[Fyron]

The iPhone might be crippled by Apple's lockout of 3rd party software. Contrast this with any smart phone made by any other company... Nearly everyone else supports (or at least tolerates) 3rd party devs, but it appears that Apple will lock them out.

"The operating system for the iPhone is OS X..."

Not quite. It is a stripped down, heavily modified version designed to be runnable on and suitable for embedded systems (aka the iPhone). It is similar to OS X, but it is not OS X. Its just like the relationship between Windows Mobile and XP (2k?).

"An Apple store associate told me that it's like a Macintosh for your pocket."

That Apple store associate is an idiot. It is most certainly not like having a Mac in your pocket, any more than having a Windows Mobile smart phone is like having a PC in your pocket. Smart phones are handy devices, to be sure, but they are not portable general purpose computers (ie: a Mac/PC laptop/desktop).