Tracking down Apple's missing 1.4m iPhones

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Comments

  • Reply 21 of 65
    irelandireland Posts: 17,798member
    An they're all anxiously awaiting the 1.1.3 jailbreak
  • Reply 22 of 65
    I see quite a few iPhones, and every one of them is unlocked since there are no official carriers. You can buy them on-line and everything. Of course, you can't upgrade the software.



    In the end, I think Apple should not have made this a locked phone. They would be selling a lot more of them. On the other hand, their continuing revenues would be lower. Still, I think owning the market is worth that. It's not like they don't make money on each phone.



    I'm still waiting for an officially unlocked iPhone. I'll wait as long as it takes. I'm kind of a late adopter with cell phones, anyway. I was last on my block with one, and still have a trusty V60i.
  • Reply 23 of 65
    Unless the claim is that Apple is lying, this is utter crap suggesting some cheap attention-grabbing.



    And, Apple is unlikely to be lying about something as important as iPhones "sold," considering how anal they have been on revenue recognition (incl. things such as the $2 charge to activate 802.11N on a $2000 computer, under-reporting the $ value of iPhone revenues, and so forth).



    This analyst is clueless.
  • Reply 24 of 65
    AppleInsider's blog from earlier today states that ATT activated 2.7 million new customers last quarter and Apple said it sold 2.3 million phones last quarter. Add the 1.x million phones sold in August and September and things add up nicely. Look like Apple Insiders should read each other blogs.
  • Reply 25 of 65
    irelandireland Posts: 17,798member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Alonso Perez View Post


    In the end, I think Apple should not have made this a locked phone. They would be selling a lot more of them. On the other hand, their continuing revenues would be lower. Still, I think owning the market is worth that.



    Dead right on that one. If they made half what they are making right now by originally selling the phone fully unlocked and it meant owning the market they it would be damn worth it. This iPhone will prove to have a bigger halo-effect than the iPod if you ask me. Although if was originally unlocked Apple wouldn't have gotten the freedom they have got.
  • Reply 26 of 65
    Anecdotal evidence only. In the hundreds of little shop/stalls in Shanghai's big electronics markets, seemingly everyone has iPhones on sale. Not just phone sellers, 50% of all the sellers are offering iPhones. And the amount of iPhones you see on the streets is suprisingly high. If this same sort of proliferation is similar in various ex-US markets, it is easy to imagine where 1 million extra phones are. The main push was about two months ago, with each seller yelling "iPhone" as you walked by, that wave has finished, the phones now have an constant presence in the glass showcase.



    A local website called taobao com will show you all of the results for online sellers, type iphone into the search box (site is all in chinese, but easy to understand the layout) and see the results, 20 pages of 40 sellers each.
  • Reply 27 of 65
    kenckenc Posts: 195member
    ...but my vague recollection is that Apple does not count a sale thru its own channel, ie Apple Store, until sold, unlike thru 3rd parties, where shipped, is counted. If true, and one only need check the 10K, then the hint that Apple is putting iPhones in warehouses for the Apple Store, is nonsense.
  • Reply 28 of 65
    buzdotsbuzdots Posts: 452member
    an*a*lyst |'anl-ist|

    noun

    a person who conducts anal inspections, in particular

    * an investment expert, typically in the specified field of guessing the exiting size of the human (and other) orifices.

    * short for PSYCHOANALYST - one who is a crazy ass.

    * a person who analyzes or who is skilled in analysis (see below verb)





    Etymology: mid 17th cent.: French analyste, from the verb analyser (one who is actively anal)



  • Reply 29 of 65
    shogunshogun Posts: 362member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by shawksix View Post


    Anecdotal evidence only. In the hundreds of little shop/stalls in Shanghai's big electronics markets, seemingly everyone has iPhones on sale. Not just phone sellers, 50% of all the sellers are offering iPhones. And the amount of iPhones you see on the streets is suprisingly high.



    If I were SJ and I knew that Asia was swimming in unlocked iPhones (that can't be updated) I would be holding back on something big until iPhone went full scale in Asia. Then you spring the newness and even the folks with iPhones already (that are unlocked) want to go buy a new one to get the update.



    The question is, what would that be?
  • Reply 30 of 65
    This analyst is either a crook, hack or both! How can he calculate what number of phones are unlocked or call 20 % a generous proportion for unlocked phones? There are certainly many here in Canada unlocking phones.
  • Reply 31 of 65
    wizard69wizard69 Posts: 13,377member
    I don't know about the numbers as really it isn't my cup of tea to dwell on such things, but we only have to look back a few weeks when Apple was restricting sales for only one reason. That was to reduce gray market sales. That is the bulk purchasing of iPhones for resale as unlocked devices.



    A company doesn't do such unless it is having problems, it just irritates your legitimate customers.



    I think Apple's big problem with iPhone is that they adopted a business model that people are getting very tired of. It is not that big of a stretch to see the slow change in the carriers as a sign of having to adapt to disgruntled customers. The whole idea of supplier locked phones is just irritating a lot of people. Especially when buying higher end phones.



    Thus we see the various unlock methods popping up and the jail breaking for user applications. It is unfortunate but Apple simply chose the wrong approach even though it has been common for some time. Locked hardware is just not acceptable on devices that you purchase and own; people are now more aggressive than ever at over coming these unnatural limitations.



    Dave
  • Reply 32 of 65
    Well, I have one iPhone that will never be registered/activated. My 6 year-old son is autistic, and after I got my iPhone on launch day he started playing with it and became really good at using the keyboard. Then he found the camera, and then the videos (cartoons) I had loaded, and then the calendar. He is quite proficient on navigating around the phone, and is very excited when he spells out his name and show it to me.



    I thought about getting him an iPod Touch when they came out however it did not have a camera so I used my $100 iPhone credit and bought a 4GB iPhone refurb from Apple for a very good price. Then used Jailbreak to unlock it and the rest they say is history. The phone is still on software version 1.01 but so what, it works perfectly for him.



    It really helps him with his eye/hand coordination as well as memory (navigation up and down through menus) and it is really a great device for his therapy. He and I are very pleased!



    Thanks Apple and thanks to the Jailbreak team!
  • Reply 33 of 65
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by iGrover View Post


    My 6 year-old son is autistic, and after I got my iPhone on launch day he started playing with it and became really good at using the keyboard. Then he found the camera, and then the videos (cartoons) I had loaded, and then the calendar. He is quite proficient on navigating around the phone, and is very excited when he spells out his name and show it to me.



    That is by far the coolest story I have heard about the iPhone. Hopefully a full SDK will open up even more possibilities.



    Look at multi-touch tables, reactable, Jeff Han's projects, the future of more visual tactile interfaces is just starting.
  • Reply 34 of 65
    I actually know a couple people who, already have broken their iPhones, and bought replacement iPhones which would essentially go untracked, since they are neither activating a new account, or upgrading to an iPhone plan.
  • Reply 35 of 65
    teckstudteckstud Posts: 6,476member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Ireland View Post


    Dead right on that one. If they made half what they are making right now by originally selling the phone fully unlocked and it meant owning the market they it would be damn worth it. This iPhone will prove to have a bigger halo-effect than the iPod if you ask me. Although if was originally unlocked Apple wouldn't have gotten the freedom they have got.



    You've got to have more than one phone to own the market There should be a lower priced phone as well as another version on the high end. Just look what happened to the RAZR and Motorola to see what may happen if you don't change fast enough and add more product. The cell phone industry moves very fast and the iPhone is getting older by the minute. Apple needs more than one phone product in its product line and fast. And one has to be more affordable than $400!!! The public perceives the iPhone as a cellphone first, not an iPod nor PDA, and an expensive one at that.

    It's an excellent product but it's competition is so much stronger than MP3 devices vs iPods.
  • Reply 36 of 65
    irelandireland Posts: 17,798member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by teckstud View Post


    You've got to have more than one phone to own the market..



    True, I just meant in theory is all.
  • Reply 37 of 65
    Aplle never reports channel inventory as sold. That's a popular Microsoft technique, which we saw in their last quarter to boost Vista sales numbers. When Jobs said "sold," that is what he meant. Now sold does not only mean sold to a customer; the phones are sold to the European carriers, for example, or to ATT probably (for the units they sell in their shops). ATT reported new customers due to iPhone, not customers who switched to the iPhone while retaining their ATT contract. And of course there are those who were given iPhones for Xmas but have an existing contract with another carrier that they need to run out before activation?who would pay two monthly fees just to turn on their iPhone?
  • Reply 38 of 65
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by iGrover View Post


    It really helps him with his eye/hand coordination as well as memory (navigation up and down through menus) and it is really a great device for his therapy. He and I are very pleased!





    Have you tried iPhysics? That is by far the awesomest 3rd party app currently available for the iPhone. I held up upgrading to 1.1.3 till today, when the 1.1.3 jailbreak was released to the public, just so that I can keep iPhysics on it for my 4 year old son.. and, I'll be honest, for myself as well.
  • Reply 39 of 65
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by teckstud View Post


    You've got to have more than one phone to own the market There should be a lower priced phone as well as another version on the high end. Just look what happened to the RAZR and Motorola to see what may happen if you don't change fast enough and add more product. The cell phone industry moves very fast and ...



    The cell phone industry makes a lot of noise about moving fast. Hundreds of models, lots of hype, features piled on, but little real innovation. Apple will be fine with two models and a yearly update. One more compact, sexier (iPhone Air?), maybe a clamshell. One a bit larger, more focused on capacity or screen size.



    Some color and memory variations, and that's it. You don't need 50 models. Motorola's problem was not the RAZR, which they exploited for years. It was having dozens of models, yet all mediocre.
  • Reply 40 of 65
    Does AT&T Offer Family accounts? In that case, more than one phone will be bought.



    Does AT&T include Business accounts and how many phones purchased on the account?
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