iPhone Likely Set to Launch in the UK Next Week

An anonymous reader writes "According to CNet, the iPhone is likely to be launched in the UK next Tuesday. 'Yesterday we were invited to an Apple press conference to take place next Tuesday — and we think it's most likely going to be the UK iPhone launch. Apple, as always, is keeping tight-lipped but there are several clues that point in the iPhone's direction'. No word yet on a UK operator, pricing or whether or not it will have 3G."

Oh, Steve Jobs, your lock-in turns me off

[Anonymous Coward]

In the middle of the night, in the middle of the night iPhone your name...

Anyway, Mac OS X is going completely closed source - 10.4.9 [apple.com] was the last open sourced release of the base kernel/BSD toolset. InputManager plugins - i.e. the technology underlying just about every Safari plugin - have been disabled as a "security risk" in Leopard, even though any application installed as a regular executable is able to cause as much mischief. Apple's iPhone has no official SDK support, the iPods have disabled video out unless you're using an official Apple dock, and a hash in the music library on the player means 3rd party clients can't sync properly with the new iPods.

As such, although the iPhone appeals to my desire for Apple's approach toward usability, its increasingly Microsoft-like lockin puts me off investing in any new Apple hardware or software. Come on, Apple, compete on merit, not on artificial restrictions!

Re:UK pricing

[Indecision Bob]

Indeed. At the time of writing:

iPod Touch
8Gb - $299 (~= £150) - £199
16Gb - $399 (~= £200) - £269

The US iPhone is the same price as the 16gb iTouch, so I imagine that's the price it'll be over here.

Operator

[jaavaaguru]

Isn't it O2?

Not likely to be UMTS

[Echemus]

According to this article [theregister.co.uk] on The Register o2 are busy upgrading their network to EDGE. The Register's suggestion that this is linked to the iPhone is a compelling one.

Re:I don't think no 3G is really a problem

[FyRE666]

I think it's fair to say that if Apple don't add 3G, then the iPhone will be dead in the water over here in the UK. It's pretty poor in comparison to most current phones here (as the parent mentioned, we don't have too many restrictions on the phones here; due to more competition between companies I guess) It's got a pretty poor still camera, no video, no replacable battery, and if there's no way to move files - like games, ringtones etc - on and off it via USB/Bluetooth, then it's not going to have much of an audience beyond the wide eyed "oh shiny!" gumbies that seem to buy Apple kit.