The iPhone's on eBay already
Apple won't say exactly when the iPhone will arrive, and you won't find it in any of AT&T's wireless stores, but eBay sellers are taking orders.
Several eBay sellers are already offering presales of iPhones.
(Credit: Apple)Apple's 8GB iPhone is available from several eBay sellers who promise to ship the coveted phone within 30 days of the date the item is purchased or when the listing ends, in line with eBay's policies on pre-sale listings. The iPhones went up for sale over the weekend, and several auctions are ending today with winning bids around $1,000--well over the starting prices of $499 and $599. Thirty days from today is June 13, smack in the middle of Apple's Worldwide Developer's Conference.
The sellers, however, are going beyond that in promising that they'll have iPhones from within 30 days of the start of the auctions, which was May 11 for the earliest ones, notes Apple 2.0. That's June 11, the same day CEO Steve Jobs is expected to address developers gathered for the annual conference in San Francisco.
All Apple has said on the matter is "late June," but some fans might not want to bother standing in the inevitable line outside major Apple stores during the first days the device becomes available.
One potential obstacle to the eBay sales? The Federal Communications Commission has yet to formally approve the iPhone. "This device is not, and may not be, offered for sale or lease, or sold or leased, until authorization is obtained," according to the fine print on Apple's iPhone page.
UPDATED -- The auctions listed above were removed from eBay later in the day. A call to eBay's public relations department inquiring why the auctions were removed was not returned.
Tom Krazit writes about the ever-expanding world of Internet search, including Google, Yahoo, online advertising, and portals, as well as the evolution of mobile computing. He has written about traditional PC companies, chip manufacturers, and mobile computers, spending the last three years covering Apple. E-mail Tom. 
The iPhone has been way overhyped. It's a neat toy, sure. I mean, I love PDAs and neat toys, so I can respect that about it. But is it groundbreaking? No, it's not. And outside of clever marketing and aesthetics, neither is anything else Apple makes (if you ask me :0)
And in this era, Apple has managed to bring back the Brand Name. People trust their products. They're reliable. They play nice together. They function as advertised. And they're generally regarded as stylish. Apple has managed to do what Sony did 20 years ago. They've created a product that they can sell for a sizable profit in a crowded market simply by putting their name on it. It doesn't have to make sense. People just feel good about buying their products. And that's the best form of advertising.
That is why Apple chose to go with it.
you experience great pains with a new device or hardware
implementation.
You DON'T want to have problems with your phone at this
crucial time. WAIT for the bugs to get out and the product is
tried and true BEFORE signing up to a contract!
Just to let you know, Apple plans on releasing MacBooks with
CELL PHONE INTEGRATION. More storage space, more memory,
larger screen than a iPhone. Think CAREFULLY, you might just
want to hang onto that slim cheap RAZR afterall.
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!
posting in various forums will be the first in line at Apple Stores
for the release themselves.
it has. It will require constant connections to a computer for
content updates which is a real hassle, even more on a Windows
box.
One movie video is 1.5GB all by itself, a mere 600 songs is about
3GB. Now add in Widgets, OS updates, games, emails and other
stuff and that adds up very quickly to take the 8GB of limited
space.
One is going to be constantly fighting for space on the iPhone
and eventually just quit bothering, much like many have with the
smaller capacity iPods. The iPods with video the screen is just
too small and takes too long to fill them up.
Sure if your going on a safari in Africa or a long cruise you might
want to take a huge amount of content then it's worth it. But the
small capacity devices is a real pain of updating for everyday
use.
Wait for the larger capacity or the MacBooks with Cell phone and
larger storage/flash drives.
Don't make a two year mistake.
Sure, in technological terms the iPhone and Macs aren't particularly ground breaking. However the Mac, and I suspect the iPhone, is groundbreaking in the user interface and ease of use it offers.
I hate my cellphone, not because of the technology it has, it has some really cool featuers, but because of the truely awful user interface that makes using the cool technology such a pain that I don't actually use all the features.
That is why I, and many others, are hanging out for the iPhone.
Also, Sun's jPhone may look pretty but the proof of the pudding is in the use. I can't see it matching up myself AND phones would have to be built for it if it is to even attempt to match Apple's touch screen technology. I dare say they may be rather expensive too.
- Your dates are wrong!
- by aka_tripleB May 14, 2007 4:31 PM PDT
- There are 31 in May. That means 30 days from May 11 or 13 is June 10 or 12 depending on which date you go by.
- Like this Reply to this comment
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