O2 will allow customers to unlock their iPhones once Orange begins selling the iPhone on November 10th. 

Matthew Key, head of O2, told Times Online, “Once the iPhone becomes available on other UK networks, we will allow O2 customers to unlock their iPhones, although of course they will still need to honour any outstanding contract period they have. At the end of their contract period, they are entirely free to move to another operator — though naturally we hope they won’t want to! “ 

When asked why O2’s 3G network was struggling, Key made these comments. 

“The O2 network has seen an 18-fold increase in data carried over the network in the last year and traffic continues to double every three months…” 

…”We are investing more than £30 million to address capacity issues in London alone between now and Christmas and I’m confident that we’ll see much improved levels of service as a result.” 

(via iClarified.com)

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AT&T has confirmed that contract-free iPhone 3Gs will be coming to the market next Thursday! That’s awesome knews for those who can’t afford to be tied down to a contract just to get an iPhone!

Each phone will cost $400 more than their subsidized versions at $599 for the 8GB and $699 for the 16GB. The phones will still remain locked to AT&T and will require the standard iPhone data plan.

(via iPhone-Hacks.com)

Most point out this move as an indication of the iPhone 3G’s end of service as the most recent version of the iPhone.

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AT&T will begin offering “no commitment” pricing on the iPhone 3G beginning on March 26, without any service contract requirement, according to a report leaking an internal company training memo.

The report, posted by Boy Genius, says that AT&T will only offer the iPhone 3G at its “no commit” price of $599 for the 8GB version or $699 for the 16GB model to existing customers, and limit them to one unit each at that price.

However, the document also notes that AT&T has no way of tracking if the user has already bought a unit at the no commit price within the company’s billing system, although AT&T retail stores “can see the transaction through OPUS [AT&T's point of sale system] if the device was purchased through AT&T COR [a company-operated retail store].”

The document says “AT&T is restricting the No-Commit price to existing customers who wish to add a line, purchase as a gift, or perform and [sic] upgrade and are not eligible for the Qualified or Early upgrade price.”

“Qualified pricing” refers to the standard $199/$299 price of the iPhone 3G when obtained with a two year contract commitment. For AT&T users who recently received a contract subsidized phone of any kind, AT&T charges an “Early Upgrade price” that is $200 more than the iPhone 3G’s qualified price: $399/$499. It also requires a two year contract extension.

The no-committment iPhone models from AT&T incur a device activation fee when used with AT&T’s service, and also require a data plan, although device activation is not required at the point of sale.

The new “no-commit” sales program appears to be an effort to push out remaining iPhone 3G inventory prior to the launch of the next iPhone, due sometime this summer. Last year, Apple similarly allowed the existing inventory of iPhones to dry up to the point where almost no iPhones were left for several weeks prior to the launch of iPhone 3G.

Other iPhone 3G partners are similarly discounting iPhone sales to move inventory, which has resulted in various dire rumors about the iPhone’s prospects, not unlike last year when certain pundits jumped all over “falling sales” of the original iPhone during the months when inventory levels dried up completely.

(via AppleInsider.com)

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