Filed under: Hardware, iPod Family, iTunes
ROKR's price cut to $149.99, Apple sabotaging the market?
Looks like someone involved with the ROKR has finally done something about (instead of merely talking about) the phone's less than stellar success by lowering its price to $149.99 - still with a two-year contract, of course. I guess with all the buzz of more iTunes-enabled Motorola phones on their way, such as the RAZR v3i Damien posted about Tuesday and the SLVR L7 Engadget dug up, the first step had to be taken on the road to putting the ROKR out to pasture.The one thing that bugs me about the officially announced RAZR v3i is: there doesn't seem to have been much fanfair. Apple originally announced the crummy ROKR (yes, and the nano) at a surprise press event, and even got CEOs from Cingular and Motorola up on stage. But it seems like the v3i was merely announced in some far less spectacular press release just to get it out there. It's looking more and more likely that Apple might be trying to sabotage the very idea of a music-playing phone in the US (they're huge in other countries) to keep iPod sales on the up and up. A MacSlash post from yesterday puts it best: Since Apple has the big name for music devices right now, they could keep forcing phone companies to release crippled, ho-hum iTunes phones to steer us all to buy an iPod until any significant competition reared its head. If that day came, Motorola or whoever could finally have the green light to release a truly iTunes-worthy phone, trumping anyone who steps up to the plate with the power of their music namesake. Sneaky Apple. Very sneaky indeed.
[via iLounge]
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Joshua Ochs said 11:57AM on 11-10-2005
So is it "sneaky" that Cingular won't let you use songs as ringtones? Is it "sneaky" that MOTOROLA decided to produce this POS before an iTunes RAZR? For crying out loud, did Apple design this thing or did Motorola?
The only thing you can fault Apple with is the 100 song limit, period (which I agree was a very stupid move). Of course, even reaching that amount over a USB 1.1 interface is going to take some patience.
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ToeKnee said 11:13AM on 11-10-2005
Part of the phone's failure has to do with its exclusive tie-in with Cingular. Cingular is just 28% of the market in the U.S. (http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0NZB/is_8_7/ai_n15630384)
I think that should be considered before a wacky conspiracy plot...
I am not changing my carrier to Cingular just for such a phone, but I'd sure consider it if my carrier had it. I'd at least go to the store to see it. But as it is, I haven't. I like the fact I could be listening to music as loud as I want without missing a call.
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PXLated said 11:35AM on 11-10-2005
But conspiracy theories are more fun :-)
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Doug Petrosky said 12:38PM on 11-10-2005
They may be fun but they are stupid. This phone took too long to make it to market and it was outdated when it shipped. The carriers have required crazy restrictions on it just to get it to market and you think Apple is holding it back?
Apple is probably making $10/phone in licensing costs and has no support costs associated with it. Compare that to the profit they make on a shuffle (about $20-$30) and you can see why Apple has every reason to want this to work. Remember besides the free money in licensing fees they also tie people to the iTMS (which they are making a small profit on) and iTunes which also helps push adoption of QuickTime.
Apple wants these phones to work but Apple/Steve has big press events for it's products (not to pre-anounce someone else's). I'd bet that Steve will happily show off the new Razr once it is shipping at an appropriate event but I see no reason to hold some Apple style media event for a Motorola product.
Handset players will be a big piece of the market and trust me, Apple wants it's piece of that pie.
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Brent said 12:50PM on 11-10-2005
Music playing phones are big here, too. And they've been around for years. Apple is just a bit late in the game, as usual.
I was disappointed with the release of the ROKR for a variety of reasons, chief among them was the inability to purchase from iTunes over the phone. I suspect that's another reason for the poor sales - it's just another phone that plays music. Not terribly exciting or innovative.
I've been sync'ing purchased music to my Audiovox SMT5600 Smartphone for almost a year on my Windows box. And with SD storage, I'm not limited to 100 songs.
If Apple ever comes to market with a similar device (phone, music player, semi-PDA), they'd clean house and score even more cross-over revenue.
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The Jeremy said 2:01PM on 11-10-2005
Agreed on it not being Apple's fault. Apple did not prevent AAC+Fairplay content from being used as ringtones; that was Cingular. Apple did not tell Motorola to put iTunes compatibility into the (f)ugliest phone in their arsenal either; that was 100% Motorola.
Give me the ability to use my iTunes Store purchased songs (or MP3s) as ringtones, give my iTunes synching (and iCal), and get the phone into the hands of T-Mobile and I will purchase it, whether its in the RAZR or PEBL form factors.
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Chris said 5:56PM on 11-10-2005
Best Buy has the Rokr for 129.99 exclusivly.
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Bill said 9:09PM on 11-10-2005
Well, My Wife loves her ROKR phone. I bought if from Optus here in Australia.. when I was transfering from another network (Vodaphone) to Optus... she got the new phone and popped her networks sim card in no problems. I kept my old phone. It means I now get to use our ipod more often as she just uses her phone. Anyway the phone works well, syncs with our itunes libary no probs and she say's it's best mobile phone she ever had.
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Josh said 12:41PM on 11-11-2005
Hmmm...I wonder where TUAW got the idea of Apple sabotaging from.
http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/11/09/1552220&tid=181
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David Chartier said 12:45PM on 11-11-2005
Josh: Funny you ask, as I stated in the article I got it from MacSlash
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