Thursday, July 10, 2008

iPhone Pricing (Out of this world) - Australia


Iphone launches tomorrow in Australia. And the deals are attractive, except for the data prices.
Optus, Telstra, and Vodafone are the carriers. I prefer the Optus deal, $39/mth, including 500Mb data, and a few calls. But the killer is the data pricing....


Be careful with data prices (Optus) in the fine print.

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After the included data, prices are: $350 per Gb (ie $0.35 per Mb)

which equates to about one or two youtube music videos per day (10Mb) on the Optus $39 = 500Mb monthly plan. You could burn through that download with an hour or two of youtube viewing on the tram. I think a few parents of teenagers are going to be quite surprised when they get a bill for 20 hours of youtube viewing = approx. $70 per hour (10Mb/3min*20). Look forward to the Today Tonight stories on that.....

Other prices, once using up monthly limit are: Movie 350Mb ($100), Youtube music video 10Mb ($3.50), Large photo 1Mb ($0.35), Skype 150k/min ($0.06/min), Internet radio 1Mb/min ($0.35/min), software downloads 10Mb ($3.50) / 100Mb ($35), GPS similar to radio or skype prices.


However, 500Mb probably equates to unlimited text, and small photo downloads, so browsing, without large photos is effectively unlimited.


I'll be waiting until - either the download limit is shaped with no excess fees - or there is more like 1-2Gb included. At home I (my wife and I) use Virgin 4Gb/500k for $60 with local, and STD calls included (for comparison). I have Ipod Touch with no monthly fees, and free (ok $60) wifi at home.