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Math on iPhones Just Doesn't Add Up?
Tech Dirt is reporting that recently announced numbers by Apple and AT&T suggest that there is a large gap (1.7 million) between the number of iPhones being sold and those being activated. Taking into account factors like the iPhone launching outside the US and a 20% estimate of people buying the iPhone just for the purposes of unlocking, there are still 700,000 iPhones unaccounted for. "[...] suggesting that they're sitting on store shelves, piling up as unsold inventory. That number suggests at least some gap between perceived demand and actual demand -- while also raising questions about how much effort it will take to eat through that inventory."
They all got blended:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qg1ckCkm8YI
Iran and North Korea are buying them all up to make a cluster for weapons trajectory?
Just kidding, but there was a story years ago about Iraq buying Playstation machines (and prior to that a story about the purchase of C64s) to use. The iPhone is the cool new thing.
As a more serious one, perhaps a lot are being shipped overseas and unlocked for use there?
Tibbon
tibbon.com
So is it really more likely there are 700,000 mysteriously missing iPhones, or perhaps the number of people buying them to unlock is higher than they think?
Does the number of ATT activations also include the pre-paid plans, or just the contracts?
How about Apple and Rogers getting together and selling those iPhones to us up here in Canada? We feel neglected!
A $499 iPod touch with phone capabilities and locked into America's most evil telco isn't selling! I am well and truly shocked! I never suspected this would happen!
Don't mind the extra X. Alex
The pundits math doesn't line up. What's the reason? They don't know what the fuck they are talking about.
For example: "20% estimate of people buying the iPhone just for the purposes of unlocking, there are still 700,000 iPhones unaccounted for."
OK, so then I guess maybe the 20% estimate is wrong? Horrors.
What I do know for certain is that this discussion won't solve something that only Apple can answer.
Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
Fake Steve has a write-up on this (of course). If the phones have really been sold to the public, and aren't missing because of inflated numbers or internal sales, then this has really got to be hurting the bottom line. I believe that the phone contract subsidizes the hardware, and if people buy phones without contracts, Apple is losing money on each sale. 1.7 million phones winds up being a lot of money. The amount that each phone is subsidized is unknown, of course.
Totally. Kim Jong Il got one, and now Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Osama Bin Laden are really jealous, to the point that it's threatening to completely disrupt the Axis of Evil. It doesn't help that Osama got a brown Zune for Christmas and now Kim Jong Il and Ahmadinejad are teasing him mercilessly about it.
Surely some small percentage of phones are being unlocked, but did you ever stop to think that maybe the numbers are off because AT&T hasn't reported yet how many iPhone subscribers there are for December/January and there were probably tens of thousands of iPhones purchased as Christmas gifts that sat under a tree and just barely got activated in the last couple of weeks?
"When the president does it, that means it's not illegal." - Richard M. Nixon
They've been pinched?
(British joke only, I guess)
ccalam - acoustic versions of new songs.
Service plans for the iPhone start at $59.99/mo, which is $39.99 for the voice line and $20 for data. I added another iPhone for my wife for another $20 (data plan).
$100/month? What country do you live in? I'm paying $60/month and that includes unlimited data.
rm -rf
I think the likely reason for the large difference is that AT&T is simply giving you a total number of users who activated a phone on the Specific iphone plans and it does not include users who are blending the data only plan addition with a regular voice plan.
Many people will need more minutes than the regular iphone specific plans can deliver or wanted to keep their existing plan and simply add the iphone features to it.
Or AT&T simply doesn't like paying Apple and they are looking for ways to under report the activations of iphones until after the customers window to cancel without penalties expire or something like that.
Not only that, but Apple is in for a swift kick in the ass if they're not careful. Even though a lot of people will still be able to afford an iPhone, the issues surrounding its battery will be a deterrent to purchasing it. Apple will have two choices if it wants to appeal to consumers who are starting to worry about their budgets: make the batter removable like a Razr or any other phone, or lose potential customers.
A removable battery takes away nothing from the aesthetics of the case. The only thing it does is keep it out of Apple's service shop every year, and thus makes it harder to justify buying a new one every year. Apple needs to prepare itself by making this a non-issue for the iPod Touch and iPhone if it doesn't want to face potential disruption.
Apple could take an active part in developing software for both devices, and sell them to offset the losses in their plans from people not spending a lot of money on repairs and new phones.
Actually, it had been said that the hardware in the iPhone costs 200$ or so. If that's true then Apple is not losing money on those unlocked iPhones.
The share they get from ATT is just more profit.
Also, the iPhone is said to have cost 150 million $ in development. Not such a big deal when they sell millions of them with a decent margin.
There is a lot of speculation about this device, isn't there?
You're a little high on the monthly fee as I have a family plan with the wifey for under 100 w/ iPhone at ATT. However you are completely right on the iPhone price. If there is the excess inventory then yes the price will come down.
I suspect there are alot of would be buys waiting for the 3G iPhone. Since Steve and ATT's CEO have both confirmed an 2008 3G iPhone then I can only suspect that everyone like me who doesn't care about $400 now is waiting for the 3G or the non-3G "giveaways". Time for a price cut!
You want the 100 dollar a month contract minimum to drop 100 to 200? I'd love to get an Iphone that would pay me 100 a month! I'd even be willing to forgo the 400 dollars for the phone.
I'm awake! The answer is BONK!
Thumbs down on the blog link - the original CNet news story (link) is much more detailed and has this tidbit - Based on the number of "missing" iPhones, each of the 4,400 worldwide iPhone retailers "had more than 150 units of channel inventory at the beginning of this year" which sure sounds like they're counting them F.O.B. from Apple's warehouse door, not when it's actually sold to a consumer.
Did you actually read the article? It's basically about how $ucky the iPhone combined with an AT&T contract is and suggests that tons of units are either being unlocked w/out activation (likely) or simply sitting on store shelves (less likely).
Does that sound like an Apple-sponsored ad for their product to you?
"He Who Dares Wins"
what about replaced units?
One row of sensors was damaged on a car accident. They replaced it with no fuss - in store!
Surely this plus inventory at apple stores and the ton of at stores are a very large number.
I'm pretty sure Apple knows exactly how many iPhones have been activated on the AT&T network. Mainly because you have to do it through iTunes.
Is buying a Harley Davidson as your first motorcycle since you were 16 at age 49 a midlife crisis issue?
My aunt got an iPhone at launch and i guarantee it is still sitting in the box. I know it is hard to believe, but there are people that buy expensive toys and never play with them.
So the lack of demand is why they only sold two millions of them?
I went poking around AT&T's investor relations site, and it seems to me (though I didn't spend a whole lot of time there) that the 2 million number is the number of new AT&T customers who switched to AT&T wireless because of the iPhone. This does not count customers (such as myself) who kept my existing service but switched devices (in my case, from a Motorola RAZR to an iPhone).
If this is the case, it would explain a large amount of that gap.
I think part of the problem here is that the major media would like to report that the iPhone is a dismal failure somehow--and channel stuffing (a'la Microsoft's channel stuffing of the Zune) is one way to paint this picture. However, given the number of units I've seen on the shelves at the various stores I've gone to, I cannot imagine that 30% of Apple's iPhone stock was stuffed into the channel: that would mean that every Apple and AT&T store would have a mountain of iPhones sitting in the corner, and I'm not seeing it.
I'm currently working in Dubai, and I know about 20 people who use unlocked iPhones. I also see people with iPhones everywhere I go, as they are sold in all the phone shops here (unlocked, of course). I also know a lot of people in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain who are using them... and the Middle East accounts for one of the highest numbers of mobile users anywhere in the world. So why do they estimate only 20% of iPhones being unlocked? I always thought it was closer to 50%
Can we expect a price drop soon?
Vital papers will demonstrate their vitality by moving to where you can't find them.
Maybe its due to the inherit complexity of the iPhones. I know, that when I'm working/busy, I can't be bothered to navigate through menus/fancy slide shows. All I want to do is type 7 numbers and talk. I can imagine, it seemed like a good idea at the time to buy the iPhone, but people are probably tending to revert to the older, simpler, quicker technology of the classic cel.
Hi, I Boris. Hear fix bear, yes?
How can they be sold but still setting on store shelves? Unless there's a major shipping backlog sold phones are sold phones and wouldn't count as inventory. Probably more than estimated have at least tried to unlock them but this sounds more like a math error as well as underestimating unlocked iPhones. The quote just doesn't make sense.
I work as a Construction Contractor for some rather extravagant celebrities*. One of my more indulgent clients asked what was the most expensive building materials I've ever seen. Well, I heard on Slashdot that unlocked iPhones make excellent bricks...
Tomorrow, I'm getting my sixth truckload. The North Wing is almost complete, and then I'll start working on the guest house.
* (just kidding, of course. I'm a working techie stiff just like everyone else here)
Solomon
"Twice half-assed makes an ass whole." --Solomon K. Chang
Let me get this straight: if we pull a number like 20% out of our ass, as our estimate for part of the accounting, then not all the phones are accounted for. Here's a tip: maybe a different completely arbitrary number will work better than the first completely arbitrary number.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
With all the junk passing for off topic first posts lately, it's kind of a pleasure just to see a plain old, old-school one for once.
With the release of the iPod touch you should be able to figure out pretty closely how much an iPhone costs, because Apple definitely isn't selling the Touch at a loss. The iPhone is pretty much identical except for Bluetooth and cell chips, plus a microphone. All of which together are probably a few dollars.
Apple isn't subsidizing iPhone hardware.
"When the president does it, that means it's not illegal." - Richard M. Nixon
No, silly-pants, this has nothing to do with some giant culture war. You made a joke and somebody thought it wasn't funny. As always throughout history, every time you use humor you are taking a risk. That's what makes humor interesting and why comedians have thick skins. If you get upset when people don't like your jokes, perhaps humor is not for you.
I have seen the future, and it is inconvenient.
It doesn't help that Osama got a brown Zune for Christmas
Makes sense.. That thing is a bomb.
1. Colectors buy one keep the seconds in its origional package.
2. Horders buy as many as possible and sell them on ebay.
3. Short attention span. They bought one but never decided to use it.
4. Stupid People. They couldn't figure out how to use it.
5. Loose recepts. Broken or didn't like it but never returned it.
6. Like to break things. Will it blend what makes it tick.
7. Uninformed after spending $600 on a phone they realize their home has no Cell reception
8. Competitors buy the phone and study it for its secrets.
9. Compulsive cleaning spouce. New Toy left in the wrong spot got tossed.
10. Enemies a person is jelious that you just got an iPhone... Have it dissapar.
11. Kids... Shiny... Small... Toilet... Nuff said.
12. Gifts that were never open.
I bet more too.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
d00d, what about reading the write-up, which pegged the unlocking percentage at 20%, vice your suggested 33%?
Maybe the real story here is the way Apple's stock has tanked in the face of strong profits.
We can rest assured that there was no insider trading, because people are basically good and wouldn't break the rules and stuff.
http://fakesteve.blogspot.com/2008/01/stock-is-getting-killed-ive-instructed.html
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
There's no way Osama would use a Zune. He's an iPod Nano guy if ever I saw one.
I just found 700,000 iPhones hidden under my AT&T bill.
So apple sells direct to customers... what if they treat ATT as a "customer" that buys a few hundred thousand phones. So apple has "sold" those phones to ATT and they expect to sell those phones - but given the gulf between the sales and the activations it seems that ATT is not in fact, selling those phones.
There are 1351 iPhones on eBay right now. Most of them are unlocked. Some of the sellers have hundreds of iPhones. So a sizable chunk of that unsold inventory is over on eBay.
It's like the early days of the PS3, when eBay sellers overbought and there was soon a glut of the things on eBay for months, selling below retail.
Actually, Kim Jong Il got two, because he got a hole in one the first time he tried using it.
- RG>
Hey pal, this isn't a pleasantforest, so don't waste my time with pleasantries!
Mahmoud Ahmadidntgetaniphonejad?
iphones sold in Germany use the T-Mobile network exclusively but i've no idea what carriers and resellers are used throughout the rest of the world.
"He Who Dares Wins"
Depending on what state you live in, and what ATT can get away with, there are usually some monthly fees on top of your bill. Like the taxes from the local government, and then the fee they charge you to pay the taxes, and whatever else they like to bilk from you. In Seattle my friend is on the $60/mo plan but has an additional $20 in fees from ATT to make it nearly $80/mo for his iPhone.
Still pretty dang expensive for me, even at the lowest rate. I'll sign on when I can get an iPhone for $200 and then pay $40/mo. I take after my dad who should have founded cheapbastard.com.
Actually Osama's not so pissed that he got a Zune as that he got it for Christmas .
The only iPhone I've actually held in my hand was not activated. My nephew got it during an internship, when that ended, the AT&T account was terminated and they let him keep it. It's just sleeping, waiting for the day he feels like paying to use it. But it's not in any inventory anywhere.
Did you know that iPhones are found in hipbones?
(subtle...)
How to Download YouTube Videos
I know that GP is talking about US but take a look at German T-mobile pages and if you use euro to dollar conversion you'll end up with 73/100/130usd per month. That is quite a lot.
Trolls are like broken clocks. They show the truth two times a day. The rest of the day they talk nonsense.
include "cooking the books" and "accounting fraud."
Apple's worst business skill has always been estimating demand and managing supply to meet it. That's one main reason corporations never adopted Macs: if they hire 1500 new people, what if Apple's supply chain has a slowdown at that time? The single source of Macs through Apple alone made that bottleneck a defining problem in planning to use Macs in IT. Even as recently as this decade, the iMac/iPod Era, Apple has continued to brag about demand outstripping supply, leaving "empty shelves" after product intros, as if that were good for anyone. Including Apple: every empty, grasping hand at that empty shelf is a failed sale, that could be satisfied by one of Apple's many competitors. And since those competitors' products don't run Apple software (though that's mitigated a little by cross-platform iPod peripherals), that's often a lost customer, for their entire life.
Extra unsold stock also means Apple has the opposite problem, cost of production and distribution without return from sales. Which also pisses off sales channel partners, which might decide not to risk it on Apple products when manageable supply chains (and believable marketing projections) can be had with Apple's competition.
--
make install -not war
there estimate could be wrong.
really, how hard is it to find out how many sold?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I have an iPhone. Now I know about the tendency of "after you buy a Ford, there seem to be a lot more Fords around", but even taking that into account, I see more iPhones than I expected to around Boston, especially on the T. I'd say the only single device I notice more of are Sidekicks.
Boston might not be representative, but given that it's a pretty pricey thing, I'm impressed with its marketing inroads already. (I'm also impressed with how much new functionality the upgrades have been adding)
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
The story is void of facts. One paragraph declaring Apple iPhone sales don't add up? Is that all they've got? The MySpace story above this one has more value than this.
The discrepancy is probably because of sell-in and sell-thru numbers. This is what we use in the game industry atleast. The studio get profits from sell-in numbers; units that are in stores. Sell-thru numbers on the other hand are units that have been sold to the consumer. Apple is probably using sell-in numbers to make it look like there is a huge demand and that it is a hit. When they say they want to sell 2 million next year, they are really just saying we want that many units sold to the stores. The numbers will soon level out as most stores will be stocked and will stop ordering more, until they have sold out. Then the increase in sell-in and sell-thru will usually be around the same.
Unlike when talking about Microsoft's sales numbers for Vista, I think it's pretty unlikely that anyone is cooking the books here.
There is no real discrepancy. That number can be easily accounted for in terms of unlocked iPhones, for folks who don't want, or can't use AT&T. Twenty percent seems to be a perfectly reasonable number for that.
I think if you review numbers for sales of other phones (note the significant decrease in sales of other leading phones, such as the Razr) those will also support the high sales figures reported for the iPhone.
Apple announcing the SDK prior to activating my iPhone after Christmas is the only reason I bothered to sign up with AT&T (though I still have some reservations about it). My reasoning was that if I became too unhappy, I'd kick AT&T to the curb, eat the early contract cancellation, and go to another carrier. (And, in the meantime, I still get the enhanced voice-mail my voice-mail message count, and I can still hack away at it, even with AT&T as my carrier.)
I also know a lot of savvy folks who have taken the opportunity to negotiate discounts on their existing phones and services because the other wireless carriers are scared to death of the iPhone, and of folks leaving them to switch to it. Even if only four out of five of those folks are leaving for AT&T/Cingular, they still have plenty to worry about.
Well, "maths" is definitely one of the hardest things for an American living in the UK to get used to. I still can't bring myself to say "maths" or use plural conjucations for corporations. "Apple are selling.." just never sounds right.
I've met at least a few people in Canada who drove down to the USA to buy an iPhone. They then got it unlocked. And now use it on Rogers, our GSM cellphone carrier - of course, they don't use the data much. But it's still a great phone with WiFi.
I'm sure this happens quite a bit, even in the USA. Not everyone wants to pay $$$ for a monthly plan or wants to be locked in to a multi-year contract.
In the US, 'math' is traditionally singular and is roughly synonymous with "The science or application of mathematics."
In the UK, 'maths' is traditionally plural and is short for 'mathematics'.
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Their stock tanked because they announced that they have lowered their projections for next quarter. So while they are seeing good profits at the moment, they expect them to be weaker in the coming months.
Support a true independent artist - Leila Lopez
Given that the thing also connects to WiFi, and, at least in urban environments, there is unsecured WiFi everywhere, maybe people are not activating it and using it as a mobile WiFi connection.
My contract is $70.45 per month. I'm not sure where you get your "100 dollar a month contract minimum" from.
The iphone is still not available in Taiwan. So when he went back to visit his family during winter break, he bought 4 iphones which he then unloaded to an unlocker-reseller in Taiwan. This made him a cool $200 profit. If you thought the iphone is already expensive (I do), you won't believe what kind of cash some willing to pay just to be trendy.
How did he got hooked up with a reseller? Apparently, there are plenty of posts on discussion board (of Taiwan, so in Chinese) asking if anyone living in the states are going to TW soon. It's guaranteed profit without the trouble of packing (since you are packing for the trip anyway) and shipping.
Here's another funny tips my friend told me. Pack the phone in your carry-on because apparently there are many cases airport security or luggage handler stealing these hot items (iphone, wii, etc). Since most people don't insure their luggage and can't somehow prove what's inside. They are out of luck.
The only possible interpretation of any research whatever in the 'social sciences' is: some do, some don't
Numbers aren't real. Inventories are pretend.
Ockham's razor is telling me they're in a New Mexican landfill next to those Atari 2600 ET cartridges. Two glowing finger scrolling? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E.T._the_Extra-Terrestrial_(Atari_2600)
huh?
So now we have two choices: Either Apple has done things that will get them into deep trouble, and most likely someone into jail. Or, as unlikely as it may sound, there is just a blogger you can't get his numbers right. Or, of course, 700,000 iPhones are still wrapped up under 700,000 Christmas trees. Now what do you think is most likely?
Tthey have probably left the shores of the land of the free and made their way to other countries that have GSM networks. We've had quite a few come here to New Zealand. I'm sure there have been loads of exports from the US because they weren't made available sooner in other countries.
I have a gay relative and I'll leave it that because I don't want to inadvertently out him
It's Joe, isn't it. I knew it!
Well, thanks to the Internet, I'm now bored with sex.
Now wouldn't it just tick off all of those Apple enthusiasts that bought the iPhone two days ago for $400 if Apple already dropped the phone's price to $150? Personally, I think the OpenMoko phone is cooler anyway. Linux geeks and design nuts, unite!
Of COURSE! Santa is stockpiling so that he doesn't run into the same situation next Christmas with the iPhone that he had this year with the Wii!
Warning: Apple/Nintendo fangirl. Likes her electronics cute & cuddly. May be rabid.
...not shipped. There is a difference. If Apple said they "shipped" so many iPhones, you could claim they are, like X-Boxes, sitting on shelves. They said sold, and the most liekly explanation is that the unlocking count is much higher than the analyst states. Seeing as how it's his estimate, he's drawing the conclusion he wants from the data.
Fiat Homos et Pereat Theos
In actuality, "math" as an abbreviation of "mathematics" is older than "maths." Which would make the British version the neologism here. When you consider how Americans treat collective nouns compared to how the British treat collective nouns, this makes a lot of sense.
See this article from the online etymology dictionary, which states:It should also be noted that "mathematic" was the term used until the 17th century, according to this article; it was pluralized in the 17th century. It's not too tough to see that the linguistic conservatism of the North American colonists probably played a role in our use of the term "math."
I will never understand the ugly provincialism that gives some people the (mistaken) notion that their being British gives them the right to make value judgments on American English. American and British English are two different languages with a common ancestry. The etymology link I gave above was gleaned from this blog entry, in which one commenter noted:Not cool indeed. Talk about a sense of entitlement!
Could be people are waiting for the perfect safe hack or they are outside the USA.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Seems like this sort of analysis depends heavily on different companies being exactly "in sync" in terms of their accounting. When AT&T says that it "ended" 2007 with 2M customers, does that really mean "as of Dec 31"? Or is there a little lag in AT&T's accounting? Are the 4M phones all shipped, or does that include orders and phones in transit? How about phones in transit to overseas? Are there any phones being shipped to other countries in anticipation of product launch?
Bless you! I experienced the same explosion from two Irish guys and have been looking for a counterattack ever since. I now consider myself properly armed.
I think it's also worth pointing out that Noah Webster's "A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language" was published in 1806. The Oxford English Dictionary wasn't first published until 1928 or something...in fact, Oxford University only formed a "Unregistered Words Committee" in 1857 -- more than 50 years later.
Call this flamebait if you must, but the hubris of the British isles must be called to task. Even if it is the reason for America's existence.
They really aren't selling as well as slashdot makes out sometimes.
According to the North Korean propaganda, Kim Jong Il got tree holes-in-one the first time he ever tried playing golf.
- RG>
Hey pal, this isn't a pleasantforest, so don't waste my time with pleasantries!
type in 0.0005 X X =
then keep hitting = to again multiply the result by 0.0005
the number should get smaller and smaller. However, at some point, the number becomes VERY large.
give it a shot. some type of bug.
That's what his friends call him. I think he is ion charge of Iran or something.
Yea, that's why he is so pissed at the western world. As a Muslim, he isn't supposed to celebrate Christmas in the open like we can in the western worlds. Something about their religion relegates Jesus to a prophet/profit or something.
Are there really people who need more that 6,000 minutes per month ($219)? That's talking 8 hours a day for over 12 days. I can't even get to my 450 minutes limit.
Article X: The powers not delegated... by the Constitution...are reserved...to the people
Apple pays ~$254 per device to produce (not including amortized dev costs). That's $145 per device they're still making in profit. They've sold over 1 million of them, so they have their dev costs back.
:-)
So unlocked phones only give apple $145, not $145 + $18/month from AT&T.
If you're neutral about Apple and negative about AT&T, you've gotta appreciate apple sticking it to them like this.
If you're against both of them, well, learn more about their competition
Care about electronic freedom? Consider donating to the EFF!
And if their lowered expectations were based upon knowledge of wads of iphones unsold...
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
See, here's where you went wrong. Jobs wears black mock turtlenecks and blue jeans.
No way you're gonna pass for an Apple Fanboy if you can't get those two basic things right ;-)
This ain't rocket surgery.
Maybe it's me, and I realize this is Slashdot, but what the hell is up with slogging on the BROWN Zune. Personally, I think it looks the best of the three choices, Actually, notwithstanding the inherent Microsoft stuff, I would rather buy a Brown Zune then any other Zune or iPod. White and Apple bores me.
Actually, while I'm on this rant, let me get this off my chest: I WANT Microsoft to be big and bad. I WANT Apple to be big and Bad. Why? Because Linux needs the opponent to get better. Do you think Linux would be where it is today without a worthy adversary? Not on your life. Linux vs Windows vs OSX. Each pushes the other beyond what has been done. And in the end, we (the consumers) win.
Note: I run Kubuntu 7.10 on an AMD Sempron (1.6 Ghz) and it owns my Windows box at work (3 Ghz P4).
I call it 'The Aristocrats'
I don't believe you. You're on a $59 PLAN. Show me a bill saying that at the end of the month, your total amount owing is $59. It ain't. It's probably actually in the region of at least $75-85.
Can you feel them?
In Islam, Jesus is still a prophet, and a highly regarded one, he's just not the messiah like in Christianity. The Koran is based of the old testament but places more emphasis on the teachings of Mohammed.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
frost piss thread, must hijack.
I haven't RTFA. Don't need to, it's just evident where the non-activated iPhones are! They were all sold on eBay, and the rest are gathering dust because I could not buy one. $600 = 400 euro, now go see on eBay how much they really cost on the OPEN market.
The only provider of iPhones, the only desirable smartphone, are selling it at a delirious price point, and then, the people who buy them for selling, to fulfill the *demand* don't want to lose money on them, thus, they sell the iPhones for much much more, making them unaffordable.
Simple enough. If Apple want to see activated iPhones, they just have to sell them at a right price. But that will not happen. Steve Jobs prefers to serve "niche needs" that are everyone's needs, and let everyone buy the cheap crap rip-offs.
Without that "high margin or death" mentality, Apple would be bigger than Matsushita now.
Making laws based on opinions that stem up from false informations leads to witch hunts.
Yes, it does.
I live in small city of India and almost every Tom dick and harry has an iphone here. It is available for 30000 INR (750$ approx). Unlocked to work with any Indian network SiM. There are atleast 100 cities that are much bigger than my city and I am sure that they have iphones in the same proportions as my city if not more. Bangalorians and Hyderabadis(two of the major silicon cities in India) were the first to release videos on youtube showing how to hack and make Indian Sims work with. I remember one guy had a pre-ordered iphone,which his relative had pre-ordered for him. It was sent out to him and he opened the sealed pack right there on his youtube video. I am sure there are atleast thousands in the MiddleEast too. I know this because one guy had come to me to hack his Iphone(the guy had updated the firmware) and he had got his phone from the middleeast. I am sure that there are atleast half of those phones are in India and the middle east.
If they never sign up for all the extra services and just used the thing as a phone, could AT&T still track them as iPhones?
Have gnu, will travel.
Define "powerful" and "capable". It seems the MacBook Pro is 2007's fastest Vista notebook. Mac OS X combines the power of Unix with frontend applications like Final Cut Pro, Aperture, Keynote or iDVD. I can run Internet Explorer 6, Internet Explorer 7, Safari and different versions of Firefox at the same time. I can run grep and gcc in Terminal while opening a .doc file in a native version of Word. I got a whole, fully functional IDE as part of my OS.
Now explain to me how my Mac is only prettier than a PC and not as powerful. Explain to me how my Mac, which runs Windows, Linux and Mac OS X at the same time, is less capable than a PC.
Like mine, they are unlocked and used on non-sanctioned carrierrs. No mystery there.
It makes me wonder how many MS shills and bloggers they have on the payroll
However many thay have, it can't compare to the staggering number of *unpaid* shills and bloggers that Apple gets basically everywhere. Actually, I take that back - some are "paid". There's a huge ecology out there of Apple Polishers furiously blogging about their Apple, getting high-rate gadget AdSense, and relying on each other for clickthroughs.
Da Blog
...mass buying upon the next price reduction.
...Lorenzo / I'm into kinky crustaceans. I just discovered internet praWn.
The fact that my local PC retailer (read: Chinese import scam-shop) sells unlocked iPhones en-masse probably isn't helping. I'm in Canada. AFAIK, Apple isn't selling iPhones in Canada (yet). Me, I just hate that particular shop, so everything they do must be evil! >:-$
It's silly for Apple/AT&T to ever think they could lock their phones down. There are entire (clandestine) businesses built around the unlocking/hacking of cell phones. I personally think our immigrants should seek employment in more respectable industries, but that's just one more reason why I'm not in charge.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
No--in Islam, Jesus is still the Messiah. He just isn't the Son of God. These are two drastically different things. Just ask a Jew: they don't think the Messiah will be the son of God. That's a uniquely Christian belief.
In Repressive Burma, it's not just your connection that dies. slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=314547&cid=20819199
at least and i mean at LEAST 200,000 of those are now being used on different networks because they were unlocked, you don't have to activate them, this is at&t wondering why people aren't using its network
-Noc