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iPhone 3G Finally Available In US Contract-Free
Engadget is reporting that the iPhone 3G is finally available contract-free if you are willing to pay a much higher premium. Without a contract consumers are looking at $599 for an 8GB model and $699 for the 16GB. AT&T has the added restriction that you must be an existing AT&T customer, but Apple (retail stores only, sorry) will sell one to anyone willing to pay the premium. This change brings the model much closer to the prevailing European model where phones are sold as hardware and the plans are handled completely separately.
I love how marketers in North America continue to push the idea of "European". We've all seen the infomercials where they state "This is a best selling product in Europe..." or "In Europe this retails for $60 but..."
The way that it really works in Europe is that you pay for your phone over the course of your contract. For example, if you want a phone that is $600 and you are on a 3 year agreement, you pay $16.67 as a line item on your monthly bill to pay for the cost of the phone. That's much better than the hidden subsidy cost that most (if not all) North American carriers provide.
T-Mobile and ATT use different frequencies for 3G. T-Mobile uses 1700/2100, ATT uses 850 and 1900. You can connectivity with EDGE but you won't be able to do 3G.
Anyway, just because it's contract free doesn't mean the phone is unlocked. It probably still has the ATT SIM card restriction in place.
"People that quote themselves in their signatures bother me" - athakur999
Lets define our terms:
This story would appear to be an instance of the second thing.
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
No, it does not work like that, at least not everywhere. There is one provider in Italy that does this, I know of no one in any other country.
You can either:
1. Buy a phone, then use the card you want; or
2. You get a subsidised, locked phone with your contract - the preferred way in Germany, where people end up paying much more for the iPhone than the americans, even.
In italy route 1 means that the iPhone is factory-unlocked, in Germany it will cost you more than in Italy and still netlocked to T-Mobile. I bought my iPhone in Italy and have used that several times in Italy, UK, north america and even Chile. With prepaid cards - sometimes even international sims (and will end up spending much less). In Germany and Italy I even have pay-as-you-go data plans that allow me to purchase 500Mb (italy) or 1Gb (germany) for about 10 euros.
Roberto
Or I could spend $599 for one without a contract, and still give AT&T a boatload of money.
How exactly is this a good deal?
Is the Wall Street Journal authoritative enough?
http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB122143317323034023-lMyQjAxMDI4MjExNTQxMzUzWj.html
Low iphone sales in Japan is FUD to which the blogosphere and the WSJ caught on. In fact, Japan ranks second in iphone sales. Of course the U.S. is where the majority of sales are, but the idea that iphones aren't selling in Japan is the result of somebody trying to manipulate Apple's stock price. It's all exposed here.
Gentlemen! You can't fight in here, this is the war room!
You're right. It is definitely possible that they have been able to move a lot of iPhone inventory since they started giving the phone away for free.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-10172786-37.html
I prefer this report, which says a lot more than the Wall Street Journal.
Liberal? Conservative? Compare perspectives at Left-Right
if you want a phone that is $600 and you are on a 3 year agreement, you pay $16.67 as a line item on your monthly bill to pay for the cost of the phone.
So the same as everywhere else then.
The difference is that the networks in mainland Europe are more likely to itemize this charge, and they don't bill it to people who bring their own phone.
For all those Americans who think that AT&T offers a lousy deal, look to the Great White North:
Mandatory 3 year contract. There's no option for an unlocked phone or a shorter contract.
$60 + sales tax for 500 Mb
$75 + sales tax for 1 Gb
Pretty lousy, eh? There's not even an option for an unlimited plan. Rogers had a temporary 6 Gb plan for early adopters that's no longer available.
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I may be wrong, but from watching the keynote on the apple site i seem to remember it was free for both generations of iPhone and the nominal charge is for iPod Touch's.
Thanks for that. It just seemed odd that I can walk down a street here and see people whipping them out from time to time (more than I did living in the states), yet be told that "nobody's buying them". Something just wasn't lining up.
In this case it's option three: Still locked, but simply not bound to a contract. You still can only use it on AT&T, but are not locked in to a specific monthly plan.
In Belgium, I just go out to the store, by myself a cellphone of my own choice, pop in a sim card of whatever operator and buy prepaid cards. Want to switch providers? No problem, you can keep your number and everything.
As far as I know (seem to remember reading something about this in the paper around the time the iphone first came out), it's even forbidden here to couple contracts to cellphones.