To lessen line waiting time and avoid overworking already-frazzled AT&T employees, Apple is letting you activate your iPhone and choose your rate plan via iTunes.
Watch this video tutorial to learn how:
iTunes
iPhone Will Require iTunes Registration
Apple said in an email yesterday that an iTunes Store account will be required to set up the iPhone. In addition to using the iTunes Store to sell media to iPhone owners, Apple will likely issue iPhone upgrades via the store.
Registering for an iTunes Store account will require some of your financial information, although you won’t necessarily have to purchase anything.
Update Your iPhone Without Buying Another
Apple said it will be able to add features to iPhones after they have been purchased, says the New York Times.
“The company’s executives say that the capability to upgrade the iPhone in the field will give it a significant advantage over other cellphones, which are usually replaced frequently.”
This is great news. Now you won’t have to wait to buy iPhone 2.0 to enjoy new features like (hopefully) 3G, GPS and a video camera.
Song in iPhone Commercial: “Inside Your Head”
In case you were wondering, the song in the original iPhone commercial, which first aired during the 2007 Oscars, is “Inside Your Head” by Eberg.
The song first gained some popularity back when The OC aired it in a 4th season episode. You can download Eberg’s “Inside Your Head” from the iTunes music store.
iPhone to Block Non-iTunes Music/Video Downloads
“The iPhone will be prevented from directly downloading music or video itself, even though it is a wireless broadband-capable device,” according to Fortune’s Brent Schlender.
This really puts a damper on iPhone’s irresistibility element. If you’re paying $500-$600 up-front for the iPhone plus a monthly cell phone service fee, you should be permitted to download whatever the hell you want, I think.
“To get songs or shows into the iPhone, you still have to tether it, via a docking cradle, to a Mac or a PC, even though it easily should be able to handle this task all by itself,” said Schlender.
Schlender thinks Steve Jobs’ pro-consumer, anti-DRM rant might have been just “a gambit to force Apple’s content suppliers to renegotiate their deals and make it possible to download music and video directly onto the iPhone.”
What You Can Do
- Not buy an iPhone
- Call Apple’s Public Relations office @ (408) 974-2042 and tell them how much this sucks
- Deal with it 🙁
Steve Jobs Turns Against DRM; iPhone Ploy?
“A world where every online store sells DRM-free music encoded in open licensable formats � is clearly the best alternative for consumers,” Steve Jobs said earlier this week in an open letter he posted on the Apple website titled “Thoughts on Music.”
Jobs said he wants to get rid of FairPlay, the Digital Rights Management (DRM) technology that prevents songs downloaded on iTunes from being loaded onto MP3 players other than Apple’s iPod.
While it may be that Apple is simply adapting to consumer demand for DRM-free music, it’s also possible (not unlikely, I think) that Steve Jobs’ new stance on DRM is intended to sway software companies and other online music and video vendors into selling DRM-free music so that it may be uploaded onto Apple’s upcoming iPhone.