Apple’s unveiling of iPhone Duo makes me feel vindicated. When the original Galaxy Fold was released, I argued that a foldable form factor must give us a unique platform. Opening a small phone into a larger one was only part of the proposition. What the form factor needs is exclusivity. Apple’s keynote gives me something more interesting to discuss than opening and closing.

The oddly persuasive example is the StandBy clock. StandBy already existed on ordinary iPhones. A partially folded Duo gives that existing interface a physical arrangement suited to its purpose. With a slab, the device needs an additional accessory to be in a stationary position to engage StandBy. With a foldable, opening it halfway engages it. The software does not have to be entirely new to make use of the new form factor. However, it is evident the new form factor clearly removes a piece of hardware (i.e. a stand for StandBy) as a requirement to use it.

Samsung and Google have already given developers ways to respond to the foldable. What I am still looking for is independent app developers carrying that idea beyond the uses demonstrated by the companies building the platform. Things that are not merely camera apps or video call apps. I have yet to see the fold-exclusive killer app. Apple’s Netflix and other third-party demonstrations leave that question open too. The Netflix presentation raises expectations of a fluid transition from one position to another, but how will it live up to those expectations (e.g. laptop-style viewing, switching to the outer display)? Giving developers another angle of user interface to work with is a beginning. Making it part of the ordinary experience gives people a reason to buy.

I have seen mobile games being used as examples of foldable media. Many mobile games simply display more content based on the screen ratio. They say “more”, but I see poor adaptation. The slab form factor is still the majority. If developers cut off the top and bottom to make the content fit, this repeats cutting the sides off a widescreen picture to make it 4:3-compatible. It does a disservice to both form factors: slab players lose content, while foldable players gain space that cannot hold anything essential. And if the benefit is simply more screen space, a larger tablet could provide it for roughly a quarter of the price.

Buying an iPhone Duo also means buying a first-generation foldable product from Apple, and the price looks very different depending on where it is sold. Duo starts at $1,999 in the US and ₩3,290,000 in Korea. Remove Korea’s 10% VAT, and the implied conversion is roughly ₩1,496 per dollar. With the exchange rate falling to around ₩1,350 per dollar, that amounts to roughly an 11% premium. Regional pricing cuts the other way for Galaxy Z Fold8: its $1,899.99 US and ₩2,278,100 Korean starting prices imply roughly ₩1,090 per dollar before Korean VAT. Japan shows a similar pattern: after adjusting for local tax and exchange rates, Duo costs about 8% more than in the US, while Fold8 costs about 16% less. The product is simply not priced competitively outside of the US.

Does the foldable form factor bring enough unique experiences to the table to warrant paying roughly $300 more than an iPhone Air and iPad mini together? As I wrote yesterday, that combination could be the foldable iPhone’s first competition, ahead of rival Android champions. Apple’s take on the foldable feels like vindication for my theory. Whether that translates into sales is another question. More cynically, will enough people pay the foldable premium in installments for the promise of those experiences to put pressure on developers, and will that pressure last long enough for them to build an app just for the foldable?