A wiki for prepaid (iPhone compatible) SIM cards around the world

So where does one buy either the orange or SFR SIM? Can we get it at Charles De Gaulle so we can get online right away?

@Actionable Mango

I'm a NY born and raised Chinese American and I speak English (Natively fluent), 2 dialects of Chinese (fluent) and Spanish (conversationally comfortable)

I understand people have an intolerance toward people and things they don't understand but please do not lump everyone together. It just makes you look as small-minded as the entire country of people you just tried to mock. (Which if you're really think about do not only include men but women and children as well)

Cheers

I was shocked when I see AT&T prices. I'm also French, and I've got a rate plan by Orange, 1h calls + 1h for week ends, messages and data unlimited, for just 29,90€, with 16Go iPhone 4 for 299€. There is also a similar rate plan by Bouygues Tel. Well I hope Apple will stop AT&T exclusivity to make great prices. I remember when Orange has exclusivity before in France, the same rate plan cost 50€. Now it is 20€ less.

This misses the better-value 30-day contracts which most of the providers offer in the UK. Whilst they are pre-paid they are better value for iPhone usage than the PAYG options in many cases: Two examples:

1. O2's Simplicity for iPhone is the key example. 30 days =£20, 300mins, unlimited texts and unlimited internet (500MB from Oct 10) (includes Openzone and The Cloud WiFi)

2. 3UK's offer on a micro-SIM is £15 for 1GB, 300 any network minutes
3000 texts, 2000 Three-to-Three minutes on a 30-day contract.

Personally I bought my 3GS on day one on PAYG and whilst it had unlimited internet (first 12mths) it was ideal - I hardly use any texts/minutes. I've now switched to Simplicity on the 30-day contract above - O2 are unlocking my phone and I simply need to decide which offer is best for next month.

With Apple selling unlocked phones these 30-day contracts are more and more appealing - especially for those who want to have a new iPhone every year! :-)

Interesting article.

However, as a French citizen (who then exactly knows about what you're writing about) I have to mention that you made a typo : the company that offers "La Carte" is SFR, not LFR. SFR is one of the three French mobile phone service providers. The three of them are represented in the picture illustrated in this article : Orange (front logo) is the biggest and oldest (it is partly a public company), SFR (right logo, white text on red) is the second in terms of network territory coverage, and Bouygues (logo on the left) is the third one.
And yes, we have such interesting data plans ;-) Some of our priciest monthly plans for iPhone even include illimited voice call ;-) (but you have to pay something like 100$ a month...) Apart from this, every other iPhone-attached monthly plan always includes unlimited texting (SMS).
I've read a lot about your problems in the USA with AT&T and really hope for you that it will be better soon.
In France the three mobile phone providers all have the iPhone, thanks to a lawsuit that was filed by SFR and Bouygues against the Orange exclusivity for the iPhone 1G (which was considered as something like an antitrust act).
By the way, it is really enjoyable to read news here at TUAW !

(please excuse any misspelling or syntax/vocabulary errors that may occur, I'm not fluent in English yet...)

"Some SIMs are locked to a given provider. The wiki provides information on how to deal with that, too." Unfortunately not..."We will not provide information on how to unlock you phone in this wiki, there are other resources out there that already tell you how."

It's Sfr not lfr

Your iPhone needs to be unlocked to use those sims though. C'mon unlock crew

Great idea, but they shouldn't limit this to just SIMs that have data. In the U.S. the O2 SIM at Best Buy works great, they haven't added data yet but will soon.

So in France you can get a PAYG with unlimited data for basically $16 per month. Is there anything like that in the US? I seem to remember that all PAYG set ups in the US are hindered with poor amount of data at high prices.

Anyone know of something better? I could see this as a super good alternative to use with VoIP software integration.