Talked to my AT&T/Cingular Rep...

[The MVPlaya]

Don't know if this has been discussed but I talked to my rep and he gave me some more information on the phone...

The iPhone is planned to be sold as an iPod FIRST, then if you want to activate the phone feature, you can sign a contract with AT&T. There is no activation discount, hence the high prices for the device. So regardless if you sign a contract or not, the iPhone will be sold at the same price and as an iPod FIRST...

Also there have been 120,000 pre-sales for the phone (don't know if this is nationwide), and most of them are celebs/ people in the entertainment industry.

Just spreading some info...

[Surf Monkey]

Originally Posted by The MVPlaya

The iPhone is planned to be sold as an iPod FIRST...

I very much doubt that.

Originally Posted by The MVPlaya

Also there have been 120,000 pre-sales for the phone (don't know if this is nationwide), and most of them are celebs/ people in the entertainment industry.

Now I know he's just blowing smoke. "most of them are celebs..." Didn't that raise a red flag when he said it? Seriously, don't put much stock in what a Cingular rep says. Until iPhone hits the market, all of this is just hot air. Only Apple knows the whole plan. Your local Cingular rep is just trying to look like he's looped in. He isn't.

[The MVPlaya]

Originally Posted by Surf Monkey

I very much doubt that.



Now I know he's just blowing smoke. "most of them are celebs..." Didn't that raise a red flag when he said it? Seriously, don't put much stock in what a Cingular rep says. Until iPhone hits the market, all of this is just hot air. Only Apple knows the whole plan. Your local Cingular rep is just trying to look like he's looped in. He isn't.

I expected this.

He did not say "most of them are celebs." He said most of them being in the entertainment industry...again he could be wrong, I'm just passing information. How did he get this information? Reps have meetings about new products coming out. Who controls these meetings? Cingular. It's pretty simple to understand. I saw the papers he was given etc etc...there was more info, but it was only in regard to where the phone was going to be sold at.

[jeremyjk1221]

Agh. I keep hearing this whole "I've got an iPhone on back order" everywhere!

Exactly where is this hapenning? And how?

I'm not going to believe this for a minute until someone has somethign really convincing to prove to me that, yes, you can pre-order iPhones.


P.S. I don't trust Cingular people, even though I'm a Cingular customer.
Sales reps have only one goal: selling the product. If fabricating tales helps,
they'll do it.

[ferari860]

Its probley being spread to help apples boosting stocks in the market. This iphone has pulled them up high but if they keep backing the lepord up sharers will loose trust and even in the i phone, there satus will be going to be around 80.50 or even 78 for there market. Which I think there near 100 at this time from the Iphone mainly. I don't only believe this most stock brokers and people on cnbc are calling this move. Kudos to those on apple but not for long because its not going to be a long term thing.

[joeylang]

This may sound crazy, but i seriously believe that there is a small possibility of this. Think about it, they are goin to be selling them in apple stores. How are they gonna be activated in an apple store. Also, for most of the features, you would have to have the cell phone activated. Man this sounds so carzy, and i dont know why, but i just really think it is a possibility. If this is true, then apple is probably thinking who is gonna buy this for the use of a 8 gig music player, and not get it activated. I actually think it is brilliant. IDK, call me crazy, but i think it is possible.

[mjmoonwalker]

Originally Posted by joeylang

This may sound crazy, but i seriously believe that there is a small possibility of this. Think about it, they are goin to be selling them in apple stores. How are they gonna be activated in an apple store. Also, for most of the features, you would have to have the cell phone activated. Man this sounds so carzy, and i dont know why, but i just really think it is a possibility. If this is true, then apple is probably thinking who is gonna buy this for the use of a 8 gig music player, and not get it activated. I actually think it is brilliant. IDK, call me crazy, but i think it is possible.

You can't buy it in the Apple Store. You're crazy. You can only buy it through Cingular.

[Jesse Hollington]

Actually, Apple has stated that they will be sold in Apple Stores and Cingular Stores. How Apple is going to handle the activation question is anybody's guess, but there's certainly no reason that they couldn't have an Apple rep do the paperwork when you buy an iPhone (in the same way that Radio Shack, Best Buy and Future Shop sell phones).

There's definitely no information that the iPhone will be available without an activation and contract, but at the same time, if Cingular is not subsidizing the phone (and most indications would seem to indicate that they aren't), there may not be any reason it couldn't be sold without requiring an up-front plan.

As somebody already said, it's pretty unlikely that somebody would buy an iPhone for that price tag and not activate it, and if it's still going to be SIM locked, then it's not likely they'll be able to activate it on any other carrier (at least not until the hackers figure out how to unlock it).

However, there are also indications that Cingular is only going to provide the iPhone with a two-year contract. This would be hard to enforce if they allowed the iPhone to be sold without one, since people could just pop in their own SIM card from their existing Cingular phones.

[jeremyjk1221]

Originally Posted by jhollington

However, there are also indications that Cingular is only going to provide the iPhone with a two-year contract. This would be hard to enforce if they allowed the iPhone to be sold without one, since people could just pop in their own SIM card from their existing Cingular phones.

What about existing Cingular customers who want to buy the iPhone?
Contract extensions will almost definitely be in order, but will the prcie remain the same?

[Cellulose]

I don't see why they couldn't just do the activation over the phone or online. If the phone is unsubsidized, then there's little incentive for them to hold you hostage in the store, requiring on-the-spot activation. They've got your money so it's not like they can "charge" you for the full cost of the phone if you fail to activate in 30 days.

It would be extremely easy for Cingular or any other cell phone company to enforce the activation. I think the cell phone companies have enough control over their networks to punish the honest customers... Cell phone companies claim to have the ability to block any phone, either by SIM card or by the phone ID (I forgot the name, EIMI or something). Also, the phone itself could require some kind of "activation" signal to enable itself for cell use.

I would not put that past Apple and Cingualr to go to great lengths to protect their economic interests. Apple has already demonstrated it's desire to get your money with its story about third party software "taking down the west coast cellular network" (doesn't seem to be a problem for any other phone out there).

Originally Posted by jhollington

Actually, Apple has stated that they will be sold in Apple Stores and Cingular Stores. How Apple is going to handle the activation question is anybody's guess, but there's certainly no reason that they couldn't have an Apple rep do the paperwork when you buy an iPhone (in the same way that Radio Shack, Best Buy and Future Shop sell phones).

However, there are also indications that Cingular is only going to provide the iPhone with a two-year contract. This would be hard to enforce if they allowed the iPhone to be sold without one, since people could just pop in their own SIM card from their existing Cingular phones.