Just out of curiosity, how much will it cost Verizon or Sprint users to DROP their contract early? Anybody know? 
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Verizon Rejected iPhone Deal due to Apple's Terms
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Right now it is a matter of IF it becomes a run away success. Lets get the product to the market first.
Also keep in mind, as much as the iPhone is very fancy, there are other phones that will get to market either before or close to the same time as Apple with basically the same functionality (Samsung?). IF all of these phones offer basically the same features, then $$ will come into play very quickly. I would like an Apple iPhone but the extra $200 up front is too much (example only).
Obviously a lot of people here are more than willing to cough up the $$ for the Apple phone, but then you would expect that on Apple forum. For too many people the cost of the phone up front removes them from the potential market and they will go with a much less expensive device.
Not so sure about this.
I think Apple wanted a GSM phone since it is the global standard.
My money is one Apple negotiated both so they could play one off of the other. Verizon was probably used as leverage with Cingular.
5 years of Cingular is just depressing. Here's hoping these Apple phones get unlocked fast.
I think Apple wanted a GSM phone since it is the global standard.
My money is one Apple negotiated both so they could play one off of the other. Verizon was probably used as leverage with Cingular.
5 years of Cingular is just depressing. Here's hoping these Apple phones get unlocked fast.
Just out of curiosity, how much will it cost Verizon or Sprint users to DROP their contract early? Anybody know?
I think it may be 175 bucka. but call your carrier.
Seriously, you seem to have a very short memory. The iPod debuted at a $400 price point. It was 3 years before the lower-priced ($249) iPod mini came out, and 1 year after that before the even-lower-priced ($99) iPod shuffle came out. Given the nature of the iPhone (the touch-screen with flick-scrolling, Cover Flow on an iPod, phone capabilities, awesome web browsing capabilities), I don't think it's unreasonable for Apple to ask for $150 above what the high-end iPod retails for.
The iPhone has been hyped for almost as long as Steve said it was in development. Make no doubt about it: there will be a supply and demand imbalance for many months after the iPhone initially gets released, so debuting at a lower price would have no advantage whatsoever for Apple. Only after a year or so will Apple will lower the price so that more of the market will be able to buy an iPhone.
Here is the key point: Apple does not make commodity products. They make very high-end products with great attention to detail and design. They market to the high-end of the market. Once they capture a large portion of that market, only then do they start reaching for the middle part of the market, and they never go for the low end. (Even the iPod shuffle at $79 is a bit expensive as an MP3 player when you can get 1 GB flash drives for something like $20.) If you look at countries like South Korea, where consumers are almost exclusively buying ridiculously cheap and low-end commodity products, Apple has only recently clawed its way up to a 10% market share, in contrast to the United States where it has a 70-something% share. The difference is in consumers' buying habits, and its more skewed toward the high-end here in the United States.
I don't understand what you mean by this. Did you not hear that you get a 2-year contract included with the price of an iPhone? Or are you talking about web data services, which may not cater to all of the iPhone's potential customers anyway?
Yeah, and the lowest-priced Mac is $599 without display or keyboard, so of course the iPod is going to appeal to many more consumers. For example, parents are probably not going to buy a Mac for every one of their kids, but not nearly as many would balk at a $79 iPod shuffle or a $149 iPod nano as a Christmas or birthday present.
Remember the outrage when music labels wanted a piece of the ipod pie? Well, who wants a piece of somebody else's pie now? The percentage of cellphone carriers incomes is pretty insane. I wonder what the logic was- dollars signs in their eyes, expectations that the ease of use would make people send far more data than they do, and it might be a boon, a desire to not get their phone devalued by discounts but still get the subsidation of the phone companies?
I don't get it. I'd really like to hear all of apple's logic on this. It looks like they wanted an exclusive contract with one carrier, doing away with freedom of customer choices, while simultaneously taking the opposite stand and going for a more unlocked phone model with opposing discounts on the phone (which essentially mean that they're saying no, don't pay me, phone companies). And choosing replacement or repair, etc.? It all just doesn't fit together for me yet. What's the game plan?
I don't get it. I'd really like to hear all of apple's logic on this. It looks like they wanted an exclusive contract with one carrier, doing away with freedom of customer choices, while simultaneously taking the opposite stand and going for a more unlocked phone model with opposing discounts on the phone (which essentially mean that they're saying no, don't pay me, phone companies). And choosing replacement or repair, etc.? It all just doesn't fit together for me yet. What's the game plan?
Apple wants to control the iPhone's image. They don't want a re-hash of what happened when Apple allowed crappy electronics stores like Best Buy or CompUSA to sell their Macs.
-- say over how and where iPhones could be sold: control over the sales experience
-- control of the relationship with iPhone customers: control over customer service experience
-- sole discretion over whether to replace or repair the phone: again, control over customer service experience
-- exclusive contract with one provider: yet again, control over customer's experience with the iPhone
Your analogy with the RIAA wanting a share of the profits of Apple's iPod doesn't hold water. The RIAA's only job is to be a middle-man: they don't create the music, they don't sell the music, they don't create any MP3 player device, they don't run any music-download store. In the internet age, the RIAA is outdated, unneeded. They don't deserve any part of the profits.
In contrast, Apple is the device maker for the Apple iPhone. The iPhone is a one-of-a-kind mobile phone/iPod/"internet communicator", and so if Cingular wants in on the iPhone, they'd better make it worth Apple's while.
I don't see how this is hard to understand. Without Apple, Cingular/AT&T wouldn't be getting buzz over their exclusive contract with Apple, they wouldn't be enticing a boatload of customers to jump ship from other providers, and they wouldn't be seen as a "hip" company that allows an innovative company to bend the rules in favor of the customer. Apple brings a lot to the table, and deserves a cut of the profits. The RIAA does not, and by analogy, does not deserve a cut of the profits.
If Verizon didn't want to let Apple shake things up a bit, that's their own damn problem. But if it's true that Verizon turned down the deal, I'm pretty sure they'll be slapping themselves come June, if they aren't already doing so now, given the positive press that Apple has generated for Cingular/AT&T.
Cingular - good or bad?
Living in the UK, I can't understand the difference between Cingular / Verizon / Sprint / etc. What I do know is, on the day the iPhone was announced, on MacRumors all I saw were you guys in the US saying what a tragedy it was that it was exclusive to Cingular...
Now, the majority of the posts in this thread are... "I'm switching to Cingular asap", "Verizon is rubbish, Cingular here I come", etc.
What's going on?
Has Cingular got better in two weeks? Were you just annoyed that it was a locked phone (understandable)? Or are all the Cingular bashers staying away from this thread? Explain please...
Living in the UK, I can't understand the difference between Cingular / Verizon / Sprint / etc. What I do know is, on the day the iPhone was announced, on MacRumors all I saw were you guys in the US saying what a tragedy it was that it was exclusive to Cingular...
Now, the majority of the posts in this thread are... "I'm switching to Cingular asap", "Verizon is rubbish, Cingular here I come", etc.
What's going on?
Has Cingular got better in two weeks? Were you just annoyed that it was a locked phone (understandable)? Or are all the Cingular bashers staying away from this thread? Explain please...
I, for one, wouldn't switch to Stinkular if you paid me. They wouldn't know customer service if it walked up and bit them in the rear.
And for all their touting their coverage, it's funny that more often than not I only have 1 or 2 bars on my phone when I want to make a call.
I just finished a contract with Sprint for my personal phone and despite T-Mobile's lagging behind in coverage, we will be going with them over Stinkular.
No, they haven't gotten better. They've gotten the iPhone. That's all that matters to most people here.
Fortunately, some of us are willing to wait for not only the phone itself to be unlocked, but for it to actually be a better phone.
And for all their touting their coverage, it's funny that more often than not I only have 1 or 2 bars on my phone when I want to make a call.
I just finished a contract with Sprint for my personal phone and despite T-Mobile's lagging behind in coverage, we will be going with them over Stinkular.
No, they haven't gotten better. They've gotten the iPhone. That's all that matters to most people here.
Fortunately, some of us are willing to wait for not only the phone itself to be unlocked, but for it to actually be a better phone.
Living in the UK, I can't understand the difference between Cingular / Verizon / Sprint / etc. What I do know is, on the day the iPhone was announced, on MacRumors all I saw were you guys in the US saying what a tragedy it was that it was exclusive to Cingular...
Now, the majority of the posts in this thread are... "I'm switching to Cingular asap", "Verizon is rubbish, Cingular here I come", etc.
What's going on?
Has Cingular got better in two weeks? Were you just annoyed that it was a locked phone (understandable)? Or are all the Cingular bashers staying away from this thread? Explain please...
I have Sprint and I am not leaving.... Cingular sucks. Everyone wants to say "they have the biggest network and the most customers" so does Windows douche bag! Cingular can stick it. I will wait five years and get the screaming new iPhone with thought recognition, and the narks that switched to Cingular early can have their horrible customer service.
Apple still rules....Cingular... is very questionable
in 6 years i've been with sprint, AT&T (pre-cingular merger), cingular, and now verizon. and the truth? they all stink. i actually liked at&t the best - they had pretty decent customer service.
i hope the iphone succeeds...but if it doesn't, it will be b/c of cingular and the messed up cell phone system in the states. i don't trust any of the cell phone companies...
i hope the iphone succeeds...but if it doesn't, it will be b/c of cingular and the messed up cell phone system in the states. i don't trust any of the cell phone companies...
Did they say FIVE YEARS?!?!?!
Let me reiterate:
FIVE YEARS?!
That's fricken monopoly! I'm disgusted, I mean *&*(&#% Apple WANTS MA-BELL TO GET BACK THEIR POWER!!!
Who the *(#@$%%@# all is going to benefit if AT&T (who owns cingular), buys out Verizon, Sprint, and everyone else too?!
With news like that, I wouldn't buy an iPhone if it was the last phone on earth. No, in fact I'd rather buy a phone that had "DEVELOPERS! DEVELOPERS! DEVELOPERS!" as a ring tone.
Let me reiterate:
FIVE YEARS?!
That's fricken monopoly! I'm disgusted, I mean *&*(&#% Apple WANTS MA-BELL TO GET BACK THEIR POWER!!!
Who the *(#@$%%@# all is going to benefit if AT&T (who owns cingular), buys out Verizon, Sprint, and everyone else too?!
With news like that, I wouldn't buy an iPhone if it was the last phone on earth. No, in fact I'd rather buy a phone that had "DEVELOPERS! DEVELOPERS! DEVELOPERS!" as a ring tone.
I understand your comments here, but it still doesn't really explain why everyone, all of a sudden, is all for getting a Cingular iPhone. I would say (and I'm sure there was a poll on it straight after the Keynote), that 80% were against getting the iPhone in the US; now it seems to be 80% want it, and not only that, but are bashing the competing carriers...
To those in the UK with me... do we find any one carrier better / worse than all the others? Coverage seems to be fine with most carriers. I've been with T-Mobile, Orange, 02 and '3', and - except for poor customer service with '3' - I'd say they were pretty similar... any comments?
I'm with Orange now (student deal), therefore I hope they get the iPhone. But I wouldn't worry that much about switching if someone else got it.
Good...I hate Verizon...I don't even get service at my house! With Cingular I do.
But Verizon will end up kicking themselves...the iPhone is a HUGE deal, even if some think its to much money, it will come down in price before Verizon gets a chance to sell it and Cingular will have even more people come to get the iPhone.
Apple is one of the few companys which can release and Phone and have people switch service providers. I've been putting of getting a new Phone simply because Apple was coming out with a new phone
But Verizon will end up kicking themselves...the iPhone is a HUGE deal, even if some think its to much money, it will come down in price before Verizon gets a chance to sell it and Cingular will have even more people come to get the iPhone.
Apple is one of the few companys which can release and Phone and have people switch service providers. I've been putting of getting a new Phone simply because Apple was coming out with a new phone
I prefer to be more subtle... but Chundles has a whole load of facts wrong.
Australia has CDMA nationwide via Telstra (with EV-DO in the major cities) and the coverage is considered excellent (better than any other network's GSM coverage), though Telstra will shut the network down in 18 months. They are replacing it with a new 3G network on the same frequencies that they've called "NextG" (equal coverage to CDMA, give-or-take a few swings and roundabouts). NextG is regular 3G, but on the lower (non-standard) frequencies, and it has HSDPA (high speed data). Vodafone and Optus are trialing HSDPA on the regular 3G frequencies.
3G has been here since 2003 when Three (Hutchison) released it to a couple of cities (Sydney & Melbourne only to start?), in a joint venture with TelecomNZ and roaming onto Telstra 2G when out of range. It was October 2005 before Vodafone and later Optus released 3G (sharing much network infrastructure), mainly in the capital cities. Vodafone really has a very similar setup in Australia and NZ (just a much lower market share in Australia).
Telstra did a deal with Three and expanded their joint network some. Telstra were a little behind on the whole 3G thing, until they did an amazingly fast rollout of 3G nationwide on their existing CDMA frequencies (850Mhz) after they convinced the government that CDMA was too expensive. They're now using the same frequency Cingular are using for 3G, which may bode well for Australia being one of the only countries that could use the 2nd generation iPhone??? (though personally I hope Apple supports regular 3G frequencies!!)
Iphone rumors should be taken with a very big grain of salt. Having the word iphone in the title guarantees views, if it's true doesn't really matter. Apple probably did have talks with Verizon, beyond that is anyone's GUESS.
If I know Verizon, they wanted to charge 50 cents for every ; sync with computer, picture taken, call answered recieved or missed, song played, contact added or deleted,reboot etc. Verizon sucks out loud, I'm glad they didn't get the iphone.
If I know Verizon, they wanted to charge 50 cents for every ; sync with computer, picture taken, call answered recieved or missed, song played, contact added or deleted,reboot etc. Verizon sucks out loud, I'm glad they didn't get the iphone.
Long before the iPhone was introduced people were predicting that Verizon wouldn't have it. Verizon has always insisted on installing it's own UI, that VCast abomination, on every phone, and we all know that wouldn't sit well with his Jobness. That is most likely the demand that Verizon wouldn't meet, and this article smacks of spin on their part.
This reminds me of when Hershey grabbed the deal after M&M/Mars passed on product placement in the movie ET. Remember what happened? Reese's Pieces became a household name, and, 15 years later M&M's still needed to introduce new colors to try to regain market share.
Agreed. It's too early to predict how the iPhone will do based on what we know, including "reviews" based on 10 minutes of use by a few industry pundits. For example, if the iPhone gets a bad reputation because of the on-screen keyboard or slow Web access, it'll be hard to overcome, especially at such a high price point.
That's exactly what Apple is trying to change - computers were once 'niche' items, as were MP3 players; and it was Apple's entry into these markets that brought these devices into the mainstream. The iPhone is designed to take 'smartphone' usage (web, mail, messaging etc) into the mainstream.
Interestingly - in the first (fiscal) year of iPod sales, they sold 376,000 iPods. Apple is forecasting 10,000,000 iPhone sales in the first year. That should tell you a lot about how big Apple believes the iPhone will be - it's certainly not a device aimed at a niche.
The fact that Apple devoted almost it's entire Macworld keynote - its one annual 'soapbox' that the entire tech industry tunes into - to the iPhone should back that up.
no verizon? big mistake in nc
cingular is only good in certain areas, so i think it's ludicrous of apple to use one exclusive carrier. cingular is by far the WORST phone service you can have in my area of NC. when i lived in FL cingular was ok, but up here i couldn't even get signal in my house using cingular, i had to walk outside in the yard. missed lots of calls that way till i switched to verizon. not that this is the case for everybody in the world, but this is just an example.
if i can't get proper signal at my house, and cingular tells me there are no plans to add more towers in my area or upgrade it in any way no matter what phone i get from them, then why would i ever get an iphone?
it looks cool but if i have only one choice of carriers for the next 5 years then i predict that the iphone will eventually flop because people who can't use cingular in their area will lose interest no matter how good it is, and i'm sorry but cingular is not the best provider in a lot of places.
cingular is only good in certain areas, so i think it's ludicrous of apple to use one exclusive carrier. cingular is by far the WORST phone service you can have in my area of NC. when i lived in FL cingular was ok, but up here i couldn't even get signal in my house using cingular, i had to walk outside in the yard. missed lots of calls that way till i switched to verizon. not that this is the case for everybody in the world, but this is just an example.
if i can't get proper signal at my house, and cingular tells me there are no plans to add more towers in my area or upgrade it in any way no matter what phone i get from them, then why would i ever get an iphone?
it looks cool but if i have only one choice of carriers for the next 5 years then i predict that the iphone will eventually flop because people who can't use cingular in their area will lose interest no matter how good it is, and i'm sorry but cingular is not the best provider in a lot of places.
I just took a quick look at other high end phones, the ones iphone will compete with, many were $300 to$400 with contract. So it is a bit more expensive, Apple hardware usually is, but from what I see it is easily worth a couple hundred more in terms of value, and the experience using it.
While it is priced and designed to compete with the top line phones, I bet this will also pull people up the ladder from the "buy one, get one free" crappy phones we see thrown around like party favors. It's that cool.