Sunday Funnies: Apple (AAPL) iPhone price drops but Fed rate holds firm

Anyone know if you can use the rebate towards the iTunes store? Like the author said the money does not leave Apples coffers.

True
Upgrade of iPhone is coming soon. Price cut is useful to Apple, keeping European and Asian markets as well as iPod prices in mind.

Aaron: As i understand it, the 100$ for those of us that supported the iPhone in its prime (I'd rather refer to us as such, rather than those of us who got gypt) is going to be redeamable in the Apple Store and the Online Apple Store. While I don't believe that includes the iTunes Store, at both the Apple Store and Online you can purchase iTunes Music Gift Cards, that with the upcoming holiday season you are more than welcome to treat yourself to. Atleast that's my plan.

As for my other thoughts, with the release of the new iPods so soon, I would tell others to expect a nice update to the software of the iPhones. All over the internet you can find rumors going around, and I dont intend to further spread them, but my feelings about some of them are that I agree. I would tell others to expect the next software update to include Ringtones (which having called Apple's Support myself they have confirmed), in addition to new Games (which come out with the new iPods, and thus probably for the phones), some sort of instant messaging program (like AIM, Yahoo, or MSN - though MSN is a windows program so probably not MSN), and update in the text messaging software (because the contracts for at&t's internet deal for the iPhone mention unlimited multimedia messaging service, and with that I would expect the ability to copy and paste or send text messages to multiple people at once, since often pictures are sent to many friends and family).

As for the price cut, speaking on behalf of myself and those I have talked to also with the iPhone in our pockets, we all knew that there was eventually going to be a nice price cut. BUT, and I dont intend to sound like I'm whining, Apple was very clear when releasing the iPhone that there was NO rebate to be had at that time, and that everyone was going to be paying the same $599 for the 8 gig phone. None of us expected the price cut to be so soon, and I think that was a mistake made on our own parts. Nearly every phone in history has had extreme price reductions (rebates) very quickly. Especially those phones that start primarily as AT&T and Cingular phones. In my mind I am thinking about the RAZR and the KRZR which were quite expensive and came down in price quickly without most of us Apple users thinking about it.

I fully appreciate Job's decision to give $100 credit to those of us who purchased the iPhone originally. However, what most people don't seem to be discussing, is that (atleast what I believe) Jobs, who is known to be an 'expert' at marketing, probably knew what the price reduction would cause outcry. I give credit to Jobs, because this was probably the best marketing he could have come up with, and in my mind it did EXACTLY what it was intended to. The iPhone came out, and it was a big deal for the news, for a couple of weeks atleast. And then the news began to move on. Apparently there are other things going on in the world. Then Jobs announced the $200 price reduction, and the news shot RIGHT BACK over to the iPhone. Any publicity is good publicity, and at this point, the only people who were upset were the people who ALREADY BOUGHT the iPhone. EVERYONE ELSE got to see (as Jobs would hope for) that his product was now only 67% the price of before. And all this publicity was 100% free for him. All Job's had to do was give out a few annoyed LOYAL customers a fraction of what they would have saved from before (that they can only spend back in his stores) AND the iPhone remains a top story in the news for another week or so. Jobs, as I assume you atleast partially planned this out (and will almost definitely not be reading this post anyways), I personally accept your 'appology' and commend you on a fabulous job. I look forward to our updates, and can't wait to use the $100 credit right back in the Apple store, probably buying something well over $100 (or atleast in the iTunes store).

Everything including all he things above post mentioned are good for Apple and to he investors. price cut is importnat due to competetion and to increase the market share.

This is totally unfair. The life-cycle should be atleast the average of six months and now there is massive 40% cut in 2 months. This is not the apple we know.

-Keshava Bharadwaj
http://keshavabharadwaj.googlepages.com