I saw a pile of bricks by the roadside yesterday…
…and was thrilled to find JMB’s name embossed on them.
It was but a few seconds work to whip out my latest toy, a Motorola MING (A1200) mobile phone (I got a red one) and shoot a picture with its 2 Mega-pixel camera (shot through the transparent cover with the helpfully placed side buttons).
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I wonder where the royalties from my brick company are going. I must be being ripped off by my CEO. Another Enron scandal in the making. That’s a very fine phone you have there, in red, my favourite colour. Do they have iPhones in India yet? Not in Canada yet, because none of the carriers will touch it. Too expensive by far.
regards
jmb
JMB: I used to have a very ordinary looking Nokia (6021) till about a month ago. I fell in love with the iPhone after I saw this promotional video.
I wanted one.
The fact that His Steveness announced that the iPhone will be available in Asia only in the first quarter of 2008 was devastating.
The MING was a compensatory purchase to make the wait more bearable. The Nokia 6021 was given to Priya, who used to have an even more ordinary looking Nokia (a 1100).
Too expensive!! I don’t believe that. It costs a little more than twenty thousand in Indian Rupees. I paid about Rs.12,000 for the MING. There are phones which cost more than Rs.25,000 regularly available in the Indian market (Mostly the higher version Nokias like the N-series like this N93i, one of the top models, about Rs.35,000). Not a single one of them can stand up to the iPhone in terms of looks or ease of use (basing this totally on the video & the reviews that I read on the net).
OK, what I meant was that no carrier will carry the iPhone service (carried by AT & T in the States at a starting rate of $59.95 a month for basic service). Apparently Canadian cell phone rates are some of the highest in the world so no carrier thinks enough people will be willing to pay the cost for the service for iPhone. No price for the phone itself has been mentioned at all and they are not selling them.
I hope that you get your wish to have an iPhone since you seem pretty keen then Priya can be upgraded to the beautiful red Ming.
Gosh 35,000 rupees is a lot of money for a cell phone, over $900 Canadian. 12,000 rupees for the Ming is just over $300 dollars. I hope you can write it off on income tax or get some kind of break for that money. Do you think the iPhone will only be 20,000 rupees. That sounds cheap since it is $599 in the States. Men and their toys!
regards
jmb
JMB: I converted the base price of the iPhone from US$ to INR. I expect it will cost more than Rs.25,000 when it is launched in India.
It’s difficult for me to think of cell phone rates as expensive. India has some of the cheapest rates in the world. I pay on average Rs.450 (US$ 11.1; Canadian$ 11.7 - you read that right, it is eleven dollars) all inclusive every month. But I belong to a corporate user group (CUG) wherein calls between the group’s users are not charged. But none of the other doctors and friends that I know, who are not part of the CUG, pay more than Rs.1000 to 1500 (Canadian $ 26 to 40) per month for their mobile phone service.
Since the service is so cheap, I really wouldn’t mind buying expensive equipment.