BUZZKILL ALERT! 3G iPhones Must Be Activated Inside Retail Stores
One small step for iPhone... one giant leap backwards for iPhone activation.
The President of AT&T's National Distribution, Glenn Lurie is reported to have confirmed there will be no in-home activation for iPhone 3G as once enjoyed with the original iPhone. As an alternative, all iPhone 3G faithful will be required to have their new handsets activated in either an Apple or AT&T store, a process that is expected to take 10-12 minutes. (Silence) That's unless of course you have hundreds of rabid cult of iPhone followers lined up outside in the heat willing to chew the head off of some squatter in front on them just to get inside. In the immortal words of Kaiser Chiefs, "I Predict A Riot. ... I predict a riot"
In round one Apple rewarded (boned) it's early adopters with a surprise price reduction after they spent their entire beer fund on a new iPhone. Now iPhoners get handed this little piece of good news which is the equivalent of getting gored in the ace by a neutered bull that believes you've hidden his nards in your pants pocket. Pwned!
If that's not quite enough pain, let's add a data plan price hike from AT&T for the length of your contract and no online purchases either. The low price of the newly improved iPhone 3G is starting to look very expensive from my view sitting atop the horns of this angry bull. Doh! Is this Apple's version of eating their young?
via Gizmodo via AppleInsider
jobs isn't making money from at&t. let's keep in mind that apple only makes iphones, and has nothing all to do with wireless phone service. so to say that apple is the man behind the curtain is probably the result of misinformation or flat anger. at&t does not take business advice (such as what to charge for data service) from a computer/phone manufacturer.
also, i think you can actually activate your iphone at home, although the activation/upgrade servers are tragically jammed right now. but again, apple's hands are clean of at&t's failure to think things through.
Posted by: thomas | July 11, 2008 at 05:01 PM