Right now I have a bittersweet attitude towards both Apple and the iPhone 3G. It seems as though Apple had planned this all along. Allow me to explain. People were amazed that Apple jumped into the mobile market back in January 2007. They did not care what the price was, they just wanted Apple’s first phone. The $600 price-tag made the phone seem extremely advanced. It buttressed the idea that Apple really did have the most advanced phone on the market. Then people began to realize that Apple’s amazing phone was missing some key features. 3G, GPS, a removable battery, and user made applications were some of the concerns. Soon people no longer wanted to pay that much for a phone missing such important features. Apple then dropped the price by $200 and killed the 4GB version. The iPhone was soon, again, out of stock in stores all around the country. Previous owners received their $100 in Apple credit. All was well. As the months passed, $400 seemed a bit expensive. There were enough iPhones to go around. Too many it seemed. Then interestingly enough, as excitement for a 3G iPhone emerged, iPhones started to disappear (never to be back again). The days leading up to WWDC contained a plethora of rumors ranging from the design, to the features, to the price. At one point the $200 price point was speculated, but no one thought that was possible. $200 is the price of the iPod nano. As soon as that rumor was dismissed, WWDC hit. The iPhone 2.0 firmware, along with the SDK, assuaged the need for user made applications, and added some awesome features as well. If that was not enough Steve then proceeded and introduced the “iPhone 3G.” The crowd went wild. 3G and GPS, it was all there! I was even ready to hand another $600 over to Apple at that moment, and so were many others. Steve kindly stopped us and said $600 was too much. Many could predict a lower price than the original $600. They could envision such a phone (8GB) selling for about $500. It was an accurate guess; the phone did have 3G, GPS, longer battery life, and cleaner sound. Oh! Were they wrong. At $199 people were paralyzed. “Twice as Fast. Half the price.”

As the reality distortion field faded, it dawned on me that $600 was way to much. The $199 price-tag only seemed amazing because of the high contrast. Do not get me wrong. It is great, just not amazing.

Did Apple plan this from the beginning? Voice off in the comments.