My goodness, the last 72 hours have been crazy for iPhone Australia rumours. In particular, which carrier(s) will be ranging the phone.
From my personal point of view, I love it all. Can’t wait to see what happens in the next 6 weeks! I’m quite excited that the rumour that began about a month ago (3G iPhone announced in 1st week June, launched in Australia on all carriers in last week of June) seems to still be the latest rumour. A while ago, that dream of an HSDPA iPhone on both 850/2100mHz and not carrier locked seemed crazy. But as June draws closer, and that rumour hasn’t been quashed or proved wrong, it gets more exciting…
But from a work point of view, it’s incredibly frustrating. All the non-mobiles people and customers expect us to have all the answers. And that’s frustrating because Telstra haven’t released anything at all. And very importantly, neither have Apple. I guess people who don’t normally follow all the Apple releases know that until Apple actually say something, nothing is in concrete. There’s just been article after article after article on what “people” and “sources” have said.
This is the latest article that everyone’s talking about in the office today - apparently Telstra are ranging the iPhone. It’s a great wonder who ZDNet’s source is… cos I reckon out of Telstra’s 10,000 odd employees, you can probably count the number of people on your hand who are actually in the know on what’s happening between us and Apple. And I’m most definitely not one of them.
Everyone knows that Vodafone announced that they would be selling it. However, I love how very vague this press release is - no date, no mention of what version, certainly no mention of excusivity… just that they would be selling it. And I find it really interesting that Voda actually annouced they’d be selling it before Apple announced it in those countries - isn’t that very, very out of the ordinary for all the other country releases?
Oh and it’s “understood” Optus will sell it too.
But again, I know better than to trust anything about Apple until Apple tell me themselves :)
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May 9, 2008 at 12:49 pm
Rollo
There is always the possibility that Apple themselves would leak for the purpose of creating hype and demand before they sell the product.
A company like Apple ultimately doesn’t give a toss who the carrier eventually is, so long as they can shift the units to the consumer.
I note that the source is unnamed and that Telstra also declined to comment… just like everyone else ;)
May 9, 2008 at 2:47 pm
b
Rollo : not like everyone else - vodafone issued a press release.
Although if that was done prematurely without The Jobs O.K then expect that Voda will NOT be selling iphones - a truth that one video card manufacture learnt to their dismay when they announced their cards were to be in the next round of macs - only to find that all of a sudden they were not.
Prawn : It is not out of character at all for individual providers to leak info before Apple - in fact it is the norm. The europe experience has shown that.
What Apple does is what Rollo says - they create hype by saying nothing and getting other people [or other people just do it] to dribble out little bits of information. It is how they work the media every time. Sure, nothing is in concrete until it is said by Apple - or maybe even more when it is shipping - but that is like saying you always find things in the last place you look. It’s true, but doesn’t mean much.
Vodafone has clearly said that their customers will be able to buy the phone in those markets during this year. Sure, there is no exactness beyond that - but it is pretty clear they say that they have an agreement to sell the iphone this year - which is a measure of exactness more than what Telstra is saying.
Admittedly Telstra is being exact in one way - they are saying exactly nothing.
The real question is what are the sales & marketing monkeys of Telstra saying to those customers who call and ask the question?