What’s up with the iPhone ‘shortages’?
Posted by Dennis Sellers 
May 16, 2008 at 4:49pm
After only one day with a limit of one iPhone per customer, AT&T, the exclusive iPhone seller outside of Apple in the U.S. says the restriction has ended, reports Information Week. Hmm, as the kid i the commercial says, “Something’s up.”
The telephone company said it went back to its old policy of three per customer after it found that it had enough iPhones to resume normal sales, the article adds. AT&T enacted the stricter limit Wednesday.
Could these “shortages” be hype to generate publicity for the upcoming 3G iPhone (which hasn’t been officially confirmed) and sell the first generation inventory. When you buy the iPhone, the Apple Store has a 30-day return policy, but AT&T has a 14-day return policy.
If the new iPhone is coming mid-June, as rumored, and if the Apple Store sells you the phone you can still return it within 30 days and get a refund (minus a ten percent restocking fee). If you buy it at AT&T right now, you’re stuck.
If Apple has a new phone coming June 9, it’s doubtful they want to sell you a current model now, then have you return it for a new one next month. And what will they do with remaining first gen iPhones? (Thanks to Gaurang Donovan for his help with this article.)
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Contributor
Dennis Sellers
Dennis has been a newspaper editor/reporter (seven years) and teacher (seven years). He has over 4,000 magazine, newspaper and online articles to his credit. He has also covered the Mac and tech industries for over a decade for such online publications as MacCentral, MacMinute and now MacsimumNews.
Constable Odo Says:
The older iPhones will still be useful and quite a bargain at reduced prices. It will still run all the new SDK apps. Still old iPhone users will lose out on a faster processor, video conferencing, GPS and 3G. I’m sure there are those that don’t need those features and they’ll buy the the old iPhone. I don’t think everyone has to have the latest features. They’ll still have a useful device that’s better that the average cellphone since it runs OSX.
Posted on May 17, 2008