Jim Cramer suggests iPhone may come with 18 months service free

i have cingular in ny and it's ok. if they give the 18 month free is not loosing, is keeping the customer. for them is keaping the customer. in ny there's an offer family plan from sprint 85$ 3500 minutes nights and weekends free and internet unlimited. so if sprint can do this now to keap customers for 2 years before the iphone comes, why cingular can't do it too?

I too see it as possible for them to offer 18 months of data to go with your iPhone.

I use Verizon Wireless, and I will switch to Cingular simply for the iPhone. Luckily my Verizon contract is up in May, just in time to get ready for iPhone.

But, if they do offer this, and at least ONE person signs up, no matter how much money they *lose* they still gained another customer.

Businesses are so concetrated on getting and retaining customers.

If someone has a good experience with their brand new iphone and tell all their friends about how awesome cingular/at&t is, then it's mission accomplished.

I bet it is 18 months worth of free data service. 18 * $20 = $360. That would be feasable.

My skepticism stems more from the idea that AT&T is *already* goign to steal a whole bunch of Verizon customers just by virtue of having exclusivity on the iPhone. It doesn't seem like the number of additional customers they'd garner would be worth giving that much money away to everyone who buys the thing. Then again, there's really not much growth opportunity left in the wireless market (most people who are ever going to buy a cell phone probably already have) and they could be seeing this as their one opportunity to steal a significant share of Verizon's customers. Ok, never mind... I convinced myself. It's a good idea.

Whether or not Cingular would lose money on this depends on the nature of the data package (which is almost certainly not covered by this and which most will want in order to use the iPhone's feature set).

It also depends on the exact deal Apple have with them -- exclusivity could be worth a *lot* with Apple's current popularity (bit of a high risk investment though).

I meant Cingular would lose billions, excuse me.

Again, completely irrational post. A bit of common sense goes a long way.

Free iphones for all!!!

Hey, one question.

ARE YOU GUYS ON CRACK!!?!?!?

This rumor is obviously false. 18 months of service would be more $ than the iphone. Apple would sell about 100 million of these phones and Verizon would lose billions of dollars

I don't remember the price of the iPhone being $700. Steve announced the price, with a 2 year service contract to be $499 and $599. If the service is free, like Jim Cramer said, (I'm going to hold him to that), then I have $599 burning a hole in my pocket! June won't come to soon...

Assuming this rumor is true (which the math adds up to too much generosity), I suppose my question would be what would be the contract fulfillment terms?

With Verizon and most carriers, if you take the deal (rebate), you're stuck for 1-2 years.

If you take 18-months of free service, are you commited to 18-months + another 2 years? Not to say I have a problem with commitment, but that's a really long time to be dedicated to a sole provider...