Today is the alledged announcement from Steve Jobs at the WWDC that the new iPhone 2.0 is being released. There has been a ton of rumors and speculation about this and I am very interested in hearing what actually comes out of it. It starts at 10:00 MST so that is in less than 20 minutes for me. Once the announcement is made, check back to see my thoughts on everything announced.

Popularity: 22% [?]

That’s a nice title. Imagine if you could get an iPhone regardless of what carrier you have. Now I know that not all phones are available to all carriers but not all phones have the popularity of the iPhone. Personally I would love to have one and have considered it in the past if you keep up with my blog. At the time, I decided to instead get the iPod Touch and keep my T-Mobile Dash.

I’m now re-thinking that decision. I know that with T-Mobile, I’d have to jailbreak any iPhone but that isn’t an issue with me. I’ve jailbroken my iPod Touch and feel pretty comfortable doing that with the iPhone. But I have T-Mobile and it’s relatively easy for me. What about the people out there who have Verizon, Sprint, Alltel, etc? What do they do?

There are two sides to this discussion. On one side you have the demand from all the consumers like myself. But on the other hand, you have Apple not wanting to over-saturate the market in iPhones. I do think it would be a good idea for Apple to allow the iPhone to be used under more carriers than just AT&T. If T-Mobile had the iPhone, I’d buy it today. People are locked into contracts with other carriers and that makes it difficult to make the switch. Had Apple opened up the iPhones when they were released, I think they would have made more sales. Now people are waiting out their contracts to go with AT&T but their existing providers are giving deals to keep people from buying iPhones.

But what if Apple decided to open up the iPhones? Do you think that everyone would have one with its high pricetag? I don’t know but I do think that more people would have them. Motorola’s RAZR crashed the party a few years ago and I saw a lot of RAZR’s on the streets and in the hands of friends. I don’t think that hurt Motorola but I do think that they were the beneficiaries of the latest gadget and rode the wave as long as they could. Now Apple is on that wave and doesn’t appear to be giving it up anytime soon.

Just like Apple did with the iPod to MP3 players, I feel that the iPhone can do the the cell phone market. I guess that only time will tell but I will say that I am waiting until mid-June for the 3G iPhones to come out and then I’ll seriously think about getting one to replace my Dash.

What do you think?

Popularity: 38% [?]