How Jobs Played Hardball In iPhone Birth

Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "Apple bucked the rules of the cellphone industry when creating the iPhone by wresting control away from normally powerful wireless carriers, the Wall Street Journal reports. From the article: 'Only three executives at the carrier, which is now the wireless unit of AT&T Inc., got to see the iPhone before it was announced. Cingular agreed to leave its brand off the body of the phone. Upsetting some Cingular insiders, it also abandoned its usual insistence that phone makers carry its software for Web surfing, ringtones and other services... Mr. Jobs once referred to telecom operators as "orifices" that other companies, including phone makers, must go through to reach consumers. While meeting with Cingular and other wireless operators he often reminded them of his view, dismissing them as commodities and telling them that they would never understand the Web and entertainment industry the way Apple did, a person familiar with the talks says.'"

Comments

Re:Still Two-Faced

[Reaperducer]

Locked-in? Yes. Crippled? Well, that's just FUD.

How exactly do you expect Jobs to convince a cell phone company to alter a fundamental feature of its network (voice mail) to support an iPhone-only killer feature (Visual Voice Mail)? In this world you have to give in order to receive. It's why he's a billionaire and you're posting lies on Slashdot.

Re:Reality Disortion Field spreading

[Reaperducer]

It does not even do 3G. I know in US it is not much of a problem but here in Europe 3G is happening right now and don't even think about Asia.

Well, Europe doesn't even get a chance to try it out until the end of 2007, and Jobs has already stated in front of thousands of people that a 3G version is coming. So.... what's your complaint again?

Re:On a general level...

[Achromatic1978]

Telstra's biggest competitor is Optus. Optus is owned by SingTel (Singapore Telecom). The iPhone is EDGE (IIRC), which never really took off in Australia, the four+ years ago it was introduced. Telstra's NextG etc networks are CDMA, not GSM, that's why.

US telco's (speaking as an Australian who moved to the US in December) are up and down. On one hand, for A$200 (US$175), my wife and I get unlimited time to each other, and each of us to any five land or cellular lines in the US and Canada, unlimited evening time, unlimited weekend time, 2000 additional minutes beyond that, unlimited text messaging, and unlimited data, as well as free WiFi access at any of the provider (T-mobile)'s hotspots. On the other hand, it's amazing how horrible coverage can be. Major suburban centers with /zero/ coverage. Some areas where you roam onto another network (fine, esp. since you don't get charged for it these days), but in my office in Redmond I get nothing, while Cingular and Verizon are fine. Mind you, elsewhere, it's the reverse, and friends with those two ask to use my phone.

Re:On a general level...

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

Please read my comment.

I didn't say Apple should license fairplay, I implied that Apple is not above using proprietary tools to lock out competitors (just like the cell phone companies).

Thank you for pointing out that Microsoft, like Apple and the telcos is not above using proprietary tricks to lock out competition. Do you really think anyone's surprised by that?