query for reporters All hail the new iPhone - Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Brock N. Meeks" <[email protected]>
Date: January 12, 2007 5:36:57 PM EST
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [IP] more on All hail the new iPhone - Pittsburgh  
Tribune-Review

It is curious why Jobs would hang the initial success of the iPhone on a
single carrier.  We can only speculate, for now, why that might.  It  
could
very well be that Cingular has some kind of financial arrangement  
with Apple
wherein the company will kickback to Apple a certain percentage of  
all fees
generated by new iPhone subscribers.

During the Microsoft antitrust trial we certainly saw how all kinds  
of deals
were made by Microsoft with the computer vendors wherein certain  
financial
arrangements were given in return for prominent placement of the Windows
Explorer icon.

There's nothing illegal in this type of transaction and I suppose if  
such a
deal has actually been made it would show up, somewhere, in Cingular's
quarterly earnings statements.

I wonder if any business reporters have asked about this (surely they  
have),
I just haven't seen any answers.

On 1/12/07 4:33 PM, "David Farber" <[email protected]> wrote:

> I'm utterly baffled as to why Steve Jobs would tie the success of the
> launch of this product to a single vendor... unless follow on phones
> might be released in editions exclusive to other providers, or other
> versions of the product might be available on multiple platforms. In
> fact, if it is his attention to capture 1% of the WORLD cellphone
> market, that seems almost mandatory...



-------------------------------------------