Reactionary

Yesterday, at one of those product rollout presentations Apple has become known for, CEO and co-founder Steve Jobs announced the 4GB iPhone is no more and the 8GB iPhone will now cost $200 less than its original sticker price of $599. I was pretty happy with that news though I’ve decided to spring for the new touchscreen iPod rather than an iPhone. I still cannot justify the cost of a more expensive monthly plan and the fact that I cannot swap out a battery on my phone in a pinch. I need the phone for work as well as it’s become my primary phone. I cannot be without it and sending it in to get a new battery is something I cannot accept. But I’m not posting here and now to discuss the ins and out of the iPhone. I’m posting to note how appalled I am at the fury people have expressed at the price drop (see comment #10, I’m convinced that person is insane).

Granted, I’d feel a little stung if I bought something and then two months later, it’s $200 cheaper. But that really is life, you do it to yourself, you know. I don’t understand where this fiery backlash comes from. People can’t bother to demonstrate or flood Washington with letters noting their disapproval at the shoddy way the country is being run and yet they have the energy to get all up in arms about a $200 price drop on a piece of technology. This is how technology moves. You can never have the latest and greatest for long. Price drops are a fact of life. Something debuts at a high price and it’s well-known that something better and cheaper is not long behind it. And yet, some people, commonly known as early adopters, must have the new thing. They buy it and possess exclusive bragging rights until prices come down and/ or version 2.0 comes out. That’s the way it is.

If you buy something for the sticker price, then that product was worth that price to you with the corresponding specs when you bought it. If it was too expensive, too underpowered, too whatever, you shouldn’t have bought it. Why did you buy it if you thought a $599 phone was $200 overpriced? WHY? What’s wrong with your brain? (At least one person agrees with me.) If you went into debt to get it, that’s your business, man. Never buy anything you can’t afford, that’s Money Management 101. Remember that credit commercial where a guy’s watching TV and then his stuff starts disappearing. Then, the voiceover says, “Some people think if you use your credit card to buy things you can’t afford then you won’t have anything to worry about. But if you use your credit card to buy things you can’t afford, than you won’t have anything.” It’s right on. Don’t whine to me that you paid $599 for a phone. You wanted it. You had to have it. You bought it. Sale made.

Some people are saying it isn’t the original price itself that’s bothering them but the fact that Apple’s dropping the price, as if it were some kind of covert operation to rob people. I ask, didn’t you still buy the phone? Weren’t you happy with it? You bought the phone when it was worth $599 with both eyes open. No one pulled a fast one on you. Stop whining. It blows my mind that people have energy to protest so enthusiastically over something so trivial and yet US foreign diplomacy is in shambles and scandal after scandal is rocking Washington and millions of children are uninsured and people are blowing each other’s heads off in the streets and yet the only thing to get some kind of united, immediate response is a quibble over $200. Amazing.

Steve Jobs has written a letter to iPhone whiners and Apple will be giving people money back. He and Apple don’t have to. They have done nothing wrong. It’s not an admission of guilt, just a sign of the times in these United States. The letter sounds like a reasonable man trying to explain life to a bunch of unruly children. I don’t mean that as a knock on the letter, but on the people it’s addressed to. This is what we’ve come to as a nation. Spoiled, unruly children.

I will not be buying an iPhone. I’ll replace my cell phone with one of my cell company’s free or greatly-reduced phones (hopefully a Nokia with a good camera) and buy an iPod touch. I have no problem finding free WiFi in this city, I don’t have to increase my already-preposterous cell phone bill, I don’t have to worry about sending my phone away to have its battery replaced, I get widescreen video and a mobile internet-connectible handset to read the NY Times with for $349. My pre-order’s in. I wish I could get a new nano for the hell of it just because they’re so cute, but I unlike so many of you, don’t buy things I can’t afford. And I don’t have unpaid bills or anything to worry about.

Posted on September 6th, 2007 under Life, News, Rant •  Print •  Email • RSS 2.0 feed • Leave a response, or trackback