I promise you that as soon as this exclusivity is up and AT&T has not changed their ways, then I am gone and not just wireless. EVERYTHING. 40,000 a month in reoccurring invoicing with AT&T will be gone. This is not threat. Its a promise.

I’m not a min person either same with tons and tons of my college and H.S. Friends who all just text now, I have the 450min plan and always have 300-350 rollover min since I get the mobile to mobile for free and I only call mobiles otherwise the only landline I call is my home rarely so if ATT had a 150min plan with unlimited data and unlimited text I’m sure tons of kids my age would opt 4 that

Does it cost AT&T more to handle calls from the iPhone?

Sounds like unmitigated greed to me. ********.

I’m not suggesting that subsidies go away completely… but these are the words of AT&T, not me.

Subsidies will continue to exist, but it is unlikely that they will be fantastic deals we currenlty get. Instead of $400 off, you’d be looking at a much more standard $150-$250 off. Still a good deal… but not the steal it is now.

Perhaps I misspoke. What I mean is 1) Verizon has come out and said that no 3rd party app stores are permitted while on their network. You may only use the Verizon app store, and 2) Verizon loves to charge monthly fees for apps, and would likely do so (like AT&T does for its turn by turn navigation app)

These are two main reasons I don’t see any kind of marriage between Apple and Verizon. Verizon refuses to meet Apple’s demands, and then pushes back in the opposite direction making policies that hinder the liklihood of a future marriage.

@ Derek: I’m not trying to defend Verizon at all here, but where do you get this information that Verizon is going to be sticking its fingers in the app store? Verizon could make apps for the app store if they get the phone, but Apple is not going to let anyone take any amount of money from them there.

I still believe Apple is waiting on LTE to be released and then move the iPhone to all of the carriers that run LTE, hence no more exclusivity. One of the biggest crocks here is the subsidy price going away as all carriers subsidies there phones no matter what and its not like the iPhone is costing more to produce then some of the other phones out on the market.

Yeah, I don’t suggest that my minute usage is the norm. My point was that different consumers look for different things.

More importantly, I think as the smart phone market grows, the demand for reliable and fast 3G network connections will grow as well. I also believe that many smart phone users would be willing to pay a little more for minutes in order to have access to a better 3G network.

And that’s where the iPhone comes in. Sure… If AT&T loses exclusivity, some people will jump ship to T-Mobile, but I imagine most of the people who do their research won’t.

P.S. I’m not sure what Verizon’s goal is here, but they could own the iPhone market, and pretty much take over the cell phone world if they would negotiate a deal with Apple that didn’t involve them sticking their greedy little fingers in the app store. Stupid if you ask me.

I never said the iPhone wasn’t valuable to AT&T. It’s just that the majority of that value is found in it’s exclusivity. They are willing to pay high subsidies because of the number of new customers it brings in. I think I read that more than 70% of 2009’s new AT&T customers have an iPhone.

That said, iPhone owners are still only about 11% of their existing customers. AT&T has been competing with Verizon, Sprint, and T-Mobile since long before the iPhone existed. So I don’t think they are complancent in the service they offer. Neither do I think that losing exclusivity will give them more motivation to improve service any faster than they currently do.

All in all, my point is that AT&T losing exclusivity will result mostly in more expensive iPhones for consumers… not better service.