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You're too late to pre-order the Apple iPhone 4 on Verizon Wireless, but too soon for the 4G LTE iPhone 5 "world phone". But what exactly does "sold out" mean?
Preorders of the Verizon Wireless iPhone 4 have been suspended -- apparently because it's sold out after less than a day. Should you wait until the release date next week, or cool your jets until the iPhone 5 is available? In IT Blogwatch, bloggers hem and haw.
Your humble blogwatcher curated these bloggy bits for your entertainment. Not to mention Dell is getting greener... slowly...
(VZ) (VOD) (AAPL)
Gregg Keizer plays the game:
Apple and Verizon ... have exhausted the inventories they had set aside for existing customers of the carrier. The two companies began taking pre-orders at 3 a.m. ET ... Thursday ... but shut down sales ... at approximately 7:30 p.m. ET.
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Customers, both current Verizon subscribers as well as the general public, must now wait until Wednesday, Feb. 9. ... Both Apple and Verizon will re-open online ordering that day at 3 a.m. ET. ... Retail sales kick off Thursday, Feb. 10 at Apple, Verizon and Best Buy stores ... [for] walk-in customers and those who ordered the day before and selected in-store pickup.
Stan Schroeder expandifies:
Demand for Verizon iPhone was very strong as it took less than a day for the pre-orders to sell out. Verizons website took a beating from customers, many of whom didnt manage to pre-order their iPhone 4, but theyll have another chance next week.
And David Stellmack is puzzled:
Despite our diligent efforts, none of our contacts from the Red V seem to exactly know what happened. Some speculate that Verizon only had a specific number of iPhones set aside for pre-order and the company has reached this number.
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Verizon had indicated since the iPhone announcement that initial inventory availability would be limited.
But Jessica Dolcourt urges caution with flowery prose:
As wildly as the American populace has envisioned Verizon's iPhone to cure all mobile ills, there's still plenty that Verizon's iPhone 4 lacks on its newfound carrier. ...
The iPhone 4 will not make use of ... 4G LTE. ...
Verizon's iPhone has no SIM card ... what makes it easy as pie to switch from one mobile phone to another on the same network. ...
Verizon uses CDMA technology instead of GSM. ... [It] will not have the AT&T iPhone's more-seamless and extensive support as a world phone. ...
[No] simultaneous voice and data. ...
An ever-so-slight change to the ... hardware means that previously manufactured iPhone 4 cases won't snugly fit.
And Eric Raymond thinks this is all so last decade:
We can expect Verizons iPhone sales to be anemic. ... Most of Verizons potential Apple customers decamped to AT&T long ago. ... The iPhone is in deep trouble. 4.1 million activations looks like a lot, but ... in a market moving as fast as smartphones, a product with less that 10% new customers in a quarter is usually only a few quarters from market share decline.
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Over a year ago, when Android was shiny-new ... I predicted that the ubiquity game would beat the control game. This has since been happening at a rate even my boldest predictions couldnt keep up with, and the accelerator pedal just got another stomp.
At which, Clint Boulton yells "FUD":
AT&T may have seen flagging sales in the last quarter because of the iPhone coming to Verizon. ... Regardless, Android is the leading U.S. smartphone platform as I write this. It's a proven platform, so AT&T would be foolish not to embrace it.
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Since when did Apple and its iPhone get relegated to Nokia Symbian status?
Richi Jenningsis an independent analyst/consultant, specializing in blogging, email, and security. A cross-functional IT geek since 1985, you can follow him as @richi on Twitter, pretend to be richij's friend on Facebook, or just use good old email: itbw@richij.com.
