iPhone - June 29th
Over the weekend, it became official that the release date for the iPhone is June 29th.
As others have begun to wonder, is there too much hype for the iPhone? Consumers are amazingly critical of gadgets that have an explicit utilitarian value. If the iPhone does wrong any one of the half dozen things users expect on their cell phone, it could fail to meet expectations. With over a million inquiries about the iPhone, and it barely being publicized off of the Internet (until this weekend), that alone is rather amazing. Some of its most likely buyers are people who are not computer savvy, but those that are simply - uh - rich.
Of course, if anybody has been paying attention during water-cooler talks, it’s clear that the first wave of buyers are trend setters and those in the social elite. Just as with the iPod, the iPhone is all about style and status. I honestly don’t think the first wave of buyers will care about the phone’s capabilities, so long as it’s good enough; they are happy with the overwhelming attention they’ll receive at every single social gathering for the next three months.
Is there such a thing as having too much hype over the next big fashion item? I don’t think status symbols works like that. We’ll find out on June 29th.
On a personal note: no, I won’t be getting one of these. My company provides me with a Blackberry, and those run on T-Mobile (which is not AT&T).
Do you know when these come out in Europe? Also, I assume they’ll have GSM technology (i.e. good with any provider out there). They also better be quad-band. =)
Comment by Gigio — June 4, 2007 @ 2:12 pm
I don’t know if I’ll get an iPhone; I probably won’t, since I’m very minimalist in my choice of cell phones and I won’t necessarily want the cell phone plan that comes with it. I don’t know if it’s “overhyped”, either, but it certainly looks like a very cool product.
Also, those are amazing advertisements.
Comment by L33tminion — June 6, 2007 @ 3:45 am