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iPhone 3G rolling worldwide, Russia coming soon
Thanks to the magic of time zones, the iPhone 3G is already on its worldwide march across 21 countries. Tipster Lawrz let us know that the handset is on sale in the Philippines from Globe Telecom, after a sold-out party that started at 10 p.m. local time counting down to midnight August 22. It's already Friday in India, and midnight is just now crossing Europe, as of this writing. Also, tipster Efthymios tells us that Vodafone Hellas is distributing unlocked iPhone 3Gs, as is the law there. 8GB models are €499 and 16GB models are €569. Contracts plans for the handsets have not been announced, but should be available in the next few hours. (Update: and here they are.) However, Efthymios notes that Greek character input is not yet available for the iPhone, with many people having to resort using "Greeklish" instead: Greek words typed with English characters. Reuters notes today that Russia will also be getting the iPhone 3G in October. Apple struck a deal with the country's largest mobile provider, MTS, which has nearly 84 million subscribers. Thanks, Lawrz and Efthymios! [MTS details via Macworld]
August 22: Big day for iPhone abroad
Mark your calendars for August 22, when many countries will start offering the iPhone 3G for sale. Here's a list of the countries that are expecting launches that Friday (and their associated carriers, in parentheses): Argentina (America Movil) Chile (Claro/America Movil, Movistar/Telefonica) Colombia (America Movil) Czech Republic (Telefonica O2, T-Mobile, Vodafone) Thanks, Luke and Tom! Ecuador (Porta/America Movil, Movistar/Telefonica) Thanks, Andy! El Salvador (America Movil) Estonia (TeliaSonera, EMT) Guatemala (America Movil) Greece (Vodafone Hellas) Honduras (America Movil) Hungary (T-Mobile) India (Bharti Airtel, Vodafone) Latvia (TeliaSonera) Lithuania (TeliaSonera) Paraguay (America Movil) Peru (Claro/America Movil, Movistar/Telefonica) Philippines (Globe Telecom) Poland (Orange, Era) Romania (Orange) Slovakia (T-Mobile, Orange) Thanks, Hannah and Bulu! Uruguay (America Movil) Apple said last month that 20 countries would be getting iPhone 3G on the 22nd. Singapore is also rumored to be releasing the iPhone 3G that day, but SingTel hasn't confirmed their participation yet. In other news, Virgin Mobile is now offering iPhone 3G service in Australia. This addition gives the country four providers to choose from: Vodafone, Optus, and Telstra are the other three. Sadly -- according to this article, they're already out of stock. [Compiled with help from setteB.it, VentureBeat and AppleInsider.]
Ecuador pushes carriers toward socialization
Stung with apparently widespread, systematic technical problems on its cell networks, Ecuador's taking measures to clamp down on a pair of foreign firms that together control some 96 percent of the nation's market. Porta -- a unit of Mexico's America Movil -- and Telefonica's Movistar have been told that they've got a couple choices: either allow the government to snap up more control over the airwaves, improve reliability, and lower costs to consumers, or scram. Both carriers are due for renegotiation on their contracts, giving the government gobs of leverage. What's more, Porta's under official investigation for its service failures (for which it's facing sanctions) and has to have its network in tip-top shape by next month, so it's all just a little hairy at the moment. Officials are pressing the carriers to contribute one percent of their revenue to a fund set up to provide service to Ecuador's poor; we're certainly not professional negotiators here, but if we were Porta or Movistar right now, we might go ahead and agree to make that happen if we wanted to stick around.
