iPhone 4S lands Android switchers due to iOS 5, Siri, Sprint, Verizon

by Bill Palmer

Here come the iPhone 4S switchers from Android. Independent studies showed that nearly half of Android users (42%) claimed they would move from their current platform to the iPhone 5 when it was released. But with Apple having released less ambitious new iPhone hardware this month in the form of the 4S instead, would the switcher army still show up? The hard numbers remain to be seen. The iPhone 4S has been an overwhelming initial success, with more than a million online preorders in less than a day and a retail launch which appears to have set sales records as well. But it’s not yet been determined what percentage of 4S buyers are new to the platform as compared to replacing an existing iPhone, nor is it clear what percentage of buyers are landing on each platform. However, anecdotal evidence is beginning to pour in that factors ranging from iOS 5 and Siri to the addition of carriers like Sprint and Verizon have motivated Android users to begin migrating to the iPhone 4S. Interestingly enough, while it’s long been a given that mainstream users who aimlessly ended up on Android by default as a placeholder until the iPhone arrived on their carrier would eventually move to iPhone once their carrier nabbed it, even some geeks who intentionally chose Android for its hacker-friendliness have switched to the iPhone 4S…

Much as the tech geek community recoils at the notion, most current Android users will admit up front that they’ve never had any allegiance to the platform and that they only bought it because the iPhone was tied to AT&T for its first four years and they had no intention of leaving their preferred carrier. Android was, after all, created specifically to fill the vacuum created on carriers like Verizon, Sprint, and T-Mobile (and their equivalents worldwide) which had been shut out of the iPhone by Apple. While all Android phones have sold quite well combined, none of the individual carriers has been able to use its in-house Android lineup to compete with the iPhone in terms of growth. Verizon’s internal data showed its Droid was being outsold by the iPhone by a ratio of 2.5 to 1, prompting the carrier to jump on board with the iPhone 4 the moment the exclusivity deal ended in order to stop the bleeding. But most Verizon customers stated their preference to wait for the next iPhone, which would be the first to arrive on Verizon at launch, rather than settle for what was by then an aging iPhone 4. Sprint followed suit this month by giving up hope that its EVO Android line could rescue it and instead opted to bet the company on a pricey iPhone deal with Apple. Meanwhile AT&T is the only U.S. carrier showing any real growth over the past few years, and that’s thanks almost entirely to the fact that it had the iPhone all to itself; that growth is now in danger as its iPhone customers have the option of leaving…

But even as current iPhone users reload with the iPhone 4S this week while longtime iPhone fans on Sprint and Verizon load up with their first iPhone, the minority of Android users who actually believe in Android may be the ones to watch. Those types tend to be significantly removed from mainstream society (even though the same group tends to control most of the tech headlines written, even in mainstream publications). Walk down the street and perform a headcount of visible iPhone and Android phones in use, and you’ll conclude that the iPhone has majority marketshare. But enter an insulated geek conclave like Google+ and you’ll find it’s dominated by Android worshippers, too busy quoting Android activation numbers to bother realizing they have little to no correlation to actual device sales or marketshare. Point out that Android devices only account for about a third as much web traffic as iPhone devices, and they’ll respond back with either bizarre counter-arguments or in some cases flat-out threats of violence. But while the more insulated and deluded among the Android geek army might rather jump off a cliff than switch to an Apple product, some among the more rational Android geeks appear to be leaning toward the iPhone 4S.

There’s the tech writer at the Huffington Post who’s geeky enough that he’s using the “Ice Cream Sandwich” code words in reference to Android (a phrase which no one among the mainstream 99% of Android users has ever, ever heard). And yet he just switched from Android, which he still likes, to the iPhone 4S. His reasons? The new iOS 5 operating system, iCloud, and specifically Siri. Search around the web and you’ll find more tech geeks announcing that they’re moving from Android to the iPhone this week, each of them touting some of the same reasons.

For mainstream users who value ease of use and understandability of features as their primary (and in many cases only real) decision making factor when it comes to picking a smartphone, the iPhone has long been hands-down the only choice. The only thing the iPhone 4S changes in that regard is that it’s now on Sprint and Verizon as well as AT&T (and equivalent carrier expansion around the world), meaning that the iPhone goes from being the non-option they’ve always wanted to now being an option and a nearly automatic sale for Apple. But for the tech geeks who’ve long favored Android because it has infinite theoretical features whether they do anything or not, because they can hack it and make system-level coding modifications and write their own homebrew apps and do all the things that geek would rather do than use it for anything practical, the notion that at least some percentage of them are now switching to the comparatively unhackable iPhone 4S is a sign that perhaps Android doesn’t have a permanent lock on the geeks after all -or maybe some of them are just tired of using their smartphone as a tinker toy instead of a smartphone. Here’s more on the iPhone 4S.

Updated with additional information on iPhone switcher data

iPhone 5 indifference: Sprint and Verizon eager but AT&T has no iLove

by Johnny Major

Even as Verizon discounts its iPhone 4 in order to draw down inventory ahead of the iPhone 5 and Sprint can barely manage to bite its lip with excitement regarding its impending iPhone 5 addition, and even Canadian carriers like Telus begin serving up the iPhone 4 at bargain bin prices, original iPhone carrier AT&T remains publicly indifferent. Most notable is that even as AT&T serves up discounts this week on dozens of smartphones from rivals like Samsung and HTC, not a penny has been shaved off the price of its iPhone 4. This kind of indifference has come to be expected from AT&T customers, who watched the carrier respond to its impending loss of iPhone exclusivity by eliminating popular unlimited data plans and not lifting a finger to compete with the Verizon iPhone 4 which arrived in the spring. That leaves AT&T iPhone customers in the position of going carrier-shopping with the launch of the iPhone 5 (but not to T-Mobile, which admits it won’t have the iPhone this year), with various factors marking the pros and cons of doing so. For those iPhone 5 buyers who are looking at marking the occasion by moving to Verizon or Sprint, here’s a look the ups and downs of it…

The first factor is a financial one. Verizon’s plans cost roughly the same as that of AT&T, while Sprint offers pricing which is cheaper for most users in most instances. However, any AT&T customer who bought their last iPhone less than two years ago is looking at having to pay off the remaining portion of their early termination fee if they’re going to change carriers at the iPhone 5 launch. There are actually three groups here. The first are those whose current iPhone is more than two years old and are already post-contract: they can change carriers without regard for cost. The second are those who are eligible for upgrade pricing (typically twelve or eighteen months after purchase) but aren’t yet out of their contract: it’s cheaper for them to remain with AT&T because the iPhone 5 will cost the same no matter who they get it from, and leaving AT&T will require an ETF payment. The third group faces a different fate: those who aren’t yet upgrade-eligible will find themselves facing a $200 surcharge for an AT&T iPhone 5, and may come out ahead by buying a Verizon or Sprint iPhone 5 at standard pricing and using the savings to pay off their AT&T ETF…

Network quality is a significant factor but one which is tricky to quantify on a local level. For those who aren’t globe trotters, less important are national network quality rankings and more important are signal strength at ones home, place or work, favorite hangouts, and routes in between. A longtime AT&T iPhone user could be living in the middle of a Verizon dead spot and not know it; switching to a Verizon iPhone 5 could then become a nightmare. The way around this is to invite friends with Sprint and Verizon phones to come visit, and then check their reception while they’re over.

Network speed is another beast entirely. Both Verizon and AT&T have embarked on 4G LTE nationwide networks, but Verizon is much further along in that regard; neither one is anywhere close to being nationwide as of yet. The iPhone 5 may or may not even support 4G LTE, which won’t be confirmed until the device launches. Sprint offers a 4G network which is nationwide, but it’s significantly slower than the 4G LTE being promised by the other two carriers. It’s not yet known whether the iPhone 5 will support Sprint’s 4G, either.

Neither Verizon nor AT&T is offering unlimited data plans to new customers. Sprint is doing so, but reserves the right to revoke it down the road. Longtime AT&T iPhone users are still on an unlimited data plan if they’ve so chosen, and would lose this plan if they move to a Verizon iPhone 5. Then again, they could eventually lose the plan if AT&T revokes it later. Unlimited data plans mean you can surf the web as much as you like; those on limited data plans are in store for sizable overage fees if they go past their monthly limit. Here’s more on the iPhone 5.

Updates 4:15pm PST with additional information on iPhone 4 discounts worldwide

Verizon tips iPhone 5 release date via iPhone 4 blowout, AT&T sits out

by Bill Palmer

In the surest sign yet that the iPhone 5 will see an October release date, Verizon is now offering select customers an iPhone 4 for a mere $120 via direct text message offers in an attempt to wind down existing inventory ahead of the launch while making clear that the deal is only good for the next week (even as AT&T oddly offers up deals on dozens of its smartphones, none of which is the iPhone 4; Telus in Canada is also blowing outs its iPhone 4 units with a $99 sale through October 3rd). It also points to an increased probability that the iPhone 5 is paired with a low cost iPhone 4S replacing the existing iPhone 4, hence Verizon’s motivation to dump its remaining units. “I received a text from Verizon offering me an iPhone 4 at the price of $120 with a new 2 year contract but the offer only stands until the 30th of September,” reports one Verizon customer. This news falls in line with various reports placing the iPhone 5 launch event the first week of October, which would then place the device’s release date anywhere from days to weeks later, but sometime before the month of October is over. It also comes amid a chorus of pre-emptive boos from those who’ve long been awaiting the device, who’ve begun inventing their own doomsday scenarios in which the announcement ends up being less than they’re looking for…

There’s the one reader who fears the “new iPhone” will be just the 4S rather than the 5. This latest Verizon news points to that not being the case, however. If the iPhone 5 is facing such manufacturing issues that Apple must resort to releasing just the iPhone 4S this fall, then the iPhone 4 would be sticking around as the bargain model. Verizon wouldn’t then be so motivated to blow out its remaining iPhone 4 inventory ahead of the turnover. Then there’s another reader who worries the iPhone 5 will indeed arrive this fall but without its iOS 5 operating system, which Apple previewed publicly in June and promised would arrive this fall. But there are two reasons to sleep easy on that front. One is that iOS 5 has been through seven rounds of developer beta testing and, while it’s not quite perfected, developers report that it’s “close” which is a sign that it can be released just as soon as the iPhone 5 itself is ready to go. There’s also the fact that the iPhone 5 is designed specifically to run iOS and not the existing iOS 4.3; cooking up a new version of iOS 4.x to power the iPhone 5 would actually be work than merely finishing off iOS 5 or yanking any remaining iOS 5 features which aren’t yet ready to go. Apple could then push those features out as part of iOS 5.1 or 5.2 later on. Meanwhile, more evidence of a sooner-than-later iPhone 5 release date continues to pile up…

Earlier this week, Apple board member Al Gore (yes, that Al Gore) made a point of stating that the “new iPhones” are coming next month, his use of the plural seemingly confirming that there will be an iPhone 5 and an iPhone 4S arriving simultaneously. The speech was notable in that Gore made an intentional point of working the “iPhones” reference into it despite the speech itself being on an unrelated topic. Gore rarely speaks on Apple’s behalf, leading some to presume that he made the mention on instructions from his employer, who wanted to remind the public that the iPhone 5 is coming ahead of its official launch. Sprint has also recently confirmed that its network is ready to handle the iPhone 5, a tacit admission that it expects to begin offering the new device. T-Mobile, however, confirmed that it will not be offering the iPhone 5 in 2011, in the process implying that other carriers will in fact be offering the iPhone 5 this year. As for Verizon customers being offered the $120 iPhone 4, our advice is to wait til next month if you can. Once the official announcement from Apple is made, you’ll have the choice of acquiring an iPhone 5 for (Apple’s history would suggest) $199 or the iPhone 4S for perhaps $99 or even $49. Here’s more on the iPhone 5.

Updated 1:05pm PST with additional information on how Verizon is making the offer and information on AT&T and Telus deals

Late iPhone 5 release date harms Verizon growth, T-Mobile AT&T merger

by Bill Palmer

The iPhone 5 release date comes in at least two American flavors and as many as four, with each of the four major U.S. carriers directly impacted by Apple’s latest smartphone whether they end up offering it or not. There’s old iPhone standby AT&T, whose impressive growth still depends on the iPhone even as it attempts to diversify into Android phones. There’s Verizon, who gained the iPhone 4 so late in the game that it’s been largely bypassed in favor of the upcoming Verizon iPhone 5, something the carrier has publicly acknowledged is hurting its growth potential. Sprint is so tired of iPhone questions it’s banning its employees from answering them. And T-Mobile is in legal limbo amid merger talks which could keep it from adding the iPhone 5 as quickly as it wants. Here’s a look at what each of the four entities is facing as the release date for the iPhone 5 creeps up in silence, ready to pounce upon the public without advance warning.

Verizon: After watching some customers bolt for AT&T in order to get the iPhone while remaining customers began to get rowdy at the prospect, Verizon had to wait years to get its hands on an iPhone. Too bad for the carrier, by the time the AT&T exclusivity ended, the iPhone 4 era was almost over. Verizon went with it anyway as a stopgap to prevent losing customers. That’s been working in terms of retention, but many existing Verizon customers have opted to wait for the Verizon iPhone 5 and stick it out with their existing Verizon phone in the mean time. In short, Verizon may be sitting on an even bigger iPhone 5 release date payday than AT&T…

Sprint: The talk of the town is that Sprint will have the iPhone 5 on its release date, or at the carrier’s October press event. But that talk comes largely from the sentiment that a Sprint iPhone makes too much sense for all sides not to do it, lacking hard evidence that it’s coming. With T-Mobile for sale and Verizon having gained the iPhone, Sprint faces the dual whammy of suddenly becoming the smallest major carrier in the U.S. and the only one without the iPhone. This should leave so Sprint highly motivated that it’s willing to strike a deal with Apple on just about any terms. Otherwise, mounting anecdotal evidence shows a mass defection among Sprint customers to Verizon for the iPhone 5…

AT&T: Network quality disgruntlement aside, millions of AT&T customers are sitting on an iPhone they’re ready to replace with the iPhone 5, meaning that AT&T is looking at a massive payday when the iPhone 5 sees release. Then again, the iPhone 5 launch will also be the true test of just how many or few AT&T iPhone customers end up jumping to the Verizon iPhone instead; at the time of the Verizon iPhone 4 launch many AT&T iPhone customers (including all 3GS users) were still under contract. With those contracts now beginning to expire, AT&T’s loss equals Verizon’s gain. So the iPhone 5 release date could be a big win and a big loss for AT&T all in one.

T-Mobile: Those crickets you hear chirping are marking the time that’s passed between AT&T’s announced intention to acquire T-Mobile and the present, during which little positive has happened in the name of making it happen. A stock market correction has made it more of a financial challenge for AT&T. Now the DOJ has come out against the deal, meaning it has at least as a good chance of falling through as it does going through. All this is playing out at the speed of mud even as T-Mobile was supposed to have somehow worked out iPhone 5 plans with Apple in the mean time. Did that actually happen, or has the merger gotten in the way of a T-Mobile iPhone 5? We’ll find out soon enough. Here’s more on the iPhone 5.

iPhone 5 tiered pricing changes Verizon upgrade equation to match AT&T

There’s a case to be made that the iPhone won’t really arrive on Verizon until the iPhone 5, and the strongest pillar of that argument isn’t that the Verizon iPhone 4 showed up so late in the game; it’s that the entry price for the iPhone on Verizon is four times as costly as it is on AT&T. Thanks to the fact that Apple likes to keep its current iPhone model at $199 and $299 price points, the bargain balancing act is pulled off by keeping the previous model around at a sub-$100 price point for those who want an iPhone but don’t want to cough up multiple hundred dollars. At present that means the iPhone 3GS, introduced in 2009, can be had for $49 (previously $99) through AT&T. But because there’s no previous iPhone model that works with Verizon, customers of that carrier are faced with the option of plunking down a flagship price for the flagship iPhone 4 or not getting one at all. But the iPhone 5 will change all that, even if it ends up not being any cheaper than the current iPhone 4.

There’s been debate as to whether Apple will opt to keep the iPhone 5 at the two and three hundred dollar price point or whether it’ll opt to cut margins in the name of being more aggressive in the face of competition. But either way, the iPhone 4 will stick around throughout the iPhone 5 era, on both Verizon and AT&T. And whatever the iPhone 5 is priced at, the iPhone 4 will be significantly cheaper. This means Verizon customers will have the option to get their hands on an iPhone 4 at perhaps $99 or even $49, just as AT&T customers can do now with the iPhone 3GS. Of course AT&T customers will have the same crack at a cheaper iPhone 4 once the iPhone 5 era begins, but it’ll represent the first time in which Verizon and AT&T customers are on equal iPhone footing – not just in terms of getting the iPhone 5 at the same time, but in terms of having a more economical (if less shiny new) iPhone option available. Here’s more on the iPhone 5.

Verizon iPhone throws smartphone virgins into deep end of pool

The Verizon iPhone is set to bring three kinds of users onto the iPhone platform: those who are ditching a competing smartphone, those who are graduating from an iPod touch, and those virgins who have never owned a smartphone of any kind. Each of those three groups has some overlap, but all of them are set to be tossed into the deep end of the pool, to varying degrees.

Those who have never been a smartphone user or iPod touch user are in for the rides of their lives, as they’ve thus far been shut out of the app generation entirely. No mobile email access. No tweeting or facebooking from anywhere but their desk. That segment of Verizon customers who are about to become iPhone users simply have no idea what they’re in for. But they’re not the only ones. Even those Verizon fans who’ve been riding the iPod touch wave as far back as 2007 are in for a shock, as the get their hands on an iPhone and for the first time realize what it’s like to be able to use their network-reliant apps anywhere and everywhere they want, as opposed to years of network apps being all but useless anywhere but home and Starbucks. That “Maps” app which could never be used on an iPod touch while driving? Now it’s no longer broken. Want to tweet about something other than the coffee you just ordered, because the coffee shop is the only free wifi source you’ve ever found? Here’s your chance.

In fact it may be iPod touch users who are the most jolted by the arrival of the Verizon iPhone, as they’ve spent the past three years only thinking they know what the iOS mobile experience is all about. At least the true virgins, who’ve never used a smartphone or an iPod touch, know that they have no idea what they’re in for. And even those smartphone veterans, who’ve long wanted and iPhone but instead long settled for whichever smartphone Verizon was offering at the time, are in for a bit of a dip in the pool themselves. After all, they’ll be joining the iPhone platform nearly four years into its evolution. Here’s more on Verizon iPhone.

Welcome: Verizon iPhone procrastinators arrive after tense holdout

Holdouts. Waiters. Procrastinators. Stubborn folk. Validated, finally. Verizon customers who’ve insisted on waiting for the Verizon iPhone have seen their ups and downs over the past four years. They’ve seen four different iPhone generations come and go while they’ve been stuck on a flip-phone or some Verizon smartphone they didn’t really want. They’ve seen the App Store explode even as they realized that when it comes to making the iPhone work with Verizon, there’s been no app for that. They’ve ignored the fact that most iPhone users don’t have issues with AT&T of any significance. But mostly they’ve gone through a cycle of saying to themselves, “Alright, no Verizon iPhone was announced this time. I must have an iPhone, but I don’t want to change carriers, so I’ll give it one more year.” And after three years of getting the short end of that stick, even as many of them were adding the corollary “…and this time I mean it,” this time they’re instead getting the payoff they’ve been waiting for. So here’s the question: was it worth it?

I’m not asking you, dear Verizon customer who’s now getting ready to camp out in front of an Apple Store as soon as the official on-sale date is made public (looks from here to be the first Friday of February, but we’ll see). And I’m not asking you, because I’ve heard what you have to say: AT&T is so bad that iPhone users can’t even reliably make phone calls. That AT&T has more dead spots than an episode of Saturday Night Live. That iPhone users also have to carry a Verizon flip-phone in their other pocket just to make phone calls. Yes, we’ve heard all this. Even as iPhone users have spent four years doing just fine with their iPhone on AT&T, we’ve had to listen to Verizon holdouts quiz us on just how horrifying the AT&T iPhone experience is, as if they were trying to find a way to reinterpret what we said into something negative even if it wasn’t. When Verizon users start in with their absurd fantasy-based questions about the AT&T iPhone experience, iPhone users often don’t know whether to laugh or sigh.

But we can’t really blame you, dear Verizon customer, because we know that you’re not just completely making it up. Like all carriers, AT&T works better in some places than others. Objective studies show Verizon’s network to be marginally better than that of AT&T, although both fall decidedly into the “mediocre” category. But then you’ve got fraudsters like Consumer Reports claiming that AT&T has the worst network in the history of the world. Then again, what do you want? Those are the same jackwagons who falsely claimed the iPhone 4 antenna issue was real, and revoked their iPhone 4 recommendation based on something they knew didn’t exist. Most iPhone users with Apple would sue those worthless pieces of crap at CR out of existence, if only so we wouldn’t have to hear about CR’s fraudulent claims from Verizon holdouts who become desperate to self-rationalize their decision to hold out every time they come into contact with an iPhone user. But I digress.

Here’s one thing for certain: regardless of whether you’re not validated for waiting all this time for a Verizon iPhone or not, dear Verizon customer, we welcome you to the iPhone platform with open arms. Now shut the &#($ up about how your Verizon iPhone is supposedly so superior to our AT&T iPhone. We’re tired of hearing about it already. Here’s more on the Verizon iPhone.

Verizon iPhone: Apple must leverage Verizon enthusiasm to wake AT&T

by Bill Palmer

With the dawn of a new year and on the eve of the Verizon iPhone (more info), questions linger as to whether Apple is wearing the proverbial pants in the relationship when it comes to either new partner Verizon or old frustrating friend AT&T. The notion that Apple would need to hold court with either carrier is a peculiar one, when one considers that based on stock market value, Apple is larger than both carriers combined. Although it’ll certainly never happen, Apple could theoretically buy out both Verizon and AT&T, and have enough spare change left on its marketcap to acquire Sprint just for kicks. It’ll never happen for regulatory reasons, and Apple buying a carrier probably never should happen, as the moment Apple becomes a cellphone carrier, other carriers will stop wanting the iPhone at all. As inexplicable as it seems, many or most consumers would rather settle for a phone they don’t want from their favorite carrier than move to another carrier to get the phone they do want. And it’s that particular foible which has Apple not quite dominating its relationships with U.S. carriers even though it could literally own all their backsides.

So what does this mean for Verizon – and AT&T – customers on the eve of the Verizon iPhone? Clues may come from examining the ongoing relationship between Apple and AT&T up to this point. In one sense Apple’s partnership with then-Cingular seemed doomed from the start, as AT&T was rolling out not just a new (old) brand name but also a new CEO at the same time Apple was rolling out the iPhone, and the new AT&T CEO appeared to want to be anywhere but on stage with Steve Jobs during the iPhone introduction, regardless of the generic positive words he appeared to be reading off a napkin. Did the previous CEO make promises to Apple that the new CEO had no interest in fulfilling? In any case, 2007-2010 was full of the iPhone user base expanding faster than AT&T was either capable of, or interested in, keeping up with (depending on ones interpretation). Features like MMS and tethering were inexplicably slow to roll out, leaving most iPhone users to feel that even though they didn’t have issues with AT&T in terms of network reliability (source: every survey of iPhone users ever conducted), most iPhone users to feel as if AT&T has treated them as more of a nuisance than an asset.

The early days of the Verizon iPhone era should be different. Verizon clearly wants this, and the leaked internals which show the Droid selling only about forty percent as well as the iPhone means that Verizon needs this in order to restart its stalled growth. Oddly enough, history shows AT&T needed the iPhone to fuel its impressive growth over the past few years, but ultimately didn’t seem to care either way. Either that or Apple simply recognized that there are millions of Verizon customers who will never, ever bolt for AT&T, and decided to expand the iPhone to two U.S. carriers regardless of anything relating to AT&T itself.

Because Verizon knows up front that it needs the iPhone, expect Verizon to try harder to at least make iPhone users feel wanted. But don’t expect Verizon to actively blow up the blueprint which has allowed the four major not-at-all-regulated U.S. cellular carriers to get away with printing money while providing a level of service which almost no consumers consider adequate. If Verizon bends over too far backwards in the name of playing by Apple rules, which are to over-deliver to the customer in the name of being able to keep margins and retention high, then Verizon knows it’ll be playing a dangerous game in terms of decreasing the leverage of the entire U.S. carrier industry. Apart from the near total lack of rules, regulations, and enforcement when it comes to the four major U.S. tower builders (which is really all they are), there’s no explanation for how these four thoroughly unimportant companies ever gained so much industry leverage in the first place.

The question for Verizon is whether it thinks it can gain a competitive advantage by breaking the mold and catering directly to the world’s only vital smartphone platform, or whether it thinks it can “win” the iPhone battle simply by out-AT&T-ing AT&T. Accordingly, the question for Apple is whether it can persuade Verizon, through friendly or strong-arm tactics, to break that mode – and in doing so, perhaps jolt long-comatose AT&T to life in the process. Short of that, with no plans for long overdue government regulation on the horizon, expect the Verizon iPhone era to be a case of meet the new boss, same as the old boss. Here’s more on the Verizon iPhone.

False move: Verizon iPhone prospects muddied by 4G LTE Rhapsody deal

All the Verizon iPhone pieces are falling into place, except one. The most popular smartphone in history, the iPhone, is set to join forces with the most popular U.S. carrier which doesn’t already offer it, in a year in which said carrier is about to roll out its nationwide next gen 4G network which should give the next gen iPhone room to run. Apple will no longer have to answer questions about a Verizon iPhone from consumers who have thus far refused to join the party. Verizon will no longer have to worry about the fact that the iPhone 4 is outselling Verizon’s own Droid by a 2.5 to 1 margin, as now Verizon will be selling both. Except wait a minute, here comes Verizon introducing its new 4G LTE home-based internet service. And instead of partnering with Apple’s iTunes, by far the most popular digital music service in the world, Verizon is instead partnering with bitter (and dying) iTunes rival Rhapsody. Huh?

To be clear, Verizon’s 4G LTE pilot program has nothing to do with cellphones. It’s a home internet experiment (think cable or DSL alternative), designed for use on your desktop or laptop computer, at your house. Verizon’s partnership with Rhapsody for its home 4G pilot program in no way gets in the way of Verizon’s ability to turn around and sell an Apple iPhone, which of course is fundamentally part of the iTunes ecosystem. But it’s just bizarre. And Apple can’t be happy about it.

Rhapsody, essentially a rebranding of RealNetworks, has been a grand failure. It’s about as much of a threat to iTunes dominance as a mosquito is to King Kong. But Rob Glazer, the head of Real / Rhapsody / whatever it’s called now has long been a very public aggravating thorn in Apple’s side. And now Verizon is getting into bed with Real / Rhapsody at the same time it’s getting into bed with Apple? That’s just odd.

For Verizon to partner with dying Rhapsody would appear to be a poor business decision on its own merits. But doing so at a time when Verizon is courting Apple’s favor is doubly bizarre. In years past, a younger and more iconoclastic Steve Jobs might have pulled the plug on the entire Verizon iPhone over such an absurdly rude move by a potential partner. Will the Steve Jobs of 2011 see fit to look past this minor transgression on Verizon’s part and allow the Verizon iPhone to continue full steam ahead? We’re betting yes, but we’ll see. Here’s more on the Verizon iPhone.

Home stretch: why a Verizon iPhone and not rivals Sprint, T-Mobile

As U.S. iPhone exclusivity goes down for the count, the race to see which other carrier comes up with the iPhone first is in the home stretch and it’s become clear that the Verizon iPhone is set to be the winner ahead of either a Sprint iPhone or a T-Mobile iPhone. One of the three had to be first because, well, that’s just how Apple does things. If Apple had its way the iPhone would remain available on only one carrier per nation and it would use that exclusivity (and the threat of revocation) to whip that carrier into offering an Apple-like experience. But upon realizing that such a thing isn’t possible, at least here in the U.S., here comes the iPhone on a second carrier and it’s Verizon by at least a nose. In hindsight, here’s why the Verizon iPhone had to come first ahead of T-Mobile or Sprint, much as it’ll upset devotees of those two carriers:

Verizon is significantly larger than either T-Mobile or Sprint. That fact has to come first and foremost in any conversation on the matter. Expanding the iPhone to Verizon means more potential customers than expanding it to either (or perhaps even both) of the other two. It’s obvious, but there it is.

Verizon wants it. Badly. Don’t let all the Droid bluster fool you. Internal numbers from Verizon show that the iPhone is outselling the Droid by a jaw-dropping margin of 2.5 to 1, meaning that Verizon’s highly visible attempts to compete with the iPhone have been a flat out failure. While Sprint and T-Mobile have their niche markets for various reasons, Verizon is looking to play king of the world against AT&T – and without the iPhone it’ll never, ever happen. That means that Apple can get Verizon to capitulate to doing a Verizon iPhone on Apple’s terms.

T-Mobile and Sprint customers won’t want to hear this, but Apple is likely gambling that at least some of them, who rejected the idea of using an AT&T iPhone out of hand, may now be willing to settle for a Verizon iPhone instead. Even though study after study shows iPhone users to be very happy with AT&T, and Verizon and AT&T to have the same retention rates, those outside the AT&T customer base have a colossally negative opinion of the carrier. For whatever reason, despite being no better in any measurable capacity, Verizon benefits from a much better reputation. That means Apple has a shot at gaining the customers of three different carriers simply by releasing a Verizon iPhone and seeing how many Sprint and T-Mobile customers jump ship. Here’s more on Verizon iPhone.

Verizon iPhone second glance: exclusivity farce a fireable offense?

by Bill Palmer

With minutes to midnight on the Verizon iPhone countdown clock, it’s worth stopping to pose a vital query in hindsight. This is not about blame, as everyone, including every successful regime, makes their share of mistakes along the road to success. And this isn’t about a seeming lack of foresight, as no one can predict the future with anything approaching a full degree of accuracy. But if only so something can be learned and banked on for the next time around, here goes: With that original long term iPhone exclusivity deal with AT&T having been a quantifiable mistake even amidst the greater iPhone success story, just how much of a screw-up was this? Put another way: If Apple were being run by a less accomplished CEO, one without such a stunningly positive track record of getting so many things right year-in and year-out, would the lack of a Verizon iPhone these past four years be a fireable offense?

Before anyone goes off and willfully misinterprets that, let’s be clear. Steve Jobs is the most successful CEO of the past decade, easily, and is the odds-on favorite to retain that title in the next decade. No company has been more successful, and no executive has been more vital to that company’s success. That isn’t likely to change any time soon. But that said, imagine if Steve had retired five years ago and the 2007-ish decision to sign a deal to keep the iPhone out of the hands of close to three-fourths of U.S. consumers (unless they changed carriers) for as long as five years had instead been made by new CEO Phil Schiller. Or perhaps Tim Cook. Or some new CEO from outside the company. Heck, Apple just canned iPhone hardware boss Mark Papermaster, and while we still don’t know exactly what it was that got him tossed, it can’t have been as bad as the decision to throw away the majority of potential iPhone sales in the U.S. for a five year period for reasons which in hindsight are completely indecipherable. Not only would there be two to three times as many iPhone users in the U.S. right now, it’s doubtful that the competing Android OS would ever have gotten off the ground in any mainstream capacity (see Google’s other pet geek project, Chrome, for an example of just how tiny Android marketshare would likely be if the iPhone had launched on all four U.S. carriers simultaneously and three of them hadn’t been desperately searching for a counter measure). So the iPhone user base would be massively larger, hardware revenue (and app sales, music sales, etc) would be massively larger accordingly, and the iPhone’s biggest competition would the BlackBerry (which is withering of its own accord) and the always-struggling Windows Phone.

And yet one stupid executive decision later, and here we are with the two most oft-asked iPhone questions headed into 2011 being “When is the iPhone coming to Verizon?” and “What is iPhone going to do to fight off Android?”. Of course the answer to those two questions is one and the same, and the arrival of the Verizon iPhone will likely put the Android hype, which is still significantly overproportioned in comparison to actual Android sales, to bed at last. But if you’re an Apple shareholder, or someone who roots for Apple to do well, or an iPhone user who believes your experience will improve as the user base grows, ask yourself this: if it had been Apple CEO John P. Smith who had signed that absurd AT&T exclusivity contract to keep the iPhone off Verizon, Sprint, and T-Mobile for all these years instead of Apple CEO Steve Jobs, you’d probably be calling for his head by now. On the other hand, if the lack of a Verizon iPhone is the biggest screw-up of the second Jobs era (and it is), then that actually speaks volumes about just how well the rest of that era has gone. Here’s more on Verizon iPhone.

Verizon iPhone success could prompt Cingular rebirth as counter move

When Verizon took a pass on the iPhone back in the day, it wasn’t AT&T who scooped up U.S. exclusivity. Well, it was the same company. But back then it was known as Cingular. But around the time the iPhone was first showing its face to the public, Cingular picked up a new CEO, a new subsidiary, and the rights to the long dormant “AT&T” brand name, which it eventually adopted company wide. Many speculated at the time that the name change was made because Cingular had done such a fine job of earning a horrid reputation among the public that by changing its name, it would lure back clueless former customers who, by moving to “AT&T” after finding no luck with Verizon or Sprint, would have no idea they were going right back to the first carrier they dumped. In hindsight, the iPhone has been almost singularly (no pun intended) responsible for the rapid growth of Cingular/AT&T, not the name of the carrier. But just as the new name arrived with the rise of the iPhone, don’t be shocked if the AT&T brand name once again disappears just as the Verizon iPhone makes its debut.

There’s no inside information here, no secret memos, nothing rising to the level of TMZ or WikiLeaks here. Instead there’s just the cold hard logic of it: the company formerly known as Cingular has spent the past four years running the AT&T brand name into the ground reputation-wise, and with iPhone users in the U.S. about to have a choice of whom get their iPhones from, AT&T is going to need an edge in combating the temptation among existing iPhone users to go running to Verizon – if not now then in a year or two, once the service contracts of existing iPhone users begin to expire en masse. And if AT&T can’t be bothered make any actual improvements to its services and offerings (why start now?), then a name change might be the company’s best strategy. After all, at a time when everyone is hearing about the iPhone expanding to additional U.S. carriers anyway, why not become Cingular again? After, no company named “Cingular” has ever sold the iPhone, meaning that those T-Mobile and Sprint customers who want an iPhone but have been avoiding AT&T (and don’t care much for Verizon either) might well be confused into buying a “Cingular iPhone” because, hey, at least it’s not AT&T. No consumer should be that foolish or misinformed. But if history has shown us anything, plenty of them are. Just take a measure of how few consumers are aware that the company currently known as “AT&T” used to be Cingular. Here’s more on Verizon iPhone.

Verizon iPhone to see six degrees of 2011 tech story permeation

by Bill Palmer

The most-written technology headline written in 2011 can be summed up in two words: Verizon iPhone. Here are six degrees of permeation the nation’s most popular carrier and most popular smartphone will pass through on their way to becoming for the year’s most popular tech story.

Countdown: From the minute the clock strikes 2011, the Verizon iPhone launch is a potential go. As is customary, expect more details to leak as the launch grows nearer.

Pre-announcement: Every Apple press event gets announced at least a week ahead of time. Except the invitations to include some giveaway phrase which makes it clear that the event will see the announcement of the Verizon iPhone, but will do so in just vague enough of a manner so as to make that last week extra juicy.

The event: How will Steve Jobs and company spend a full hour or more introducing the Verizon iPhone at a press event? “Here’s the Verizon iPhone. It’s an iPhone which works on Verizon.” Ten seconds down, fifty-nine plus minutes to go. In other words, there will be much more to the Verizon iPhone launch event than just the Verizon iPhone. So even the biggest non-surprise of the year will come with bonus surprises.

The count-up: Between the announcement and on-sale date of the Verizon iPhone, expect the bulk of Verizon customers to make it clear that they intend to buy one, triggering public online meltdowns on the part of geek Droid fanatics, along the lines of the meltdowns the geeks had right around the time the iPad was launching. In fact, expect some of those meltdowns to come from the exact same geeks as last time. Except instead of being shocked and repulsed that the iPad was a mainstream hit, this time they’ll be shocked and terrified that the Verizon iPhone is set to wipe out mainstream Droid marketshare in about five minutes. Everyone will have seen it coming but them.

The denouement: Verizon customers will get their iPhone home and brag about it until they realize it’s the same iPhone experience AT&T customers have had since 2007. Then they’ll feel a big collective letdown over their own stubborn refusal to join the party sooner.

The sideways glance forward: Verizon customers are joining the iPhone platform half a year into a generational cycle, which means that both the ones who jump on board with the first Verizon iPhone offering and those who decide to wait for the next new iPhone generation before taking the plunge will have one eye firmly focused on the future before they even download their first app.

Here’s more on the Verizon iPhone.

When Verizon iPhone doubles marketshare, analysts will choke on words

Almost no one is going to buy a Verizon iPhone unless they’re already using an iPhone, claim pundits who are clearly high on something. Here’s what’s actually going to happen: Verizon customers, who’ve been stubbornly holding for the iPhone for as long as it’s existed, will line up in droves, literally, on the first day the Verizon iPhone is available. AT&T customers, who’ve been using the iPhone going back to 2007, will mostly stay put. With Verizon about as large as AT&T, it’s easily conceivable that the arrival of the iPhone on the other side of that impenetrable cellular wall will result in the iPhone seeing its U.S. marketshare double by the time it fully saturates itself among Verizon customers, leaving analysts who are predicting the converse to choke on their own words. In the mean time, with what little time is left before the Verizon iPhone rolls, it’s worth analyzing why the analysts have got it so wrong.

The theory analysts are clinging to says that nearly everyone who’s ever going to buy an iPhone has done so by now. But that theory assumes that nearly every consumer values having the phone they want over using the carrier they prefer, which any formal or informal survey of Verizon, Sprint, or T-Mobile customers will quickly disprove. Earned or not, AT&T has a special kind of bad reputation among much of the populace. Even as most iPhone users profess to have little or no issues using their iPhone with AT&T, users of the other three carriers are simply unwilling or unable to believe them. Many of AT&T’s haters will point to customer service horror stories of years past, rather than any real evidence of network or call quality issues, as they reason why they’ll “never” become an AT&T customer under any circumstances. Intriguingly, some of those haters have referenced their own first-hand experiences with AT&T from a decade or more ago, when AT&T was primarily a long distance landline provider whose makeup bears almost no resemblance to the AT&T of today, calling into question the sageness of the carrier’s 2007 switch from the Cingular name back to AT&T. In any case, with so many Verizon, Sprint, and T-Mobile customers unwilling to go anywhere near AT&T, iPhone or otherwise, it’s clear that a Verizon iPhone will see significant sales from the Verizon customer base right out of the gate, as the product currently has an unprecedented level of pent up demand.

With the iPhone going to Verizon in early 2011 but apparently not going to Sprint or T-Mobile, the real question is not whether the Verizon iPhone will hurt AT&T, which as the iPhone, but whether the Verizon iPhone will lure customers away from the other two carriers. How many Sprint and T-Mobile customers, who’ve been avoiding the iPhone because they can’t live with AT&T, will suddenly decide that they can in fact live with Verizon once the Verizon iPhone hits the market? These are the angles analysts should be focusing on, rather inexplicably pimping the notion that everyone with an interest in the iPhone has already switched to AT&T and bought one. Here’s more on the Verizon iPhone.

Star Wars: Verizon iPhone as nerdy and science-fictionish as Droid?

The Verizon iPhone will be a mainstream smartphone best marketed to mainstream (non-geek) consumers, just as has always been the case with the existing iPhone. But with Verizon’s penchant for running TV ads for its own Droid smartphones which are nothing short of one long geek-pander episode, one has to wonder whether Verizon will be able to develop the mainstream chops to market the Verizon iPhone effectively. To large extent, the mere fact that Verizon is offering the iPhone will be enough to drive sales, as Verizon customers have been waiting years for this and they know what an iPhone is and does despite however Verizon ultimately chooses to market it. But with Verizon’s smartphone TV ads up to this point having been along the lines of “Please don’t buy this unless you’re a technology geek,” you have to wonder. After all, this is the carrier which named its flagship in-house smartphone after a Star Wars character. Can you get any more nerdy and science-fictionish than that?

Then again, it wasn’t Verizon who came up with the “Android” name in the first place. And it’s possible that Verizon’s marketing department, upon realizing that the Android-based phone they were selling was based on an open-source operating system unsuitable for anyone but science fiction nerds, decided to go ahead and play the motif to the max. The Droid, by virtue of the operating system Verizon adopted for it, was only ever going to appeal to geeks and tinkerers anyway. So why even try to market it to anyone else? In fact, after spending about five minutes back in 2009 attempting to promote the Droid as an iPhone competitor (by name), Verizon backed off and instead started running ads full of Star Wars-like sound effects and science fiction-themed CGI graphics, as if to say “this phone is for geeks and we know it.” It’s almost as if Verizon didn’t realize that, even with the Droid only being suitable for geeks, it would still sell to non-geeks who were simply looking for the closest pseudo-iPhone on Verizon’s roster.

Hmm. It’s clear in hindsight that Verizon marketed the Droid in a very self-limiting and self-defeating manner, and yet did well with it anyway (in terms of sales, if not nearly so well in terms of user satisfaction). Verizon’s first rough draft at an iPhone ad has come in the form of its iPad ad, which steers far away from science fiction nerdiness and instead attempts to be Apple-esque: a laid back non-geek consumer sitting casually, with a largely white background. Then again, the ad does ultimately show a guy sitting in his living room on a five dollar plastic patio chair, so Verizon isn’t so much capturing that Apple cool factor so much as attempt to emulate something it doesn’t fully understand. But at least Verizon appears to understand that “For the geeks, by the geeks” science fiction sound effects and other such nerdy foolishness are no way to market an Apple product, which suggests that Verizon will at least attempt to market the Verizon iPhone as the mainstream product it is, as opposed to the Star Wars derivative nerd-phone which nerds already irrevocably despise it for not being.

Verizon iPhone a done deal and soon, say four insider clinchers

The Verizon iPhone is a done deal for early 2011, say these four insider clinchers which could each be explained away separately but when combined paint a picture of an Verizon launch being the next iPhone news Apple serves up once the clock strikes 2011. Here are the big four.

Verizon has a secret: When you’ve got a secret you want to share but aren’t allowed to, you start dropping every increasingly obvious hint you can, in the hopes others will put two and two together. The mere fact that Verizon has TV a TV ad for the iPad is over the top. The fact that the ad is in heavy rotation is a desperate teletype from the carrier to its customers: “We’ve got the Verizon iPhone on the way, we just can’t tell you about it. Hang in with us a little longer, no need to switch to the iPhone carrier, because we’re about to become an iPhone carrier. Why else would we be running all these ads just to announce that we’re now one of dozens of retailers who resell the iPad? We’re giving you the strongest hint we can, without actually breaking whatever secret vows we’re under.”

AT&T doth protest too much: When you know that bad news about you is about to drop, you go into overtime trying to convince everyone around you that you’re fine. In doing so, you often telegraph what that impending bad news is. For AT&T, the bad news is that it’s about to have to start sharing the iPhone with Verizon. And the pre-emptive “I’m fine” assurances are coming in the form of TV ads for the new AT&T BlackBerry, the new AT&T Windows Phone 7, and before it’s all said and done, we’ll probably see ads for the new AT&T Zune as well. AT&T wants you to know it’ll be fine in the Verizon iPhone era. Apparently, it doesn’t mind being the one to inform you that the Verizon iPhone era is coming.

Motorola thinks it’s AT&T: Same story as above, except with Motorola playing the role of AT&T, the mouth of Motorola’s CEO taking the place of AT&T’s TV ads, and the Verizon iPhone being the big bad news for the company which manufactures some of the iPhone’s top Verizon-based competitors. If you want double confirmation, the interchangeability of the actions of AT&T and Motorola at the moment seals it.

The future is long: Apple doesn’t comment on future, potential, unannounced products. Except when it sometimes makes a point of announcing what it won’t be bringing to market, so as to steer attention back to the path the company is actually on. And yet every time Apple has the chance to make it clear to U.S. consumers that it has no intention of doing a Verizon iPhone any time soon, it declines to, even though such a definitive statement would surely motivate at least some Verizon holdouts to go ahead and switch to AT&T and buy an iPhone. If Apple could truthfully make a dismissive statement about a Verizon iPhone, it would certainly do so. Instead, when Apple is asked directly about the matter, Steve Jobs says things like “the future is long.” The clear cut conclusion is that he’s declining to dismiss the possibility of a Verizon iPhone because doing so wouldn’t be an honest statement. In other words, well, you do the math.

Original sins: Verizon iPhone and other goofs Apple was slow to correct

iPhone perfection? Nah. Why so long to fix the most obvious complaints, and just where is that Verizon iPhone already. The iPhone got so many things right from the start that it revolutionized the entire cellular industry and (despite continual unsubstantiated claims otherwise) dominates the smartphone market. But ask iPhone users (or non-users) whether they think the device is perfect, and they’ll instead rattle off a typically short yet biting list of original sins which Apple got wrong off the bat and then took too long to fix or still hasn’t. Here are the most popular iPhone sins, which may or may not be in any particular order, depending on your point of view.

Verizon iPhone: If you build it, they will come to AT&T, or so Apple must have thought. Some did. Some have made it clear by now that they never will. Four years later, Apple is just now finally about to fix the Verizon iPhone sin, orso we think. That’ll still leave the Sprint iPhone sin and the T-mobile sin, but there’s always the year after.

Orientation lock: Many early iPhone users were downright dizzy thanks to a hyper active autorotation and no way to turn it off. After three years of this generally being the number one complaint among existing iPhone users, Apple finally grudgingly added the option to turn the cursed thing off, but only through a buried five step process. Apple’s sin here is that it’s still too proud of its autorotation, being almost as averse to an autorotation-free iPhone as it is to a Verizon iPhone.

Email: The iPhone has had a great email client from the start, so long as you only had one email address. Having two email accounts on your iPhone was a downright nightmare. Thankfully, Apple fixed this sin fully with the release of iOS 4.

Backseat: Verizon iPhone feature list secondary to release date

Verizon junkies who’ve been waiting for the Verizon iPhone dating back to 2007 are about as interested in specific features as the guy who’s gone a week without water is interested in which flavor of beverage ultimately gets handed to him. In each case, the details of the desired arrival take a significant backseat to the timing of said arrival.” Give me water, or orange juice, or vodka,” says the man dying of thirst, “whatever you’ve got the most handy.” Similarly, the Verizon customer who is still waiting for any taste of the iPhone as the calendar turns over to 2011 isn’t typically interested in whether or not it comes with 4G networking, for instance. That would be nice, but really, none of the four iPhones to market have had 4G, and said Verizon customers would have gladly scooped up any of them if they’d been offered through their carrier of choice.

So what are Verizon customers looking for when it comes to the iPhone? A release date, of course. “We don’t care about specs, we won’t be picky about whether it’s black or white,” say desperate Verizon customers. “We don’t even care if it’s just a retread of the iPhone model that’s already been on the market since mid 2010. We’ll take what you’ve got.”

Of course that all changes once the Verizon iPhone actually has a release date. Once the primary needs are attended to, the secondary needs invariably come rushing back. And once Verizon’s customer base begins converting themselves into iPhone users next year, they’ll be able to then join existing iPhone users in being totally spoiled about what they have and in demanding Apple deliver ever more with the next iPhone model. Just as surely as the guy whose thirst has been cured suddenly remembers what his favorite beverage is shortly thereafter.

Verizon iPhone mistake will be confirmed by Android tablet flops

by Bill Palmer

The forthcoming flop of the various Android-powered tablets will be good-news bad-news for Apple, as it’ll finally deliver proof positive that no one outside the geekdom ever cared about the Android platform in the first place, but it’ll also prove just what a devastating mistake Apple made when it opted to pass on a Verizon iPhone, T-Mobile iPhone, and Sprint iPhone back in 2007 in favor of giving the iPhone exclusively to one U.S. carrier.

Even with the iPhone slowly and steadily putting the BlackBerry to bed in terms of marketshare, the Android platform has arisen this past year for reasons that seemingly make no sense: it’s an inferior operating system aimed at geeks instead of the mainstream, with an inferior app store, running on an assortment of clunky jalopy hardware, making for a fragmented developer scene and a scattered accessory market. Other than the uber-geeks who of course flocked to the Android the moment it landed, there’s really no reason why any non-geek consumer would even consider buying an Android phone over the iPhone. Except, of course, that Android phones are available on Verizon, Sprint, and T-Mobile, while the iPhone isn’t.

Geeks have spent 2010 squawking about how the rise of Android proves that the iPhone is a flash on the pan, or that geek-oriented products are back in style after all, or however they want to conveniently misinterpret what’s played out in the past year. Nevermind that consumer satisfaction and loyalty surveys show the iPhone to be infinitely more popular than the Android. Nevermind that grabbing any ten non-geek Android users off the street will result in finding nine of them who will admit they’d rather be on an iPhone but aren’t willing to leave Verizon or their current carrier. For the geeks, having spent the decade watching nearly all their control over consumer technology slip away, the Android represents their battle of the bulge. After the flops of various geek-themed products like Linux and the Zune, and the overwhelming rise of consumer-themed products like the iPod and iPhone and iPad, the Android movement is all they have left. And that’s about to get crushed.

All one has to do is to look at the iPad’s forthcoming Android-based competitors to see that they’re destined to flop as badly as the Zune, as badly as the Dell DJ, as badly as the Sony NW-HD1, as badly as any geek-oriented product over the past decade. Android phones have been the only exception, the only geek-themed product in the past decade which hasn’t been a flop or an embarrassingly small niche of a product. And once Android tablets all flop, it’ll show there to have never been mainstream interest in the Android platform to begin with – finally proving that the lack of a Verizon iPhone was the real reason Android phones like the Verizon Droid ever saw substantial sales at all. And while seeing proof positive that its primary competing platform has been a paper tiger all along will be good news for Apple, it’ll also serve to show the world just how much more dominating the iPhone could be right now if it had been available on all four U.S. carriers from the start. The lack of a Verizon iPhone is the single biggest mistake of the second Steve Jobs era, and 2011 will be interesting as we watch him correct his mistake four years late and attempt to get away with it.

Months out, Verizon iPhone continues to be thorn in Apple’s side

Verizon is the reason the iPhone doesn’t have majority marketshare among smartphones in the U.S. Verizon is the primary reason the iPhone’s primary competitor, the Android, has anything beyond the niche status it was always marked for. And Verizon is, in the mind of Apple Store employees, by now a four letter word, the one you can’t speak in their presence without seeing their faces turn red. And with good reason, as questions relating to the “Verizon iPhone” are what they hear all day, and those words almost always mean they’re not making a sale, at least not for a few more months – which they can’t even officially inform the customer of…

“I want to buy an iPhone.”

Great. Which model, the 16 GB or 32 GB?

“The one for Verizon.”

The iPhone only works with AT&T.

“But I heard there’s a Verizon iPhone now. I read about it in the…”

Those are just rumors.

“But I was just up at the food court, and the cashier was saying…”

[Begins to wonder if there are jobs available in the food court]

“But I really love Verizon, and I’d rather slit my wrists than leave Verizon…”

[Begins to wonder which iPhone model would be the most apt for using to slit his own wrists]

“Seriously, can’t you just tell me when the Verizon iPhone is coming?”

Well, you did read about it in the…

—–

By all accounts there will be a Verizon iPhone in the first half of next year. And in the mean time Apple is moving record setting numbers of iPhone units to people who aren’t in love with Verizon (or Sprint or T-Mobile, for that matter). But in the mean time, the lack of a Verizon iPhone is not only the worst nightmare of every super-loyal Verizon customers who drools over the iPhone from a afar, it’s every Apple Store employee’s worst nightmare as well.

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