To see why, the first thing you need to know about the iPhone is that it's not a phone.

It's actually a so-called 'thin client' computer, made very small, with no keyboard, and the ability to connect to mobile networks or wifi. Plus an iPod.

At a price in the US of $499for a 4GB version and $599 for an 8GB version, it is more expensive than some desktop computers.

Market researchers already reckon that Apple's prediction that it will sell 10 million iPhones by the end of 2008 is probably too conservative, as the consumer appetite goes far beyond technophiles' predictable gadget-lust. But it could be that the iPhone becomes a model for the sort of device that most workers would have as their own computer. On it they could listen to music, watch videos, surf the internet, but also have mobile access to corporate information like documents, spreadsheets and presentations that would never actually live on the memory of the device in their hands.

In an unprecedented public interview seated next to Microsoft's Bill Gates at a Wall Street Journal conference in June, Apple CEO Steve Jobs called the iPhone a key device of the "post-PC" era. Jobs seemed to be hinting about the wider potential of iPhone, or Son of iPhone, and not just for consumers. Pressed for more detail about future enhancements, Jobs would say only that he'd been chastised early in his career for leaks. "It isn't funny when a ship leaks from the top, " he said . . . an odd, if apt, way of putting it.

'Thin client' computing is an old idea in new wrapping. In the pre-PC era, the idea was that applications and information would be stored on a huge mainframe computer, accessible through terminals that on their own weren't able to do much. Then came the PC. The revolutionary idea behind the PC was that it put a lot of computing power . . .

more than most users would ever really need . . . into the hands of ordinary people. The idea of putting that sort of power into the hands of punters scared the hell out of most IT managers at the time.

Mark Templeton, CEO of Citrix, a leading firm in the technology that allows companies to deliver corporate applications locally, recalled going out to buy his first PC when his company's IT manager couldn't deliver the tools that would let him do the job he thought needed doing. So he went out and took things into his own hands, bought a PC and did it himself.

Speaking at a Citrix conference in Edinburgh this year, Templeton said he saw a similar generational shift in the way "digital natives" are demanding to use technology at work. Younger employees want to work where, when and how they choose to work, and big IT departments are being forced to change how they serve up corporate information. Ultimately what will sit in the hands of these employees, he said, will either be a 'thin client' computer that offers tightly-controlled access to sensitive company information . . . a security requirement increasingly mandated by laws like Sarbanes-Oxley . . . or a computer the employee buys and looks after herself. In a pilot programme last year, BP introduced just such a plan, giving employees their own personal IT budget to spend.

But instead of buying a standard laptop, would some of those employees choose to use that personal IT budget to buy an iPhone? If it could be used for the basics in accessing corporate information, they just might.

Whether the iPhone is fit for business purpose is already hotly debated. Technology analysts Gartner waded in with an emphatic 'no'. Gartner's Ken Dulaney wrote: "this is basically a cellular [mobile phone] iPod with some other capabilities, and it's important that it be recognised as such".

Some observers concurred, noting the iPhone's lack of mobile security software, lack of compatibility with major business email systems, no removable batteries, and the lack of a business pricing plan from the mobile operator.

But Apple may have a notso-secret ally in its battle to make the iPhone work not just for consumers, but for many business users: Google.

Google CEO Eric Schmidt recently joined Apple's board of directors. Google Maps comes pre-installed on the iPhones on sale now. And quietly last month, news leaked out that the iPhone would be able to access Google's "Docs & Spreadsheets" and its Gmail email programme. While Google executives consistently deny they are trying to compete with Microsoft's Office suite by offering these increasingly sophisticated applications, few believe them.

The sight this week of thousands of "digital natives" using their iPhones to work on their company Google documents and spreadsheets may mean the post-PC era isn't coming.

It's already here.

rdelevan@tribune. ie