The iPhone sneaks into the office

The BlackBerry is still the gold standard of corporate PDAs, but the consumer-friendly and vastly popular Apple iPhone is starting to sneak past the corporate barrier and into the business world, according to resellers.

There's two forces at work here. PDAs in the business world are usually decided on by IT managers, not by the people who actually use them. That's not to say that users haven't been happy with their BlackBerries. Everybody loves 'em, and carrying one around has become a sort of status symbol that says, "I've made it in the business world." And of course, the BlackBerry was made for the business user in mind. The iPhone, on the other hand, is consumer-driven, and its features were designed with consumers--and not business users in mind.

But lest we forget, businesspeople are consumers too, and they started bringing their iPhones to work, and we're already starting to see a slow infiltration by Apple into the workplace. Not many IT managers will be swayed by the personal bells and whistles, and the ability to play music on one's mobile often doesn't sit well. But with a few more business-friendly apps, the iPhone may just make headway into the workplace.

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