Bad news
"If you just can’t wait to buy an iPhone from another cellular carrier, like T-Mobile, Cingular has a message for you: you’ll be waiting a long time, my friend.
Cingular’s exclusive rights to sell Apple’s new iPhone is a “multi-year agreement in the U.S.,” said Glenn Lurie, Cingular’s president of national distribution, in a press conference today at CES. The agreement also includes future models which will be introduced “soon.”
And if you’re thinking of buying the iPhone through Cingular and then using it on another GSM network, you might want to reconsider. Both Apple and Cingular will sell the phone as a “locked” device. Even though it uses the GSM standard, it won’t work on other GSM systems.
Hackers have made the unlocking of locked phones a cottage industry, but Cingular says that that won’t be so easy with the iPhone. If the iPhone gets hacked and unlocked, “we’ve thought through what our next steps will be,” Glenn Lurie said.
As for price, Cingular thinks the $500 initial cost won’t be a barrier to sales. The total cost of an iPod, cell phone, and PDA is just about the same."
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/01/10/more-iphone-fun-facts/