Pioneers take the arrows
In the flurry of iPod announcements today came word that Apple dropped the price of the iPhone 8GB from US$600 to $400–an almost 35 percent drop in just over two months (68 days, to be precise). They are discontinuing the 4GB model completely.
That's a huge early adopter tax if I ever heard of one. It reminds me of an old saying "The pioneers take the arrows, the settlers take the land."
The price drop is Apple's way of saying that they are behind on their iPhone sales forecast. I thought for sure they would have sold 1 million iPhones by now, but according to today's release Apple is "on track to sell its one millionth iPhone before the end of September."
The announcement of the iPod touch is also indicative of a plateau in iPhone sales. Apple would never have announced the "phone-less iPhone" until iPhone sales leveled off, because as a ZD colleague (who shall remain nameless) emailed me "I for one will never get an iPhone now that the iPod touch can go Wi-Fi."
Where do you stand on the iPhone price drop? Gathering torches for a march on Cupertino or scooping up an iPhone at the 35 percent off fire sale?
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