It may also reflect that there aren’t any new must have features this year as well in the Japanese. Last year 1seg TV tuners were the must have feature and frankly, judging by advertisements, the current features being pushed are iPhone like touch screen operation (zooming of photographs, etc.) for a few features and photoediting on the phone. I don’t know whether young adults are going to be motivated to change phones for that, especially since the phones cost more. Also, most of the cellphone operators are selling phones for a little down and monthly payments so the monthly cost has changed that much. Of course being economical middle aged geek, I only change phones when there’s either some feature that I really want or the rechargeable battery goes bad about the time that a fairly desirable 9 month old model becomes heavily discounted (generally coinciding with the end of the contract period for my old phone).

It’s the usual thing. “Be careful what you wish for, you may get it.”

We complain about the carrier-subsidized model in the same way that we complained about airline food. Of course, that was back when we had airline food.

Go to a college campus and look at all the students with Blackberries. Blackberries in Apple.edu? Why yes, because the Blackberries cost $49.95 with a 2-year contract.