mperdue-
Hindsight is 20/20 you know. Today we think what Verizon did was foolish but was it, really? History lesson: Back in 2007, Verizon's policy with all their supported phones was to CONTROL the final offerings to make sure the offering was completely compatible with their service. Now ( again in retrospect) what did that buy them? It bought them the #1 position in the industry for customer satisfaction. With Apple, iphone, Ap[ple insisted on being in control of what the iphone offered and this was the main stumbling block between a successful agreement between the two companies, but with AT&T looking to have a device to put them on the map, in the wireless business, at any cost, they agreed to take that with the exclusivity. We also know that Apple, back then had serious production limitations with certain parts of the iphone, namely the memory which was in very short supply. So, li,miting the offering to a carrier that wasn'y very popular then didn't hurt their limited production capability at all. Apple and AT&T was a pretty good match, IMO. The marriage was mutual beneficial. For Apple, it allowed them to grow at a pace consistent with their production capacity. For AT&T, it gave them something exclusive that drew a huge customer base they they otherwise would never have.
Today, the Apple story is different and they are ready to break out huge but AT&T's conservative technical growth until recently is what's limiting the sales. It's a real good thing that Apple is breaking out to all carriers because I doubt Verizon will be able to handle the load alone.
IF the islate or whatever they will call it is offered with an exclusivity to one carrier, I won't like it either. What I stated was not to mean that I wanted Apple to have a mobile carrier service, what I wanted was for Apple to have no exclusive carrier. But, I do understand why it may have been necessary in 2007 when the iphone was introduced.
All I want is to have my own choice of carriers, or no carrier and in the islate case just use it with my wifi here at home. Hopefully, today we will know what's up with Apple.