Holy cow. Those guys at fusion.osx86.hu/#iphone are geniuses. Late yesterday, I downloaded a copy of iASign, their new iPhone activation tool. Right now, at this second, my iPhone just made its first call using the SIM from my disposable Cingular phone with its $10 card. After, I dialed *777# and it told me I've got $9.25 left on my account. The phone number in Settings -> Phone shows the proper number for the disposable phone (versus the one I activated with the iPhone PickYourPlan).

After spending far too many hours trying to set up pre-paid iPhone directly with AT&T, I decided to take matters into my own hands this evening. Instead of trying to connect my newly provisioned AT&T account, I iSigned up using iTunes and entered 999-99-9999 as my social security number (as recommended by one of the more clueful AT&T people).

Of course, this failed the credit check and I was offered the prepaid plan. I selected it, agreed to the terms, and pretty much 1-2-3, I was put into the activation queue. At this time, I'm getting the "Your activation requires additional time to complete"/"You will receive an email confirmation", but my iBrick has taken some major steps forward in its uselessness.

Gallery: iPhone Prepaid Gallery

It LIVES! Update and advice here

Yes, the commercials say "2 Year Activation". Yes, I said that it looked like prepaid options were out of the picture. This came a few weeks after after we had heard rumors about prepaid iPhone codes. This evening, Christopher Price over at Phone News dropped me a note and we briefly chatted back and forth. He pointed me to an article he'd written about newly launched AT&T options for pay as you go customers.

Price thinks prepaid isn't dead despite what you see in those commercials. The new AT&T feature packages look as if they're ready to bring prepaid phone services to a new level. So 2-year-contract? No 2-year-contract? Prepaid? No prepaid? I'm just getting whiplash. What do you think?

Oh and by the way: that commercial Scott posted earlier today? Check out the very end and see if you notice...what's missing.

Update: Commercial is LIVE at Apple. No "2 Year Contract"--although the earlier commercials still say that.

Update 2: TUAW Reader Steve reports that he's not seeing the "2 Year Contract" line on the live repeats of the first 3 TV ads either. Can any other readers confirm that these have changed as well?

Update 3: TUAW Reader Gruff reports that the text is now missing from all the online Apple ads.

So would an iPhone that you could buy outright with prepaid service appeal to you? If priced attractively, would it make the difference in your buying decision? BoyGeniusReport has tracked down some curious iPhone codes: "We can infer from the 3 codes received that the iPhone will be available to...postpaid users...[S]ince the masters of prepaid can purchase these, anyone will be able to snatch one up, whether they are in contract or not." Of course, we have no idea how much these plans will cost and what the final cost of phone + plan will turn out to be but surely the idea of a contract-free iPhone is appealing, right? Electronista thinks AT&T may have reconsidered it's in-network-only stance.