Riding the Mobius

The iPhone 3GS

I love my iPhone 3G, but I think I’d love an iPhone 3GS even more. That being said, I’m fully prepared to suck it up and watch everyone who has the 3G either wait out their contracts (as I plan to do), or pay $500 or $600 to get the latest shiny, and after a little background rambling, I’ll tell you why.

When the first iPhone came out, I was filled with a powerful techno-lust that was only kept in check by the exorbitant pricing and my relative poverty. I was forced to “slum it” with a Samsung Blackjack, my first entry into smartphonedom. My mouth practically started to water every time I saw someone gliding their lucky little fingers over their glass-faced, metal-backed beauties, which is an odd reaction, considering that I’m pretty sure an iPhone would be too crunchy for my tastes.

When the iPhone 3G rolled out, I was only a month away from contract renewal eligibility, so I was in good shape. As it turned out, I didn’t get the phone for another two months anyway due to the insane demand for the product, but I’ve loved the phone from the moment that I got it set up.

Despite its obvious and super-irritating flaws and/or omissions, most notably the lack of copy-and-paste and multimedia messaging, a non-user-serviceable battery, and an inadequate battery life, I still consider the iPhone 3G to be the finest all-around phone that I’ve owned yet.

The iPhone 3GS looks like it will address the most glaring of these flaws right out of the box, and adds some other niceties that I wanted, like video recording, data tethering, a better camera, increased capacity, etc. This, of course, means that I want it, and would probably buy it at the subsidized price, remanding my current 3G phone to my fiancée, who would then pay almost twice as much a month in service fees over her current voice-only plan.

Now, in the early days of my adult working life, I worked for AT&T Mobile (and other carriers which it bought out), so I’m familiar with the idea of subsidizing phones. In those days, we’d allow people to re-contract pretty much at any time to take advantage of our specials; you didn’t have to ride out your existing deal in order to enjoy a new promotion. It was easy, it was cool, and it was probably unprofitable.

In case you’re unfamiliar with the concept, that iPhone 3GS I so dearly wish I could get for $299 actually costs AT&T a lot more than $299, but they eat some of that cost so that we, the little people, will be more inclined to buy the phone and lock ourselves into a two-year contract that costs significantly more than a Plain-Jane voice plan. (Remember how I skipped the first generation iPhone? Had the unit cost been more reasonable to me, AT&T could have been charging me for a full voice/data plan for several years by now.)

I don’t fault AT&T for balking at sucking up a few hundred dollars per phone every time Apple decides to release a new hardware iteration that addresses something that should have been included from the start. Business is about making a profit, and subsidizing our purchases every time we get bored with our hardware would leave less money for AT&T to expand and improve the network that actually makes the phones, you know, DO STUFF.

Instead of simply ignoring the issue, I’ll propose that AT&T consider trying some tactics to avoid alienating the legions of iPhone 3G users who are crying foul on the upgrade situation, even though our outrage is mostly based on our own self-interest.

One idea is to allow us to trade in our existing iPhones to qualify for the standard subsidy; investing a few bucks in reconditioning phones that have probably been babied (as mine has) would give AT&T a pool of phones that could be sold at an extreme discount, hooking new users who will need to upgrade to the more expensive voice/data package that the phone requires.

Another idea is to start a “recruit a friend” sort of program. For example, I’d give my fiancée my iPhone 3G if I could get the 3GS at the subsidized price without having to ride out my contract, and I’d even sign a new two-year deal. This, again, would result in my fiancée upping her plan and spending more money each month, and AT&T wouldn’t even have to recondition the phone.

There are, of course, other solutions to consider. Anyone could, theoretically, add a new line to his/her account at the subsidized price, cancel their existing line, and pay the early termination fee, which I believe is a pro-rated $175; this would kill your existing number, but would still likely result in a net gain for the user and increase in dreaded “subscriber churn” for AT&T.

The most reasonable option, I think, is probably just to relax and enjoy the 3G phones that we have. We’re getting the 3.0 upgrade for free, which takes care of the stuff that I care the most about, and I don’t have to shell out hundreds of dollars to get those features. (I can’t believe I’m saying this, and I’ll be aggressively protecting my Nerd Card for the next week or two in case the Nerd Guild enforcers come to reclaim it due to my abject heresy, but there it is…)

One final thought for those of us who have been enjoying 3G iPhones for the past year: let the first-gen iPhoners have this one. They’ve had to watch us gloat about our GPS functionality and better reception while they “suffered” with their metal-backed signal-repulsors, and now they can one-up us until next June, when we’ll undoubtedly be having this discussion again after the fourth-generation iPhone is announced.