The two things I've realized over the years is:
Firstly - NEVER SAY NEVER .. yes there are those that keep talking about the Iphone as an Ihype and of very little value. Personally, I have a hard time believing that Apple/Jobs is not going to ride this incredible wave of products with something that truly is that bad. I can understand those of you with issues about EDGE and to me that is probably the biggest deterrent (if you go back in time, and see when Jobs revealed the Iphone the one thing that I was surprised by was the lack of UMTS), but let's face it North American subscribers have really not jumped on the data-over-cellular train. We're still stuck with an archaic network over GSM .. barely scratching 2.5G.. the UMTS that is there in the US is just in some pockets. Hopefully this is the push that networks will get to adopt a decent 3G+ implementation. For me, I'd be happy if my lousy GSM provider will bring out a data package that AT&T came out with ($20+ for unltd data) to add on to my service.
For my part, I'm not a casual cellular user, I rarely use my home phone and my cell is my primary point of contact.
As for the price, I'm not calculating it merely as a phone. I find the price reasonable enough for a device that can allegedly work great as a phone and (this is in order of what I look for in a pocket device):
* has a very stable platform, allegedly (if it's anything like the OSX it's going to be just fine). I've said it before, my current phone is based on the Symbian UIQ 2.0 .. and it is one of the first things I look for in terms of a good multifunctional device. Windows Mobile & Palm devices that I've used have been extremely disappointing. The available Symbian devices, though stable, have either been rather bulky or lack that one thing somewhere (sometimes it's the lack of Wifi ..sometimes quadband etc etc)
* has an effective method of entry (I can't stand tapping in text through a keypad)
* has a good PDA feature set including sync-s with my desktop scheduling software
* has a decent enough camera (my digital camera is a fairly bulky DSLR and the 2MP camera seems decent enough on this)
* is a decent net surfing/emailing device .. especially since I'm within a WiFi AP for nearly 90% of my life
* is going to be a great music player (I dont own an Ipod and this works well for me)
So given my requirements I'm not saying that its never going to be an Iphone or that its never going to be anything but an Iphone .. I like alternatives such as the
the P1I which is rumored to be pricier.
Again, I never buy locked/subsidized phones (another drawback of our one-network country .. they never provide an unlock code) so I'm looking for SIM-free versions to come out. I've seen some stores in Canada already advertising unlocked Iphones as coming soon.
AND
secondly NEVER BE AN EARLY ADOPTER!
I will be seeing how it goes with the iphone and its early subscribers and rely on them to do a broad beta test for me. I'm going to check to see what fixes or enhancements are in the works for further revisions of the Iphone... already rumored are fixes that allow for Ipod accessories to work with the Iphone (stuff like car adapters are apparently still not ready for it).