If You Want an iPhone, Get Something Else First

I have been using a Motorola standard feature phone for the last two years. It was falling apart and I needed a new phone. I really like the iPhone, but I really don't like the fact that it is not 3G. I don't want to drop four or five bills on something that I am going to want to replace in perhaps less than six months. And I rarely sell anything. Its too much of a pain. So if I buy it I typically own it for life until it hits the trash can. So selling and upgrading would probably not be in the cards.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3G

So, though the iPhone is clearly king of the hill, I needed a way to stall. The problem is that my old phone was essentially dead, and was on Verizon, a CDMA network. I decided I really wanted to be on AT&T since it would allow me at some future point to get an iPhone without having to switch networks. AT&T is also a GSM network which means it supports SIM cards that allow you to easily switch between and experiment with different phones.

In the middle of all this thinking, AT&T launched a promotion: the Blackberry Curve for $99. The seeds of a plan start to come together.

I decided I would get the Blackberry. This works out incredibly well economically because the $99 price is a subsidized price that only comes with a new AT&T contract. The iPhone comes with no subsidy, so when you get a new iPhone with a new contract, you are throwing away the AT&T subsidy opportunity.

What I recommend for anyone intent on buying an iPhone is to get another free or cheap AT&T phone using the contract subsidy, and then get the iPhone. Even if you do it all the same day. Otherwise you are giving money away. If nothing else, get a free backup phone.

And so the very clear lesson learned from AT&T and Apple seems to be, if you want an iPhone, get something else first.