[Macworld.com]

The reaction to Apple’s iPhone is not unlike the reaction to the original iPod—and that’s not the only way in which the two devices are similar. [more]

[adobephile]

I agree very much with your assessment. Though I had looked at getting a Treo for a long time, something held me back. I tried to imagine what Apple would do for a PDA/phone, and when I learned about the iPhone and its features it came very close to what I had pictured in my mind.
I got mine on the 29th and have been very happy with it. Yes, I can see where it's missing functionality here and there, but I think much of those improvements are waiting a certain amount of consensus from customer surveys and feedback.
So many people almost literally drool over it, and I find myself drawing a crowd wherever I go.
I even got to try out the maps feature when someone asked me directions to the nearest location for a local restaurant chain which had several stores in the area. The answer was just a few taps away. It was fun and quite gratifying that this new "gadget" was actually quite useful in a very new way.

[Colorado_Bill]

Maybe someone can help me here! All I read about is 'how expensive' the iPhone is, BUT if you want to purchase another unlocked brand of 'cell phone', ie. Nokia, Sony, to name a few, are as expensive as the iPhone! Don't mean to hijack this thread, but I am curious as to the 'perception' of expensive!

[swartzfeger]

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I agree very much with your assessment. Though I had looked at getting a Treo for a long time, something held me back. I tried to imagine what Apple would do for a PDA/phone, and when I learned about the iPhone and its features it came very close to what I had pictured in my mind.
I got mine on the 29th and have been very happy with it. Yes, I can see where it's missing functionality here and there, but I think much of those improvements are waiting a certain amount of consensus from customer surveys and feedback.
So many people almost literally drool over it, and I find myself drawing a crowd wherever I go.
I even got to try out the maps feature when someone asked me directions to the nearest location for a local restaurant chain which had several stores in the area. The answer was just a few taps away. It was fun and quite gratifying that this new "gadget" was actually quite useful in a very new way.

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Ditto on all counts. At my favorite pub, complete strangers walk up and ogle the iPhone like Neanderthals seeing fire for the first time. I let people have hands on demos and they invariably fall in love, picking their jaws up from the floor. I almost feel like Guy Kawasaki when I go out in public with it.
The girl at my local gas station never gives me the time of day... this morning, I pay for my coffee, pull my phone, keys and change from my pocket and she blurts out "wow, is that one of those new phones?!?" Gave her a quick demo and now I'm suddenly her best friend. iPhone definitely gives me a +3 charisma stat bonus.
Maybe I can actually get a date with the 2nd rev.

[alansky]

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Maybe someone can help me here! All I read about is 'how expensive' the iPhone is, BUT if you want to purchase another unlocked brand of 'cell phone', ie. Nokia, Sony, to name a few, are as expensive as the iPhone!

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Anyone who says the iPhone is too expensive should be embarrassed to let the whole world know how dull-witted they are.

[OM_user]

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Maybe someone can help me here! All I read about is 'how expensive' the iPhone is, BUT if you want to purchase another unlocked brand of 'cell phone', ie. Nokia, Sony, to name a few, are as expensive as the iPhone!

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I think the griping has to do with the fact that the iPhone is not subsidized by the carrier the way so many other phones are. I agree with you that many of those other lesser smart phones are quite expensive in their own right, especially when purchased outside of a contract as you mention.
But in most cases comparatively, the iPhone is still a little more expensive, and well it should be. It's an amazingly engineered device, and for people to expect Apple or AT&T to sell these at like $199 or even $299 is ridiculous. People making those complaints simply have no grasp of the reality of what it takes to engineer, maintain and manufacturer something as ground-breaking as the iPhone.
And they forget that Apple is a company that has to make a profit on them too.

[MrAlkene]

Another correlation is the AT&T service and the original iTunes setup. It took over a year for the iTunes music store to appear, and iTunes has improved continuously since then. I see AT&T following a similar path.

[robco]

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Maybe someone can help me here! All I read about is 'how expensive' the iPhone is, BUT if you want to purchase another unlocked brand of 'cell phone', ie. Nokia, Sony, to name a few, are as expensive as the iPhone! Don't mean to hijack this thread, but I am curious as to the 'perception' of expensive!

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The problem is that the iPhone isn't unlocked, so it's not a valid comparison. It works only on AT&T's network. If I could pay the full price and use it on any GSM carrier I choose, then you'd have a valid comparison.
The reason why you can get a Pearl or Q on another carrier for much less is because you have to agree to a two-year service agreement. They give you a break on the phone, knowing that they'll make it up over the course of the service contract. There are of course stiff penalties for canceling before the contract is up.
With the iPhone, you have to pay the unsubsidized cost and sign on for two years. So essentially, Apple/AT&T are charging a lot more. It makes the iPhone's theoretical unlocked price (guessing here) somewhere closer to $700-800. Over the course of the two-year agreement, other smartphones come out much less expensive.
Yes it is well-engineered and the UI is nice, there's no denying that. But users will decide if that is worth the higher price tag, much as they do deciding between a PC or Mac (though the price difference there has become much smaller if you compare similarly outfitted models). The iPod eventually came down in price, added new features and introduced new models. I do think Apple will eventually do the same with the iPhone. Right now, early adopters are paying the R&D costs, just as early iPod owners did for the iPod.
For me personally, the deal breaker isn't the iPhone itself, it's AT&T. It would be nice, especially if the iPhone gains traction, if it could be the catalyst for truly changing the wireless industry. Right now, it's unconscionable. I should be able to buy a phone and use it with any carrier I want without signing a long-term contract. Maybe that will happen one day.

[Dan Frakes]

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Maybe someone can help me here! All I read about is 'how expensive' the iPhone is, BUT if you want to purchase another unlocked brand of 'cell phone', ie. Nokia, Sony, to name a few, are as expensive as the iPhone! Don't mean to hijack this thread, but I am curious as to the 'perception' of expensive!

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For what it's worth, in the pre-edit version of this article, I included the following parenthetical:
(although much of that is because people in the U.S., where carrier/phone subsidies are the norm, aren't used to actually paying for their mobile phones)
...but I cut it for space reasons /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

[lantzn]

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For me personally, the deal breaker isn't the iPhone itself, it's AT&T.

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That's funny, I was very happy that Cingular (AT&T) got the contract. I would have been very dissapointed had Verizon, which I absolutely hate, or one of the smaller companies had gotten it.

[Distorted_Loop]

Your article states very clearly a concept I've been preaching to a stock investing group to which I belong; I boiled it down to one simple sentence for them:
Apple is all about the INTERFACE and the EXPERIENCE, and no one does either of them better.

[LittleTinyElvis]

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iPhone definitely gives me a +3 charisma stat bonus.
Maybe I can actually get a date with the 2nd rev.

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Not if you keep talking like that. /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

[swartzfeger]

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iPhone definitely gives me a +3 charisma stat bonus.
Maybe I can actually get a date with the 2nd rev.

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Not if you keep talking like that. /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

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Lol, true! /forums/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

[robco]

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That's funny, I was very happy that Cingular (AT&T) got the contract. I would have been very dissapointed had Verizon, which I absolutely hate, or one of the smaller companies had gotten it.

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Verizon has much better voice coverage and a much faster data network. I would prefer Sprint personally, but they have the best coverage here. T-Mobile would have been good. Which is my point. You prefer one carrier, I prefer another. No reason why we both shouldn't be able to use the one we like (other than Apple not creating a CDMA version of the iPhone, yet).
Imagine if Comcast said that only Sony or Pioneer TVs would work on its cable service. Or DirecTV only supported Phillips TVs. You'd have a lot of [censored] off consumers. The same if Verizon stated that only Dell or HP PCs could use its DSL service. The telecoms should only be providing a network upon which the device runs. Wireless phones should be the same. I should get support from the phone manufacturer (as Apple does with the iPhone) and should be able to use my handset on any compatible (GSM or CDMA) network I choose.
If Apple signed an exclusivity agreement that would only allow Macs to connect to the internet via AT&T DSL, would that be OK? Or could only use AirPort with T-Mobile hotspots?