount -- at Radio Shack through July 11). You can always duct tape it to your iPhone. Won't that be pretty?

More generally, the whole concept of sealed-in batteries in Apple devices strikes me as the epitome of "those suckers will buy anything with our name on it -- boot to the head!" consumer relations.

But hey, whatever turns you on.

--Lauren--