why not sell it unlocked?

Why doesn't Apple sell the iPhone unlocked and let the user choose the service provider? I bet they would sell way more iPhones if they did this. As a former iPhone owner myself, I like the iPhone but dislike AT&T. Especially that annoying buzz their 800MHz frequency does to computer speakers ;D

Do a simple Google search. There are millions of reasons why they are strictly AT&T in the USA.

there is an exclusive 5 year agreement between apple and AT&T. AT&T gets the customers for the 2 year contract and Apple gets a percentage of active iPhone's on AT&Ts network.

Apple s is hte ones calling most of the shots and AT&T had to put the 5 year exclusive agreement in place or they would not really benefit from it either.

Take your iPhone to use on T-mobile and apple only gets money from the sale of the phone and not the extra revenue from the percentage of each monthly contract (10 to 20%).

So basically Apple would really not benefit all that much if they unlocked it for all GSM carriers (CDMA wont come for some time). Unless they strong armed the other carriers in to a percentage of monthly bills for active iPhones on their network.

Some people need to understand its a business and its all about money and profit, not what we want as a customer, if they actually cared about us their prices would be much lower

There is a possibilty that when the new iPhone is released it may be sold unlocked.

^^^ only in France where they have laws again exclusivity to carriers. But in the US they are stuck in the Contract with AT&T for 4 more years.... which bites.

Will these French iPhones work with US carriers?

Actually this may come to pass: the Supreme Court today ruled in a fashion that hits the cell phone companies regarding this very matter. If I understand their ruling correctly, after a person completes their contract the company has no choice but to unlock (any) phone if that person desires to go to another provider. I think it is a great ruling.

rothko said:

Will these French iPhones work with US carriers?

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Even if they did, it would be a lot easier to buy a iPhone in the US and just unlock it yourself.

PapaNoHair said:

Actually this may come to pass: the Supreme Court today ruled in a fashion that hits the cell phone companies regarding this very matter. If I understand their ruling correctly, after a person completes their contract the company has no choice but to unlock (any) phone if that person desires to go to another provider. I think it is a great ruling.

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So now AT&T will simply go to longer plan requirements for iPhones, maybe with the ability to upgrade to a new iPhone at a certain point. The ruling is not likely to change much as the average life of of a daily cell phone is just about the length of the contract. The ruling also ignores the fact that there are different technologies out there that are simply incompatible between the cell companies networks. I may want to to take my Treo 700P CDMA phone from Verizon to AT&T, but it's not going to happen. I suspect many consumers are not even aware of this.

Eric559 said:

Even if they did, it would be a lot easier to buy a iPhone in the US and just unlock it yourself.

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Probably, especially if there is a chance you are going to "brick" it along the way.

with the different cell tower technology even if a iphone is unlocked it will only work with cell companies that support the gsm technology. i believe at&t and t-mobile (maybe altel not sure) are the only ones in the states who uses gsm.

sanity1082 said:

i believe at&t and t-mobile (maybe altel not sure) are the only ones in the states who uses gsm.

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Alltel is CDMA.

Yep, AT&T and T-Mobile are your only GSM options in the US, and frankly, I'd rather stick with AT&T.

Whats so hard about buying an iPhone and unlocking it ?