Viva Le iPhone

After much speculation, the iPhone finally arrived in the UK on Friday 09th January. Providing you are on the O2 network, the iPhone can be purchased for a mere £269, as long as you are prepared to sign up to an 18 month £30+ contract with 02.

Now I may be tempted by an iPhone, my phone is now a bit old and I am constantly bemoaning the requirement to carry my iPod and my phone everywhere I go. However, I am tied to Orange until Feb 2008.

Now recently it has emerged that if I was to wait until the French launch at the end of November, I could purchase one in France that would work in the UK. In France it is a legal requirement to launch a de-chipped version of all handsets.

Now surely this is a ludicrous situation for UK businesses to be in. Surely people will wait until the French launch and purhase via the internet on such sites as? This is an example of the internet breaking down international barriers to sale and UK business suffering as a consequence.

Why is it that early adopters are always punished? In America, the price of an iPhone dropped by $100 after a matter of months. Perhaps the early adopters don't care and they are willing to pay the inflated launch price in order to be the own the latest gadget? If so, I would be intrigued to know if this levarage is built into the product lifecyle as envisaged by Apple.