iPhone 5 June release date means upgrade fiasco for AT&T, Verizon users

by Bill Palmer

The iPhone 5 will see its release date in June, according to too many sources to count at this point. And while that’s good news for those who have been hoping the new iPhone would arrive sooner than later, it brings a whole new round of upgrade eligibility issues for Verizon and AT&T customers who are already in the iPhone family. AT&T’s policies allow iPhone users to become eligible for upgrade pricing either twelve or eighteen months after their last iPhone purchase, depending on a complicated formula which includes factors such as the size of your monthly bill and the last time you made a late payment. The iPhone 4S arrived late last year, meaning that by June of 2012 it’ll only have been on the market for eight to nine months. For the first time ever, literally no one in the United States who bought the current iPhone will be able to buy the iPhone 5 on its release date for advertised pricing. The story doesn’t get any better for Verizon customers…

The Verizon iPhone 4 launched in the spring of 2011, eight months after its AT&T iPhone 4 counterpart. Verizon’s standard upgrade eligibility policy is at twenty months, meaning that no one who bought the iPhone 4 or the iPhone 4S from Verizon will be able to buy the iPhone 5 at standard pricing when it launches either. So just who will be buying the iPhone 5 on its release date? That group will consist of AT&T iPhone 4 users who bought early enough to be upgrade eligible by this summer, iPhone 3GS users who arguably should have upgraded awhile ago, and those BlackBerry and Android users who’ve decided to make the switch but have been waiting for the iPhone 5 to land before making the jump. Those who bought an iPhone 4S at launch, or who bought the iPhone 4 late enough in the game that they won’t be eligible either, will be facing a financial fiasco when it comes to the iPhone 5…

The simplest move is to simply stick with what they have. Apple typically releases its new iPhone system software for free to users of the previous two generations, and if history holds up, most of the new software features will work on the iPhone 4S while some of them will be enabled on the slower iPhone 4. So those users who aren’t upgrade eligible will at least be able to partake in some of Apple’s new circa-2012 iPhone features. Another move is to wait until upgrade eligibility arrives and then pounce on the iPhone 5. It won’t be on launch day, but it’ll happen at some point during the iPhone 5 era for all existing iPhone users. The aggressive play is to buy the iPhone 5 on its release date and pay the $200-$250 overage fee, but then sell your existing iPhone in an online auction where it’ll fetch way more than its sticker price and more than cover the overage fee (for instance, an iPhone 4 still sells for more than $300 on eBay). Finally, there’s the play in which you call up AT&T or Verizon and threaten to switch to the other unless they move up your eligibility date to match the release date of the iPhone 5. We’ve seen it work, so long as you’re not more than a few months away from being upgrade eligible to begin with. Here’s more on the iPhone 5.

iPhone 5 release date makes for Verizon-AT&T showdown, Sprint wildcard

by Bill Palmer

If the iPhone 4S was the first time U.S. carriers had to fight for iPhone users’ loyalties, then the iPhone 5 release date represents a shift from that fight into an all out blitzkrieg. At present, Verizon is promoting itself as having the most reliable network for iPhone, while AT&T is pushing the fact that you can talk and use the internet on your iPhone at the same time even as Sprint touts its unlimited iPhone data plan offerings. But the iPhone 5 is set to bring a new round of items for the carriers to fight over as it delivers a host of new features. Chief among them will be 4G LTE networking. The iPhone 5 will likely be the first smartphone to employ next-gen 4G LTE antennas which offer solid battery life in contrast with the fast-draining competing LTE phones currently on the market. But as of the iPhone 5 release, each of the three largest carriers will be in its own place when it comes to building out their nationwide 4G LTE networks…

Verizon is clearly in the lead with 4G LTE, having erected towers in most major cities but still needing to blanket suburbs and rural areas. AT&T is significantly behind, still touting its 4G LTE buildout based on the number of cities it’s put towers in with no mention of just how small a percentage of the overall population that might cover. Sprint is currently in last place in the 4G LTE wars, having been using a competing (much slower) form of 4G up to now and needing to start from scratch with 4G LTE. But fans of Sprint are quick to point out that the carrier tends to do more to try to please its customers (witness the unlimited data offerings and generally lower cost voice plans), so it’s conceivable that Sprint could surpass the generally lethargic AT&T during the 4G LTE buildout. So what does this all have to do with the iPhone 5?

The fifth generation iPhone will finally and officially usher in the 4G LTE revolution. The current state of 4G LTE, in which some users have bought enabled phones but most complain about absurdly short battery life and many have no idea they’re not even getting a 4G LTE signal, will give way to the iPhone LTE era in which battery life is fine and tens of millions of LTE users are added to the map within a matter of days of the device’s release date. The carriers who’ve done well with the 4G LTE buildout up to that point will be sure to market themselves as such when it comes to the iPhone 5. Those carriers which are behind in the LTE wars by that time will need to find something else with which to entice iPhone buyers to choose them. Here’s more on the iPhone 5.

Verizon wireless plans to charge a $2 fee to pay your monthly bill

by Dennis Morehouse

Verizon has announced its intention to begin charging customers a two dollar monthly fee for the privilege of paying their bill online or over the phone. The move, which is already being widely decried by Verizon customers across social networks like Twitter and Facebook, appears to be aimed at steering customers toward mailing a check each month or setting up automated bill pay – or may simply be aimed at getting its hands an extra two bucks per customer. The move on Verizon’s part is the latest in a series of nearly mandatory “optional” fees being imposed on customers following the airlines’ collective attempt to make checked bag fees stick (successful) and Bank of America’s attempt to charge five dollars per month on most customers who use a debit card (since retracted).

The move is also the second attempt on Verizon’s part in the past half-year at getting more for less, as the carrier brought an end to unlimited monthly data plans for new smartphone customers in the third quarter of 2011, instead steering new customers to limited monthly plans which cost nearly as much as the unlimited. Rival carrier AT&T brought an end to its unlimited data plans in 2010, and last week began actively haranguing its existing unlimited data users into moving to limited plans by throttling their data if their monthly usage approaches even the top tier of its limited plans. No word on whether AT&T or fellow carriers Sprint and T-Mobile intend to charge customers a fee for paying their monthly bill. In the mean time, suddenly-disgruntled Verizon customers appear to be intent on raising as much of a ruckus on the social networks as possible in the hopes of pushing Verizon into backing down.

Verizon began offering the iPhone in early 2010 and attempted to position itself as the superior U.S. iPhone carrier choice over original iPhone carrier AT&T. However, Verizon’s subsequent moves, including limiting data plans and today’s new monthly bill pay fee, may be leaving iPhone users wondering where to turn and whether Sprint’s new promise of unlimited monthly iPhone data may be a viable alternative.

iPhone 4S rescues Sprint for now as Verizon, AT&T watch unlimited data

by Johnny Major

Sprint says today’s iPhone 4S launch was the biggest in the company’s history – and it reached that mark by noon. Suddenly the carrier, which was beleaguered and in financial danger just a couple weeks ago, is now riding high after a mere few hours of being an iPhone retailer. There’s still plenty that’s tentative about the company’s position, as carriers tend to lose money on subsidized phone sales in the hopes of getting it back through monthly payments during the course of the device’s life. Now Sprint just has to hope that the monthly money shows up fast enough from its legions of new iPhone customers in order to right the company’s financial ship. Meanwhile the the iPhone’s other partners, AT&T and Verizon, are watching closely. While AT&T jettisoned its unlimited monthly data plans for all but its longest of longtime customers and Verizon only allowed a limited number of iPhone 4 buyers under the unlimited data tent before zipping it up, Sprint is (for now) offering unlimited monthly data to all of its customers including its legions of new iPhone 4S buyers…

Sprint is gambling that it can provide a superior iPhone experience over its larger rivals by offering unlimited data usage, lower monthly voice and text pricing plans, and what many of its customers claim is superior customer service. Sprint must not only use the iPhone 4S to retain its existing customers who have in some instances been changing carriers to get the iPhone, it must also lure longtime iPhone users away from its rivals if it hopes to grow (clearly the EVO and Sprint’s other Android based phones weren’t making that happen, just as the Droid wasn’t driving growth for Verizon; both are now essentially betting the company on the addition of the iPhone). For now it’s not clear what percentage of initial iPhone 4S sales are going to which carrier. AT&T reported more than two hundred thousand iPhone 4S preorders in the first twelve hours, and Apple reported more than a million among all carriers combined in the first twenty-four; the math won’t line up until all three carriers report iPhone 4S sales (and for that matter the now sub-$100 iPhone 4) sales across the same timeframe. But for now it appears a rising tide can indeed float all boats, at least in terms of hardware sales.

Updated with additional information on the Sprint iPhone launch

2 weeks out: iPhone 5 release date event is in 14 days, says Apple rep

by Bill Palmer

The long (inter)national iPhone 5 release date nightmare is fourteen days away from being over, according to an Apple employee who’s speaking out of turn. Along with it will come answers on the iPhone 5 feature set, the iPhone 4S sidekick issue, and final word on whether Sprint will be joining Verizon and AT&T among the iPhone 5 ranks for launch day. Apple’s official policy regarding unannounced products is “What iPhone 5?” until further notice, but one staffer is nonetheless claiming that the launch event for the big iPhone 5 announcement is a mere two weeks out. Assuming the event isn’t being held on a Monday, that points to October 4th or 5th for the event. Apple once consistently had its events on Tuesdays, but has since branched out to Wednesdays as well. There’s never a way to absolutely confirm that what an employee thinks they know is in fact what’s really secretly in the cards. But this news is a ray of light amid a week in which various claims have pegged the iPhone 5 being buried in manufacturing hell and not surfacing until next year. So for the sake of that hope, here’s a look at how things will play out between now and the release date if the announcement really is two weeks from now…

One week from now, Apple will announce a media event and send out press invites. Nothing will be said in advance as to what the event is about, but the images and catch phrase on the invite will subtly hint that it’s the iPhone 5 so that the correct journalists show up, as opposed to if this were the launch of a new iMac. The event will then be held on the 4th or 5th, and if Apple’s recent tradition holds true, will be live-broadcast over the internet in an effort to get Apple’s message directly to mainstream consumers without being entirely filtered through the tech media. Tim Cook will see his first action in an Apple product launch event, as dodging the stage entirely would lead to “Where’s Tim?” questions which would only build up otherwise. But don’t expect Cook to emcee the event; Apple VP Phil Schiller, who’s spent years playing the foil in Steve Jobs’ press events, will likely serve as grand master. Jobs could pull a shocker and play a small role himself, either because he wants to prove to investors that he’s still in good health or because he believes the iPhone 5 is too important to not participate in the launch. But regardless, the event will mark the first official bit of publicly visible insight into the new-look Apple management team in action. Several questions regarding the iPhone 5 will be answered in that sub-two-hour stretch…

The actual release date for the iPhone 5 will be one of the last things announced. The new iOS 5 interface will get a long demo from a number of Apple employees, showing off new features which hadn’t been debuted when iOS 5 was first previewed this summer. Then comes the iPhone 5 hardware unveil, along with the big “killer feature” upon which Apple will build its marketing campaign. That could be anything from 4G LTE networking to a larger screen to an outside the box feature (see FaceTime with the iPhone 4 launch). Then comes the breakdown of the rest of the specs, followed by the pricing. If Sprint is indeed joining the iPhone team, expect Dan Hesse on stage to talk about how glad his carrier is to be finally offering the iPhone. Verizon’s CEO may also get an appearance, as the Verizon iPhone 4 launch in March means that Verizon has yet to get a shot at being a part of one of Apple’s official iPhone announcement events. Once the event ends, the real fun begins…

Apple typically spans about two and a half weeks from new iPhone announcement to release date, so expect Friday October 21st as the most likely on-sale target. If there’s sufficient initial inventory to allow it, online preorders will begin about a week before that date, but may be cut off quickly if demand proves to be so high that the preorders risk cutting into retail launch day inventory. Then on the 21st (or the night before, if Apple opts for an early morning launch), lines will form at retailers ranging from Apple Stores and carrier stores to electronics stores like Radio Shack and Best Buy, and we’ll soon find out just how much iPhone 5 inventory Apple really has on hand. Here’s more on the iPhone 5.

iPhone 4 antenna issues not nearly as real as Verizon Droid 2 antenna issues

Remember the supposed iPhone 4 “antenna issue” that turned out to be affecting virtually no one and was revealed to have been little more than a manufactured controversy on the part of geek tech pundits who favor Verizon’s Droid platform over the iPhone? That particular stunt turns out to have backfired in the worst way imaginable for Droid fanatics, as it turns out the new Droid 2 does in fact have major antenna and reception issues – none of which are related to how you hold it.

Whereas the entirety of the iPhone 4 “antennagate” controversy was that you could get the signal strength to slightly reduce if you purposely held it with a specific finger pattern (in other words, only if you were intentionally trying to reduce your signal strength for the sake of generating headlines), it turns out the Droid 2 can’t keep a consistent antenna signal even when you’re not touching it at all. Reports from TechCrunch, Engadget, Apple Insider, et al, reveal the Droid 2 to suffer from “endlessly fluctuating bar counts” when it comes to antenna signal strength. Apple CEO Steve Jobs offered data which shows that a user can slightly reduce the signal strength of any cellphone (including all of the iPhone’s smartphone competitors) by working to identify a weak spot and then purposely grabbing it by the weak spot, which only served to underline the fact that it’s not a “defect” if it’s something you have to be purposely trying to make go wrong. But these widespread reports of the Verizon Droid 2 having antenna and reception issues of their own accord, as opposed to a “problem” that has to be manipulated in order to occur, suggest that the Droid 2 is in for a level of controversy ten times that which the iPhone 4 faced over its minor, not-actually-affecting-anyone antenna controversy of last month.

But then again, let’s not forget that the iPhone 4 antenna controversy was started by Gizmodo, who had just seen one of its editors’ houses raided by the police after the publication came into possession of an iPhone 4 prototype. And let’s not forget that tech journalists in general come from a place of hardcore geekdom such that they despise Apple’s consumer-first philosophy even if they use Apple products themselves. And let’s not look past the fact that the Verizon Droid is based on the geek-oriented anarchist Android platform, which was developed by Google, a company which is every bit as much pro-geek and anti-consumer as Apple is pro-consumer and anti-geek. In other words, the iPhone 4 antenna controversy happened because the people who were in a position to make it happen see Apple as a threat to their continued way of geek-oriented life, and some of them just couldn’t resist the opportunity to try to taint the iPhone 4 in the eyes of the public, even if it meant destroying their own credibility in the process.

To their credit, several geek-oriented publications are at least having the guts to report on the Droid 2 antenna problems. But seeing how these appear to be actual antenna problems as opposed to the iPhone’s imaginary ones, we’ll see whether the geekdom now does the right thing by making it clear to the public that this is in fact a real problem whereas the last one they hyped up was something they invented. Something says it’s doubtful that the geek press will make such a hype-fest out of the Droid 2 antenna issues that Verizon’s CEO will have to call a press conference and explain to the world what’s really going on, but perhaps we should give the geek tech press the benefit of the doubt before assuming that they’ll do the wrong thing. In any case, here’s why Verizon’s future lies not with the Droid but with the Verizon iPhone.

iPhone iOS 4.0.2 update out-trends Droid 2 despite Verizon paid placement

On the day Verizon decided to invest major money in getting “Droid 2″ listed as a promoted trending topic on Twitter, Apple managed to upstage the campaign simply by releasing a very minor software update for its iPhone – which caused the iPhone’s “iOS” operating system to reach the trending topics list due to popularity of discussion rather than paid placement. It’s highly doubtful that Apple timed the release of the iOS 4.0.2 update (yes, it’s a mere x.x.2 release and it’s still trending) merely to upstage Verizon’s Twitter advertising campaign for the Droid 2, but it’s worked out that way anyway. Because paid-for trending topics are placed below the naturally popular trending topics, “iOS” is currently two spots above “Droid 2″ on the list. Of course neither has managed to upstage pop culture topics like “Scott Pilgrim” or cultural occurrences like “Ramadan” on today’s trending topics list. But the list does go to show that regardless of marketshare numbers (and for the record, the iPhone is still winning the marketshare numbers over the entire combined Android platform handily), the iPhone is the only smartphone that anyone outside the geekdom that anyone in the mainstream actually cares about enough to care about one way or the other.

As far as the timing, Verizon has to be cursing its bad luck; paying for “Droid 2″ to be a “promoted” trending topic was a hard stab at invading Apple’s territory, as any time Apple makes a major iPhone related announcement, it’s commonplace for eight or nine of the top ten trending topics to be something Apple-related on that day. Not only did Verizon have to give Twitter major money just to get the new Droid attached to the bottom of the list, it got upstaged by an insignificant iPhone software update to boot.

Interestingly enough, one of the inclusions in the minor iPhone iOS update is a patch aimed at continuing to force hackers known as “jailbreakers” off the iPhone platform; the geeks who “jailbreak” their iPhone are probably the only iPhone users who would be better off with a Droid instead.

Why Verizon? iPhone outselling Droid and all Moto phones combined

The iPhone needs Verizon compatibility in order to keep up with the rapidly ascending Droid and the rest of the Android platform, the claim goes. The iPhone’s AT&T exclusivity is causing Verizon customers, even if they would prefer the iPhone, to settle for an Android-based phone available from Verizon instead, the headlines proclaim. But the sales numbers say different. Not only is the iPhone outselling Motorola’s Droid line of phones according to the latest sales numbers, the iPhone is single-handedly outselling all of Motorola’s phones combined, says Apple Insider. In fact, the big picture numbers say that since the iPhone launched three years ago, Motorola’s total number of phones sold has plummeted, thus painting the current success of the Droid and Droid X as perhaps a mere anomaly for a company whose fortunes in the cellphone industry have been dwindling for years.

And before you go blaming Motorola’s misfortunes on the bad economy, the company is now selling a mere one-fifth as many cellphones as it was selling back when the iPhone first launched. With death-spiral numbers like that, it begs the question of just what Verizon was thinking when it chose a flagging partner like Motorola to build its flagship Droid line of phones. The move suggests Verizon was in a panic to come up with an iPhone competitor of any kind, even if that meant saddling up with a dying company like Motorola. It also strongly suggests that Verizon knew the Droid thing wouldn’t be a permanent one, more aimed at forcing Apple to bring the iPhone to the bargaining table under terms that favored Verizon more than they favored Apple itself.

While the Droid is far from the only Android-based phone on the market, Verizon has spent more than a year positioning the phone as its most visible flagship product. But even with all that effort, the iPhone is outselling the Droid and every other Motorola phone combined. It makes you wonder why Verizon isn’t pushing harder to get its hands on the iPhone than it is – or perhaps that’s exactly what’s going on behind the scenes.

iPhone 4: why Droid users are bailing in favor of it, Verizon or not

If we’ve learned anything this past week, it’s that some folks will go to any length to misguidedly try to help the prospects their favorite technology product. Hard data from a major research firm (which the firm itself has since amusingly attempted to downplay the significance of) shows that current Android users are overwhelmingly lined up to bail from the platform when they go to buy their next iPhone. The data doesn’t show which phone those users will end up with next, but common sense says that most people who’ve bought an Android phone to date have done so because they wanted an iPhone but couldn’t get one from their current carrier so they settled for the closest thing that Verizon (Droid) or Sprint (EVO) had to offer.

But lost in the disturbing fanaticism from the most fervent of Android fanatics, some of whom have shown they’re even willing to make death threats in an attempt to intimidate journalists out of doing their jobs, is the fact that most Android users are perfectly well balanced people who just happened to buy a certain phone that also happens to be championed by a disturbed crowd. One current Android user, who simply identified himself or herself as “S” when reaching out to us, summed up the way in which many Android users feel about their platform, and why so many of them are now lining up to leave:

“Once people actually spend some time with one, it’s a whole different ballgame. I bought one over 6 months ago instead of the iPhone because I wanted to be different, huge mistake! Now that I’ve had more than enough time using it, too much actually, I’m done with Android and I will not buy another. My phone has been plagued with problems from the moment I powered it on. The touch screen is non-responsive in a lot of areas. The software is loaded with glitches. The phone routinely decides to re-boot in the middle of a call or it just freezes up completely. The battery life sucks and the app store is filled with mostly garbage that doesn’t work a lot of the time. People rag on Apple for their strict approval process, I commend them on it, they are assuring the customer will be getting something that works as advertised. With the Android market, it’s like the wild wild west, no law, no order, just chaos. If Android thinks that’s a recipe for success I would beg to differ with them… It’s a recipe for disaster, the only people that will excuse that type of garbage are the hardcore fans. The rest of the people will see the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow was filled with rocks and I bet a lot of people won’t give Android a second shot.”

Apple would still do well to bring the iPhone to Verizon, Sprint, and the other U.S. carriers rather than asking these Droid refugees to have to switch to AT&T when they switch to the iPhone. But the numbers don’t lie, even if Yankee Group is now trying to backpedal from its own findings in a wash of gibberish (then again, if YG has been receiving as many death threats for publishing the research as we have for merely reporting on it, then perhaps they can’t be blamed for trying to backpedal). For the record, this is far from the first time we’ve received death threats from technology fanatics, and we’ve heard from other journalists at other tech publications who’ve received threats to their well being over the years; it just goes to show how thoroughly some people have aligned their own sense of self worth with the success of their favorite technology gadget, and such behavior is obviously not limited to the world of technology. But the above represents a view of how we believe the majority of (non-fanatical) Android users view their buying choice, and drives home further the point of why the iPhone is (for better or worse) the only mainstream-oriented smartphone on the market.

Brutal but true tech headlines: Facebook, Kinect, Droid X, Bumpers, more

- After recent lawsuits, no one is sure who really owns Facebook at this point. As opposed to MySpace, which no wants to admit owning.

- If the Facebook ownership lawsuits do turn out to be valid, then we all learned how to spell “Zuckerberg” for nothing

- Don’t worry, no one at Verizon knows what the “X” stands for in “Droid X” either.

- Microsoft Kinect to sell for $149. Even less, if you’re willing to take a free Kin with it.

- Amazon Kindle sales up in spite of iPad popularity, proving that 30% price cuts never hurt.

- Speaking of the Kindle, it’s surprising that Amazon hasn’t yet gotten around to suing Microsoft for using names like “Kinect” and “Kin” – though in the latter case it may simply be out of pity.

- Next time you manage to get a flashlight app approved with a hidden tethering feature built in, keep it to yourself.

- Why yes, “Bumpers” is in fact the dumbest name for a case ever.

- Question of the day: will BP change its name back to “Amoco” before AT&T changes its name back to Cingular?

Verizon tries to lure iPhone users to Flash-based “Rule The Air” site

Verizon is attempting to take advantage of the concocted iPhone 4 reception controversy by running a new series of television ads which, while not directly saying so, imply that iPhone users would be better off if they instead signed up with Verizon and switched to one of the carrier’s various fake iPhone models instead. One little problem though (and we’re not talking about the absurdity of the notion that an iPhone user would switch to an Android phone based on the unsupported claims of a Verizon television commercial): the website which Verizon attempts to steer viewers toward, RuleTheAir.com, is based on Adobe’s ancient Flash technology. That’s right: Verizon’s plan is to lure iPhone users to a propaganda website aimed at convincing them to give up their iPhone, a website which won’t even load on their iPhone in the first place. Nice try Verizon, but this ad campaign might be even dumber than the one last year which attempted to label the iPhone as a discarded misfit toy; meanwhile the iPhone continues to absolutely clobber Verizon’s Android phones in marketshare by a margin of more than three to one. Here’s a hint, Verizon: get Apple to let you sell the real iPhone, then you can stop embarrassing yourself with these stupid and ineffective TV ads.

Verizon fans: iPhone fictional negative portrayals must stop

I’m tired of it. I’m tired of hearing about the fictional portrayal of the typical iPhone user in which he can never make a phone call on AT&T no matter where he goes, that he secretly carries a Verizon flip-phone in his other pocket because it’s the only way he can communicate with people, and that he’s somehow giving up his rights as a cellphone user by surrendering to the unusable AT&T network. I’m sick of hearing that gross mischaracterization of the iPhone user experience comes from overzealous Verizon fans on a daily basis. I’m sick of hearing it because it’s total bullshit.

Since the iPhone launched I’ve lived on both coasts, in big cities where the AT&T network is supposedly crippled and small towns where it supposedly doesn’t exist, and it turns out none of those imaginary scenarios are true. I can use my iPhone anywhere I want. I’ve road tripped it all the way across the country and back – and the only time I ever encountered insufficient AT&T signal was a pair of twenty-minute stretches in the Arizona desert on I-10. Twenty-five hundred miles, and there were perhaps forty of them in which I couldn’t get a signal. As fate would have it there was a traffic backup from a fatal tractor trailer accident while I was in one of those brief AT&T-less stretches. To kill time I fired up my Verizon USB modem on my laptop, only to find that it couldn’t get a signal either. So much for the theory that the Verizon network is perfect. At another point on that trip I was staying at a downtown hotel in a major city and couldn’t get a signal on my Verizon modem, despite the fact that my iPhone had no problem getting a signal on AT&T.

On business, I routinely fly to various U.S. cities, and again, have no problem getting an AT&T signal on my iPhone. I currently live in a small town cut off from surrounding towns by lakes and cow pastures. Again, no problem using my iPhone on AT&T. Bottom line: I can and do use my iPhone anywhere I damn well please, except while on an airplane or in the subway.

Are there AT&T dead spots? Of course. There are on every carrier. Is AT&T a disgusting company do to business with? Absolutely. I can confirm that first hand, but I can also confirm first hand that Verizon is every bit as much of a disgusting company; the continual problems I had with my account led me to be thankful that I hadn’t signed a contract with Verizon, as that USB modem wasn’t worth the hassle of having to deal with two disgusting cellular carriers. Meanwhile, much as I do not enjoy continuing to be an AT&T customer, I have no problems making calls with my iPhone. And statistically speaking, I travel the country far more than you do.

The notion that being on AT&T somehow cripples you from being able to rely on your iPhone, or to travel the country with it, is a comically fictional portrayal of the iPhone user’s experiences. Forgive me if I’m a little cranky on the matter, but I’m simply tired of hearing this fictional nonsense bandied about as to how I’m supposedly a man without a reliable cellphone just because I’m an iPhone user. If you don’t want an iPhone, or you don’t want to switch carriers just to get one, so be it. But don’t make things up just to make yourself feel better about your decision and end up talking others out of getting one based on your phony information. And stop insulting me by painting me as someone who’d be stupid enough to carry around a cellphone that didn’t work reliably as a phone. Frankly, you’re not helping your cause.

iPhone 4: AT&T yes. Verizon no. Sprint no. T-Mobile no. Got it?

Potential iPhone 4 buyers in the U.S. appear to be unclear on which carrier(s) the new iPhone will be available from in astonishing numbers, if the overwhelmingly large number of U.S. websurfers landing on this site after searching Google for terms like “which carriers will the iPhone 4 be on?” and “will the iPhone be on Verizon?” and “Sprint iPhone 4″ are any indication. So in the hopes of clearing up all the confusion, we’ve assembled this simple textual chart:

AT&T – yes

Verizon – no

Sprint – no

T-Mobile – no

any U.S. carrier not named “AT&T” – no

While it’s entirely possible that iPhone 4 could be released at a later date on additional U.S. carriers, there are currently no official announcements or hints to the contrary. Outside the United States it’s a completely different story (in fact T-Mobile does carry the iPhone in some countries), but for iPhone 4 buyers in the U.S., it’s currently AT&T or bust.

We hope that clears things up for confused potential buyers. But judging by the sheer quantity of the confused search terms, we’re not so sure it will. Here’s why it might be time for those Verizon customers waiting for the iPhone to come to them to finally put up or shut up.

Verizon vs. iPhone 4: rather hate your carrier or hate your phone?

“I’ll wait for one more iPhone upgrade cycle to hear whether or not the iPhone is coming to Verizon,” says the typical Verizon customer, “before I finally give up and switch to AT&T so I can park my current generic phone and my current iPod touch in favor of finally fully getting on the iPhone bandwagon.” Then Apple has yet another public event in which many things are introduced and a Verizon iPhone is not one of them, and the user says “Alright, I’ll wait one more cycle” and goes back to biding his time. We hear this sentiment so often from so many Verizon users, many of whom are coming to Beatweek.com specifically to try to find out information on when/whether/if a Verizon iPhone might be happening, that it’s nearly a mantra by now. But with the iPhone finally seeing a massive overhaul this month, both in the hardware and software categories, it leads to the question of whether that long cycle of Verizon users waiting for the iPhone, whose patience must by now be wearing thinner than the new iPhone 4′s slim body, will finally now come to an end – seeing longtime holdouts give up and move to AT&T to get their iPhone after all.

Those Verizon users who’ve hung in there with a flip phone in one pocket and an iPod touch in the other all this time aren’t about to abandon the Apple ecosystem in favor of some iPhone knockoff. But the question of whether they have enough patience to now wait until perhaps the end of 2010, or perhaps 2010, perhaps literally forever, for the iPhone to come to Verizon will begin to be answered this summer as iPhone 4 hits the streets in the U.S. on June 24th, iOS 4 follows somewhere in the same timeframe, word of mouth from early adopters spreads about just how much of a breakthrough the fourth generation iPhone really is, and Verizon users start thinking “enough is enough” and start deciding that, as Beatweek’s Steve Loopipe likes to phrase it, “I’d rather hate my carrier than hate my phone.”

So how many of those long-patient Verizon customers will finally pull the trigger on switching to AT&T? With the iPhone having been on the market for more than three years and there not being a three-year cellular contract in existence, waiting for contracts to expire will not be an issue except for users who managed to recently get roped into (sometimes unwittingly) extending their Verizon contracts. Some Verizon users have a tendency to convince themselves that they’re hearing iPhone users complaining about dropped calls on AT&T far more frequently than than those complaints are actually being made, but either way Verizon users who find themselves running out of patience and sorely tempted by the category killing nature of iPhone 4 and its surrounding ecosystem will now have to decide whether they can stretch that patience out even further with no end officially in sight, or go ahead and take the iPhone plunge. Here’s why we think they should go ahead and consider doing so.

iPhone 4 release: $199, $299 June 24th, video chat, AT&T, no Verizon

Apple’s new iPhone 4 will go on sale xx with three models ranging in price from xx to xx, and the new iPhone will continue to only be available through AT&T, to the disappointment of those who had been hoping for a Verizon iPhone option. iPhone 4 comes in a choice of white or black models, with the 16 GB model selling for $199 and the 32 GB model selling for $299. Any current iPhone user whose contract expires any time in 2010 will be eligible to purchase the iPhone 4 at the above prices. The iPhone 3GS will remain, but at $99. The iPhone 4 will go on sale June 24th. Pre-orders for the iPhone 4 will begin on June 15th.

Additional iPhone 4 features include the same type of in-house A4 microprocessor found in the iPad, slightly better battery life, improved screen resolution, and a host other features.

iPhone 4G will now become bane of Verizon’s existence

“Hello Verizon, I heard about Apple’s new iPhone 4G and I want you to sell me one,” says the caller. “Uh, we don’t offer that phone, sir,” says the Verizon rep. “But I heard you’re going to be, and I just saw the details of the iPhone 4G and it’s the most incredible thing to ever happen to cellphones and I’m tired of sticking with this basic flip-phone and I want an iPhone,” insisted the customer. “Sorry, we just don’t offer the iPhone. We do have a phone called the “Incredible” if that helps. You know, it’s part of the Droid family,” said the beleaguered rep. To which the caller responds, “I’m looking to order an iPhone, not Star Wars DVDs.”

Welcome to Verizon’s new nightmare, as Apple introduces a revolutionary new iPhone iteration for the first time in a couple years. Those Verizon customers who’d been patiently waiting for the iPhone to come to their favorite carrier will lose a degree of patience today if the iPhone 4G turns out to be the kind of industry clock-cleaning device that most impartial observers expect. And with the new iPhone unlikely to be available on Verizon (at least not yet), suffice it to say that that news doesn’t spread to the populace as automatically as some Verizon phone reps might surely be hoping.

How much demand is there for a Verizon iPhone? Try typing “Verizon” into a Google search bar and you’ll see that “Verizon iPhone” is the second most popular suggestion behind only “Verizon Wireless” which tells you what people are searching in quantity for information on. Customer service reps from Verizon (and Sprint and T-Mobile) have been having to put up with “When can I get the iPhone from you guys?” phone calls for three years now, and today’s expected iPhone 4G rollout, if it doesn’t include their carrier, will just make their jobs suck that much more.

If you’re looking for the full scoop on the iPhone 4 announcement, go here.

Could Droid 2-for-1 sale be hint of impending Verizon iPhone?

Verizon is pushing a two-for-one sale on its Droid phone, which despite claims to the contrary on the part of Android platform enthusiasts, was only brought to market in the firstplace because Verizon couldn’t get its hands on the iPhone. While the latest data shows the Android platform to be getting clobbered three-to-one by the iPhone in marketshare, suggesting that Verizon may merely be attempting to artificially boost the user base of a middling performer, the timing of the move is nonetheless interesting. With Apple set to make major iPhone related announcements this week there are no indications that the iPhone is set to immediately become available to Verizon customers. But with Verizon now blowing out inventory of its iPhone knockoff at a monetary loss, it begs the question of why Verizon is suddenly so interested in ridding itself of existing Droid inventory. While Verizon’s backburnering of the Droid in favor of a Verizon iPhone is a near certain eventuality at some point the future, the carrier’s sudden urge to dump Droid inventory and sudden lack of faith in its own ability to sell the Droid without literally giving it away suggest that there may be more afoot come Monday after all.

What happens if a Verizon iPhone IS announced on Monday?

While even the most optimistic of forecasts suggests that the iPhone won’t escape the clutches of AT&T until late 2010 at best, what would happen if Apple CEO Steve Jobs did in fact unveil a Verizon-compatible iPhone this Monday? For all the hopeful discussion of the possibility here and elsewhere, there’s been fairly little discussion of what would actually happen if he did. Here’s the scoop…

The launch of a “Verizon iPhone” would mean one of two things: either a new hybrid iPhone which contains receiver technology for both the incompatible AT&T and Verizon networks, or two new iPhones, one for each network. The former would require squeezing additional hardware into the iPhone’s already tightly packed body, which could mean the abandonment of some other new hardware feature (including possibly a larger battery) which would have otherwise occupied the space. The latter, in which customers would be buying an iPhone knowing that they could only use it with Verizon or AT&T for the life of the phone, might be confusing but wouldn’t be devastating. The purchase of a new iPhone requires a two year contractual commitment to the carrier anyway, meaning that it’s unlikely that the user would be looking to take their iPhone and switch networks during the prime of its useful life regardless.

Nearly all current iPhone users in the U.S. are under contract to AT&T, the only exception being those who purchased their current iPhone more than two years ago, which would put them into first generation territory. In other words, even those current iPhone users who want to buy a new iPhone and use it on Verizon wouldn’t be able to do so without swallowing AT&T’s criminal $325 early termination fee. So with current iPhone users staying with AT&T whether they want to or not, at least for the remainder of their current contracts, a Verizon iPhone would initially be almost exclusively for the benefit of existing Verizon customers who have wanted an iPhone all along but refused to switch to AT&T in order to acquire one.

How sizable of an audience could that be? Quite large, if our years of observing anecdotal evidence bear out in the larger scheme of things. A significant portion of the iPod touch userbase bought that device because they wanted to get on the iPhone platform but didn’t want AT&T, and have therefore been carrying an iPod touch in one pocket and a generic Verizon flip-phone in the other for years now. In fact the anecdotal evidence suggests that the iPhone platform could gain several million new users from the launch of a Verizon-compatible iPhone, nearly all from Verizon’s current customer base, in a matter of days. Would Verizon users create lines around the blocks of Apple Stores waiting to get their hands on one, just as AT&T users did back in 2007 for the original iPhone? That would depend on whether Verizon users ultimately view the arrival of the iPhone in a manner more akin to that of excitement or mere relief.

Vegas betting odds iPhone comes to Verizon, Sprint, or T-Mobile

Forces are aligning anew which make it seemingly more clear than ever that the iPhone will eventually be available through more than one carrier in the U.S., ranging from AT&T’s desperate attempt to limit data use by new iPhone users, to Verizon’s too-carefully chosen recent words in which said that it didn’t plan to support any Apple products in the “immediate future.” But while there’s no indication that next week’s rollout of the next iPhone will involve anyone but AT&T, here are Beatweek’s best “Vegas style” betting odds that the iPhone finds its way to each of Verizon, Sprint, and T-Mobile by the end of 2010.

Verizon: 67% It’s the obvious choice because it’s the largest U.S. carrier not to have the iPhone, and its users (either by desire or via sheer numbers) have been the loudest about wanting the device.

Working in favor of a Verizon iPhone: Current Verizon users come out of the woodwork to all buy an iPhone. Apple claims dominant majority marketshare of the U.S. smartphone industry within months. Verizon makes lots and lots of money. It makes too much sense for the companies to not do eventually. And Verizon can’t be so deluded as to think that its Droid has a long term mainstream future. Here’s why we think a Verizon iPhone needs to be Apple’s priority.

Working against it: Any Verizon iPhone in 2010 would have to be CDMA, which means either an entirely separate “Verizon iPhone” which wouldn’t be compatible with any other network, or a hybrid iPhone model with multiple receiver technologies inside which would waste precious space which could have otherwise been devoted to a new iPhone feature.

Sprint: 22% It’s the one U.S. carrier whose CEO has a name everyone knows, as Dan Hesse has taken to the airwaves himself to advertise that despite not offering any phones that anyone wants, Sprint does offer the lowest monthly rates on phones that no one wants.

Working in favor of a Sprint iPhone: When your only remaining marketing strategy is to slash your prices, you’re in trouble. The iPhone could be a boon for Sprint, even if the terms of the deal were more favorable to Apple.

Working against it: The Palm Pre was massive flop, but now that HP has acquired Palm, will Sprint give HP a shot at getting the Pre right with the next generation, before going running into the arms of a competitor?

T-Mobile: 14% Outside of its own userbase, most people only know three words about T-Mobile: Catherine Zeta Jones.

Working in favor of and against a T-Mobile iPhone: How many T-Mobile users do you even know? It seems unlikely that Apple’s first iPhone foray outside the arms of AT&T would be with such an obscure carrier – unless it was as a trial run for a future Verizon iPhone launch.

Notes: These odds merely represent our best educated guesses. They add up to slightly more than 100% because we believe there’s a very slight chance that the iPhone could end up on more than one new carrier before the end of the year (although if it’s Verizon, we would expect that to be an exclusive). Only allow these odds to impact your buying decisions to the extent that you agree or disagree with the reasoning; we have no inside information of any kind. Whatever you do, don’t place actual monetary wagers. Seriously, they’re just cellphone carriers.

Oh and by the way, the iPhone expanding to additional carriers would not mean that the iPhone would no longer be available on AT&T, to existing or new customers. We wouldn’t expect that to happen any time soon or far.

With AT&T punting, Verizon iPhone more sorely needed than ever

Apple often prefers to line up exclusive partners for new products so that the prospect of continued exclusivity can be hung over the partner’s head when need be. And when Verizon originally turned down the opportunity to be that exclusive partner for the iPhone, Apple instead gave the deal to AT&T. Which would be fine if AT&T could be threatened, prompted, or motivated to act like it had a pulse in any manner. Instead AT&T has turned out to be the kind of company that just doesn’t care one way or the other. Instead of enhancing its data network to accommodate the multitude of iPhone users who’ve been making the company rich, AT&T shrugs off any desire for continued growth and instead acts as if it would just as soon not have to deal with all those annoying paying customers. And now that the carrier has announced data usage caps on new iPhone customers, it couldn’t be more clear that AT&T doesn’t want any new iPhone customers.

With its iPhone army, Apple has seemingly exposed – unknowingly, most likely – what in hindsight should have been obvious. All U.S. cellphone carriers, AT&T included, have been skating by on terribly underserved networks for years, only managing to avoid those flaws being exposed due to the fact that most cellphone users, and even most smartphone users, have only ever taken advantage of a small fraction of what they’re paying for. And now that iPhone users have exposed the AT&T network for being the fraud that it is, AT&T would apparently rather simply give up and try to discourage people from switching to the iPhone, for fear that any more users on its pathetic network would cause the whole thing to come crashing down to the point that the company would in fact have to make significant investments in propping it back up; the company has instead made the calculation that it’s better not to bring on new iPhone users and continue limping along with its fractional network than to face the prospect of having to finally invest real money in its network, which judging by how paper-thin the network is currently, could involve real dollars and impact AT&T’s bottom line in the short term.

Make no mistake, other U.S. cellphone carriers (including Verizon) have networks just as horridly under-built as AT&T’s; it’s a racket that’s been going on for as long as the thoroughly unregulated U.S. cellular carrier industry has existed. The only difference here is that AT&T was dumb enough to take on the iPhone stampede with no understanding of the fact that iPhone users were by and large actually going to use the data capabilities of their devices in quantity. That having been said, it’s now clear that AT&T no longer wants new iPhone customers burdening its porcelain network, and so it’s now up to Apple to make a move which remedies this growing problem.

It’s a tribute to Apple that it managed to come up with a smartphone that people are actually using to do things with, but with AT&T slipping into a calculated coma when it comes to continuing to grow the iPhone userbase, Apple now has no choice but to shake up the landscape by offering the iPhone on more than one carrier. Doing so will cause Verizon’s equally porcelain network (or whichever carrier signs on next) to turn into a pumpkin in equally short order. But at least new iPhone users will have the opportunity to pick their poison. And such a move just might push AT&T and Verizon, who are in obvious collusion over the sad state of their cellular networks no matter how many television ads they may run in which they pretend to be competing with each other, to finally have to go ahead and compete with each other in terms of finally building twenty-first century cellular networks instead of the two cups and a string which (all) U.S. cellular networks can currently be compared to.

AT&T will do nothing to fix its network until it begins to feel the sting of losing current iPhone users to another carrier. Despite phony geek claims to the contrary, that’s not happening with Android or any other iPhone knockoff; it’ll only happen when the real thing is available elsewhere. It’s not that iPhone users will find any better of a network with Verizon if they shift over en masse; nor for that matter will they shift over en masse. But even a relatively minor exodus of iPhone users to another carrier, and the subsequent hit to their bottom line, just might b enough to bring AT&T out of its current coma and force the company to make the newly calculated decision to actually invest in its network. Absent any sense of wanting to make the world a better place, absent any business ethics of any kind, absent any whiff of government regulation, and yes, absent any effective maneuvering on Apple’s part thus far, these cellular carriers in here in the U.S. only understand one thing – money – and a Verizon iPhone could solve two problems in forcing AT&T to readjust its calculations in the face of losing customers while bringing the same crushing blow of data usage to Verizon’s equally inadequate network which might in turn force Verizon to think about investing in its own two cups and a string. The good news, then, is that a Verizon iPhone could reportedly be ready to go for Christmas 2010.

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