Vodafone New Zealand has announced three iPhone 3G plans:
More info here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “SteveNZ” and “anthony” for the heads up.]
MacDailyNews Note:
• iPhone 250 = US$414 for 8GB iPhone, US$527 for 16GB iPhone, US$60/mo.
• iPhone 500 = US$339 for 8GB iPhone, US$452 for 16GB iPhone, US$98/mo.
• iPhone 1GB = US$150 for 8GB iPhone, US$263 for 16GB iPhone, US$189/mo.
• iPhone Only = US$739 for 8GB iPhone, US$852 for 16GB iPhone
Watch Mark Bushworth, Vodafone’s Chief Bullshit Weasel Media Officer attempt to justify this blatant attempt at thievery via 3 News’ Campbell Live here.
Muntlandish! This’ll go straight down the gurgler, if you ask us.
If you think it’ll make a difference, an online petition has already been set up.
http://www.petitiononline.com/nzmac/petition.html
Adam Christianson well known apple podcaster did a survey of current iphone users including his own data useage for the month and it was very surprising to him the the average current ist gen iphone user users on average 50 to 100 megs of data only a month he said on a heavy usage month he gets to 150 so was surprised how low the useage level is so a 250meg account should be plenty for 90% of users.
Nz is an expensive place fullstop. Anyone thats been there recently would attest to that. And yes this is taking into account average wages in nz.
But still this is a very bad move by vodafone, unfortunately it also gives apple bad publicity.
This is a clear cut case of Vodafone ripping people off. And that pisses people off. Internet access is also pretty slow by world standards, the reason for this i have no idea.
You can say that iPhone is expensive compare to other phone. All price stated here is in NZ$.
This are the price Kiwi have to pay for regardless what type of phone you are using. As long as you are on Vodafone network.
Cost per month
250min talk plan will cost $109.95
600TXT option is $12.95
200Mb wireless broadband data plan is $29.95
An Nokia N95 8Gb will cost you $1399. If you lock into a 24months contract(talk plan) you might be able to save between $300-450 of the phone purchase price.
So the plane that they offer for iPhone is not bad in NZ standard. I do wish it can be better. If you are already spending $109.95 on just Talk plan without any other option, It will be silly no to go into the contract to get the iphone cheaper. I don’t think anyone with iPhone in had don’t surf the net.
It’s the chicken and egg problem in NZ. The market is not big enough to attract other company to compete(4.3m in population for the whole NZ) London alone is 7.5m(base on 2001 figure) and Sydney alone is 4.2m.
http://www.3news.co.nz/Video/VodafonetalkstoCampbellLiveabouttheiPhoneprice/tabid/367/articleID/62352/cat/84/Default.aspx?articleID=62352#video
kiwihub.com
wow… NZ is getting ripped majorly
lets hope Australia doesn’t get the same thing :'[
http://www.dragonkicks.com/product_info.php?cPath=908&products_id=7473
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”smile” style=”border:0;” />
option 2.
I’ll ask again. Why is Apple doing business with these companies? Who they partner with reflects poorly on them.
@PC Apologist
In some countries there are no options. To sell the iPhone, Apple must work with the telco available. In a world of bad choices, what is worse: iPhone with an expensive plan or no iPhone available?
Skimming the cream of heavy users/payers, eh? This will slow adoption. The question is how much is Apple’s take?
Australia did do the same thing right? Time to use ebay auctions I think:
http://www.mobiles.org.nz/