The $100 Price Point For The Smartphone

Image by Getty Images via @daylife$200 does not feel right. Microsoft and Nokia will have a huge advantage that they seem to want to enter the market at the $100 price point.

Microsoft Finally Cracked The Phone

A $200 price point is actually a $600 price point. Only they don't charge you up front. You pay month after month for two years.

BGR: AT&T’s Q1 2012 roadmap: Nokia Lumia 900 to launch March 18th for $99.99

That price point would make this sleek smartphone an absolute game-changer for Windows Phone ..... Nokia could easily have a hit on its hands when this handset launches later this quarter.

If Android is free why are the good Android phones the same price as the iPhone?

The real stickler though is the monthly price. There Republic Wireless has nailed it. Only they are not a reality in the market yet. $19 a month is a good price point there.

Republic Wireless, Galaxy Nexus And Tardiness

Events: Week Of September 19

Monday, September 19
07:00 PM - 09:00 PM Feedback Forum: Campbell McKellar & Anna Thomas of Loosecubes.com
New Work City, 412 Broadway , 2nd Floor

Tuesday, September 20
08:00 AM - 10:00 AM New York Telepresence Open House sponsored by AT&T and Cisco
AT&T, 630 Fifth Avenue (btw 50th & 51st St)

07:00 PM - 09:00 PM Skillshare Presents Creative Arts: a party, art show & lesson!
Gallery Bar, 120 Orchard St
F to Delancey

07:00 PM - 09:00 PM Post BUILD: Metro, Windows 8 and the future of .NET
Microsoft 1290 6th Avenue
B/D/F/M Rockefeller Center

Wednesday, September 21
5:30-7:30pm Technology You Can Touch
AOL Headquarters
770 Broadway

Thursday, September 22
06:00 PM - 08:00 PM Network and drink with Time, CNN and Turner executives
Time Life building, 1271 Avenue of the Americas, 8th floor
B/D/F/M Rockefeller Center

06:00 PM - 11:00 PM OBLITERATI sponsored by: Google Places
Sweet and Vicious
5 Spring St

07:00 PM - 09:00 PM Bain Capital Ventures Cocktail Hour
General Assembly
902 Broadway, 4th Floor

07:00 PM - 09:00 PM New York Tech Karaoke
Karaoke Cave
9 East 13th Street

Friday, September 23

08:30 AM - 10:00 AM DUMBO Tech Breakfast Meetup
The Gallery
108 Jay Street

Dr. Baburam Bhattarai, Prime Minister of Nepal
1245 PM to 245 PM Theresa Lang Center, The New School, 55 W 13 St

San Gennaro Festival (Saturday)
Dumbo Arts Festival (Sunday)

Something's Rotten, It's Not The Fish

The Truth: What’s Really Going On With Apple, Google, AT&T And The FCC TechCrunch how the Google Voice application hurts “the iPhone’s distinctive user experience.” ..... over the last few months Apple expressed dismay at the number of core iPhone apps that are powered by Google. Search, maps, YouTube, and other key popular apps are powered by Google. Other than the browser, Apple has little else to call its own other than the core phone, contacts and calendar features. The Google Voice App takes things one step further, by giving users an incentive to abandon their iPhone phone number and use their Google Voice phone number instead (transcription of voicemails is reason enough alone). Apple was afraid, say our sources, that Google was gaining too much power on the iPhone

This is a generational conflict. Apple and Google belong to two different generations of tech. This small iPhone app conflict is symbolic. The larger conflict between the two brands is to be seen in the smartphone arena where Apple sees the phone as a smaller desktop, and Google suggests there is nothing much to download, all apps should be web-based.

A happy ending would be if the costs for calls start sliding down dramatically. How do you do that? Serve ads like for search.

Weekend Reading

• Game Theory and Politics
• Real-time Distribution
• Why AT&T Killed GoogleVoice
• Smartphone Wars
• Solar Power
  

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