iPhone 5 prerelease politics leave 3G enabled iPod touch 5 dangling
Shortly after its introduction, Steve Jobs quipped that the iPod touch was “training wheels for iPhone,” suggesting that the only reason the device was on the market was because Apple was expecting all iPhone lusters to switch over to AT&T and buy one when their contract was up. That happened in far less capacity than Apple must have expected, however, and it eventually had to relent and expand the iPhone to Verizon (this spring with the iPhone 4) and now Sprint (with the iPhone 5 release date). In the interim years, the iPod touch became the de facto other-pocket occupier for those on non-AT&T carriers who wanted a part of the iOS experience but were sticking with a phone they didn’t want from the carrier they did want rather than going with an AT&T iPhone. That meant Apple had to transform the iPod touch into something more than the crippled punchline it was in its initial iteration…
The first iPod touch had no volume buttons, no camera, no email client, and Jobs admitted it only had a web browser for the purpose of signing onto wifi networks so users could use the mobile iTunes Store (which launched the same day as the original iPod touch, something Jobs may have ultimately regretted). Rather than being the cheap starter-toy Apple envisioned it as buyers quickly transitioned over to the iPhone with their next purchase, the touch became a long term proposition for Verizon, Sprint, and T-Mobile holdouts. Eventually they demanded the product be improved, and slowly but surely, it gained feature parity with the iPhone – except the part where it had no access to any network based functionality beyond wifi, but that’s another story. What mattered is that, network-crippled or not, the iPod touch became an accidental full-fledged product line of its own over the years. But with the rise of the iPhone 5 on (nearly) ever carrier once its release date gets here, the iPod touch may actually see its end rather than seeing an iPod touch 5…
Such a move might be on the extreme side. There are, for instance, parents who buy the iPod touch for their kids specifically because it’s not a phone, which they don’t want their kid to have. But the rise of the 3G enabled iPad and iPad 2 shows the popularity of mobile-data-enabled mobile devices, as the 3G model now vastly outsells the wifi-only iPad. That leaves Apple with two options going forward. One is to build 3G (or 4G, as it may be) into the iPod touch 5 and include an optional monthly data plan with it, as is the case with the 3G iPad. The other is to offer a non-contract iPhone whose “phone” functionality is only active if activated, and have that replace the iPod touch. Whether this device would be an iPhone 5, or an iPhone 4S, or even a warmed over iPhone 4, is another story. But with the traditional launch date of the new iPod touch having come and gone with few expressing consternation over the matter, it points to the iPod touch (as it’s currently defined) perhaps having outlived its usefulness. Now comes the part where Apple rectifies that by either juicing up the touch or burying it. But we won’t get to find out which until the iPhone 5 itself is ready to dance.
Source - [ beatweek.com ]
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