So I bought an iphone in Japan

People in Japan were as impressed by the touch technology as anyone else, but overall, the iphone hasn't done very well in Japan. In North America, where the only other things to compare it to are Nokia and Blackberries, it's considered "The Jesus Phone". But here, its just an interesting contender with some fatal flaws. For a long time it didn't have emojis, the animated emoticons that play such a vital role in Japanese text messaging. Second, the camera is lower quality than the ones on phones many carriers give away. And third, it doesn't have a digital 1-seg TV tuner, meaning people with an iphone are missing out on the hottest new cell application here.

And fourth- it just costs too much. Even in America the iphone bills are steep. But then, so are most cell phone bills in general. But in Japan, unlimited data rate plans hovering around $40-50 a month have been common for about 5 years. I went to the carrier's store to look into getting one, and they wanted me to pay $300 for the phone and what would likely work out to be about $90 a month total, even if I never actually used the phone and just used it for web browsing. Why bother? In short the iphone is good...but just not so much better than the run-of-the-mill cell phones here that you would willingly pay double to get one. I know some high-income foreigners that have it, but for the most part, the iphone is just kind of curiosity here, like maybe an antique car, or a craftmatic adjustable bed- everyone is interested to see you have one, but that doesn't mean they would ever seriously consider buying one themselves.

So Apple, or at least their carrier in Japan, Softbank, did something you rarely see- they compromised. The iphone is now available at a reduced rate- free. And the basic unlimited data plan has been reduced from extortionary rates down to about 4400 yen, $40 a month. Now that's more like it! I pay about $45 a month, or 5000 yen for unlimited web browsing on AU (the PC site viewer). The Softbank sales rep worked his way through the Byzantine cell phone plans and figured out a way where I only pay 980 yen for the phone end of the service (and get free calls anywhere in the country to other softbank customers, should I ever use the phone). All told, it'll run me 5711 yen a month for service. That's less than 6 bucks a month than what I pay for web access now, and I get a free iphone for giving them my business.

Side note- Obviously the iphone has less memory than by current ipod classic, I don't have to worry about storage space either, because with the simplify media app, I can stream all the
music on my own computer, and since I have unlimited data I don't even have to worry about racking up charges. Cool eh?