10 Jul
The $199 iPhone: Cool! Possibly Imaginary!
As nifty at the same time that the current iPhone is, there are muliple reasons not to buy it: It’s got a slow data connection, it doesn’t yet run third-party applications…and at $399 with no subsidy from AT&T, it’s kinda pricey. We know that a 3G iPhone is adhering its way, and that Apple’s upcoming iPhone SDK will make the phone into a first-rate platform for apps of all kinds. And now it looks like that 3G iPhone might be downright affordable.
In theory, at smallest. A Fortune blog is reporting that a source has told it that AT&T will offer a $200 subsidy for iPhone buyers who sign up for a two-year juxtaposition, bringing the price of the hip handset into disgrace to $199. That would in like manner address one of the greatest in quantity irritating things about the first-generation iPhone: The fact that AT&T currently makes you sign up for a two-year contract and doesn’t offer any sort of price break in recollection of that placing in confinement.
(I hate phone contracts myself, so I’m assuming and hoping that you’ll also be able to pay the full-freight $399 for the iPhone without a contract.)
I don’t have any reason to exercise the mind that Fortune’s report is false, but it always pays to be extremely watchful about accepting any fact approximately an upcoming Apple product as gospel until Steve Jobs himself declares it to be so. And the New York Times’ Saul Hansell points out that it seems implausible that an iPhone sold at an AT&T store could be had for $200 less than one sold at an Apple Store, especially since Apple-Store iPhones must exist activated on AT&T’s network anyhow. The bottom put inside is that I wouldn’t be the least bit amazed whether or not the $199 iPhone turns out to be fantasy.
And speaking of being distrustful of Apple rumors, the Fortune story says that the 3G iPhone will exist 2.5mm thinner than the current model. Just a few days ago, Engadget was reporting that the unused phone would be a tad thicker than its predecessor. Somebody’s got it wrong. (My money’s on Fortune being right; it’s forced to imagine Steve Jobs ever releasing a next-generation product that’s even a nanometer thicker than the one it replaces.)
As I’ve mentioned judgment, I passed steady the first-gen iPhone, for all the reasons I outlined at the top of this post. But if I have power to snag the 3G model for $399 with no contract, I’ll be tempted.
How about you?
