Yes, few Americans. CDMA might be the most popular tech in USA, but fact remains that if you look at worlwide numbers, CDMA is tiny. GSM is about an order of magnitude more popular than CDMA is. There were 1 billion GSM-users in 2004, there are even more today. How many CDMA-users are there?
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Wall Street Journal
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Yes, few Americans. CDMA might be the most popular tech in USA, but fact remains that if you look at worlwide numbers, CDMA is tiny. GSM is about an order of magnitude more popular than CDMA is. There were 1 billion GSM-users in 2004, there are even more today. How many CDMA-users are there?
First off, at 300 million people, the USA is only 20% of the world's population.
Next, we're not one of the countries with the highest "cellphones per capita". In fact, we're 57th (651 per 1000).
So while CDMA vs GSM might be a big deal for us, its really splitting in two an already non-huge marketplace...very roughly speaking, you're looking at maybe 100 million CDMA phones in the world.
Which suggests that something like an iPhone may actually have a bigger influence on the market, especially when you consider all of the BS moves the cell companies have already done to try to maximize their profits from their consumers - - ie, locked sets, crippled features, etc.
There's probably a growing segnment of the consumers of cellpohones who are getting fed up with the provider's nonsense.
Personally, I'm tired of my Verizon CDMA not working on vacation outside of the USA. And my wife is tired of paying for incoming SPAM text messages coming from Croatia. I'm still using an ancient Digital/Analog "Startac" which Verizon gets pinged by the Feds because they're supposd to get rid of Analog users to free up the old Analog spectrum, yet Verizon has the audacity to try to saddle me with another contract if I want to help them out as much as me by a low cost phone change. So much for intelligent, consumer-friendly business practices...companies like this deserve to go out of business.
Our current contracts end in May. Change is guarenteed. If I can't get an unlocked GSM, I'll get rid of my subsription based cellphone entirely.
-hh
Europe and Asia are the largest phone markets in the world, and dwarf that of the United States. They are also at the cutting edge of the industry in terms of the adoption of new technologies.
The majority of all major handsets are released in Europe and Asia first, for this reason, and the US is considered a fairly minor market to which they will only migrate if they are successful elsewhere.
The iPhone will certainly launch in the US, but if it isn't simulateneously launched in the EU and Asia, then Jobs will just reveal how little he knows about the industry.
Because its something will can identify with until Apple reveal the correct name. Its always been called the iPhone ( even though the final product will not be ) in most previous rumours.
Calling it the Apple mobile phone / Apple Cell phone takes longer to type.
'MacPhone' is just plain dumb - gives the impression of a Mac Only Phone.
i love europe. the people are sexy and the cell phones just work. i think they should get everything the U.S. gets either at release or within a month. that really is in apple's and the consumers' best interests.
the phone will do apple much better attached to the ear of well-dressed european than a fat nerd with a starbucks.
the phone will do apple much better attached to the ear of well-dressed european than a fat nerd with a starbucks.
I own a Treo 650 myself. As much as I like the Treo, what kills me is that the Palm OS as we know it is dead and stagnant, and the Palm OS-based Treos are running the same old hacked up Palm OS 5 that hasn't seen any REAL improvements in quite a while.
It's one reason I'd love to see Apple eventually get into the smartphone market.
-Zadillo
talki and the scoot those are just stupid names, I liked the newton better. Though I thought for a while ipod phone would work, if it is gonna make it in the business world then now way. LG has a great push with the chocolate and the enV, have a feeling this is what Apples phones will be. One for the kids another for the rest.
A summary of the Wall Street Journal article.
http://www.computerworld.com/action...eBasic&articleId=9007561&source=NLT_AM&nlid=1
http://www.computerworld.com/action...eBasic&articleId=9007561&source=NLT_AM&nlid=1
You're definitely just being honest about the obesity levels in the US. However, the US market is larger than Europe and should get the technology first.
To that end, the phone should be unlocked and accessible to all providers. The consumer should be the one to choose.
I dont think it [Hell] can freeze any more than it has this past year with the switch from PPC to Intel, which NO ONE ever thought possible
But 2 more hours and we shall see
When deciding which standard to support, it doesn't really matter if more than half of Americans today are on non-GSM networks. It matters whether 99% of Americans today can use GSM networks.
The vast majority of Americans have access to at least one GSM network, I'd say 90-95% have at least two rival GSM operators in their area. That is, it may be a matter of cancelling your Sprint PCS or Verizon contract and getting a T-Mobile or Cingular one instead, but you can do it. And yes, I'm sure someone will raise the point that it's expensive to "get out" of a contract, but T-Mobile actually buys people out of their contracts anyway, and most people do not replace their phones until near to the end of their contracts.
In other words, yes, Apple can just make this an unlocked GSM phone.
And it's in their best interests to do so, as long as the operators of the "mainstream" alternative insist on requiring the subscriber get permission to connect an arbitrary but compatible phone to their networks. When the IS-95/IS-2000 operators adopt R-UIM, then yeah, I see value in Apple selling a phone for those standards. But for now, switching someone over to an Apple GSM or UMTS phone is going to be infinitely easier, and require far less handholding and involvement of third parties, than switching someone over to a CDMA2000 phone.
Sorry Verizon. This is something you can change, but you're too much of a bunch of control freaks to be willing to think that way.
Sorry Verizon subscribers, you backed the wrong horse. At least be glad competition is strong enough that rivals will buy you out of your contract.
The only bad thing about GSM is that Cingular is the most widespread operator in the US, and they're not doing a great job. With the release of AWS spectrum, I'm expecting that to change, as a significant amount of additional capacity can be added, and competition nationwide from T-Mobile will also make a major difference.
The vast majority of Americans have access to at least one GSM network, I'd say 90-95% have at least two rival GSM operators in their area. That is, it may be a matter of cancelling your Sprint PCS or Verizon contract and getting a T-Mobile or Cingular one instead, but you can do it. And yes, I'm sure someone will raise the point that it's expensive to "get out" of a contract, but T-Mobile actually buys people out of their contracts anyway, and most people do not replace their phones until near to the end of their contracts.
In other words, yes, Apple can just make this an unlocked GSM phone.
And it's in their best interests to do so, as long as the operators of the "mainstream" alternative insist on requiring the subscriber get permission to connect an arbitrary but compatible phone to their networks. When the IS-95/IS-2000 operators adopt R-UIM, then yeah, I see value in Apple selling a phone for those standards. But for now, switching someone over to an Apple GSM or UMTS phone is going to be infinitely easier, and require far less handholding and involvement of third parties, than switching someone over to a CDMA2000 phone.
Sorry Verizon. This is something you can change, but you're too much of a bunch of control freaks to be willing to think that way.
Sorry Verizon subscribers, you backed the wrong horse. At least be glad competition is strong enough that rivals will buy you out of your contract.
The only bad thing about GSM is that Cingular is the most widespread operator in the US, and they're not doing a great job. With the release of AWS spectrum, I'm expecting that to change, as a significant amount of additional capacity can be added, and competition nationwide from T-Mobile will also make a major difference.
That's another idea, I'm not sure if Apple would go with a pay-as-you-go/prepaid phone. At least from what I observe they seem to have a reputation of being cheap/bad service/for people who can't afford real phone service (although I don't believe any of this is actually true). This is starting to change though.
This is the most mild winter I've had in my life. I'm in Minneapolis alot as well as farther north in Duluth and neither places have snow on the ground (normally there are several feet by this time) and the temps have been really warm. Just about every bit of snow on the ski hills had to be manmade this year.
Probably not the MN you remember.Do you have facts to back that statement up? Because, I bet you'll find Europe to be a bigger market.
That's another idea, I'm not sure if Apple would go with a pay-as-you-go/prepaid phone. At least from what I observe they seem to have a reputation of being cheap/bad service/for people who can't afford real phone service (although I don't believe any of this is actually true). This is starting to change though.
This is the most mild winter I've had in my life. I'm in Minneapolis alot as well as farther north in Duluth and neither places have snow on the ground (normally there are several feet by this time) and the temps have been really warm. Just about every bit of snow on the ski hills had to be manmade this year.
I know, this winter has prety much been nothing. Although it is kind of nice, it's definately not stupposed to be like this! I haven't even went skiing or snowboarding yet simply because man made snow hurts! lol but ya i am crossing every thing crosable on my body waiting for the Apple branded celluar device to be release, i really really hope it will be
Cingular would actually be ok with me. I have Nextel now and it has been good, but lately has started going down hill. I think there's something wrong with the tower here. With Cingular I could get a discount by bundling it with my Bellsouth service. Right now I have a 5 year old Nextel phone, so I need to upgrade it. I'm in the country so some of the services like T-Mobile don't work here.
This is the most mild winter I've had in my life. I'm in Minneapolis alot as well as farther north in Duluth and neither places have snow on the ground (normally there are several feet by this time) and the temps have been really warm. Just about every bit of snow on the ski hills had to be manmade this year.
No, not exactly
I was there as a foreign exchange student in 95/96 (went to MCW High in Sherburn, down in South Central)- man it was cold that winter! But the weather is crazy all over the world - we had almost 60 degrees F today - that's extremely abnormal for this season.