Apple deserves praise for its latest product announcements! Lopping $200 of the price of the iPhone was a smart move strategically(long term) and tactically(short term). The iPhone lineup is now complete and strong. From entry level $80 to iPhone at $399. The stars are the Nano at $199 and the touch at $299.

Determined competitors are lurking, however, ready to attack. These fall into three categories. Phone makers, music player companies and titans.

Nokia, Sony, LG and Motorola mostly care about phones (and phone usability and design) and view music players as a nice feature to drive sales and protect market share. They are the most pressing threat. Sony w580i (here) and Nokia n95 (coming packing 8 gig fo internal memory) are ready to fight. Price points are critical for these. The cell phone guys lack capable marketing and good software both on the phone and on the desktop. But hardware they have nailed. Will Apple ever produce phones this sleek?

Music player makers ... these guys just need to add screens and software! Sandisk, iRiver and Creative already offer players with more memory for less money. If they could just buy the same screen as iPod nano has and get some desktop software they'd be set!

The titans ... both Google and MS have to keep that gray hair growing on Mr. Jobs head. A Google phone is coming. Probably for between $25 and $250. Google clearly wants 25 to 30 million units to be sold. They'll want to drive adoption in the third world ... especially Africa (where cell phone use is booming) and Central and South America. The flagship model will probably be $50 and feature a keyboard and good Google software. A nightmare scenario for Apple is Google deciding to open a music store.

Lastly whay will MS do. Sometimes MS will fight a battle just to stay in the midshare of its users and audience. If Google comes MS will unleash a total assault. Will they cancel Zune and empower (acquire) one of the MP3 makers like Creative or iRiver so they can battle Apple? They already have phone partners.

Bottom line ... apple dominates today but cannot continue to do so for very long.