Congress is looking into the deal between Apple and AT&T. Some people said it was creating a monopoly. Which it isn't because Apple should choose who they do business with and who they didn't. Apple is a small time player in the cellular phone market and probably will be for a long time. 1 million phones sold is nothing. However being congress, they will probably write a law that makes such deals illegal. This means that cellphone companies cannot enter into deals to provide their newest phones to companies of their choice. The cellular providers won't have the contracts to offset prices and so therefore general phone prices will increase. Actually fits in well with lawmakers since they get powerful lobbying funds from both manufacturers and providers. The manufacturers will end up making more money because their phone will sell for 50-80 percent more and providers will make more money because people will bounce between them more than they do now and they can raise prices easier.
Just the consumer that suffers because of increasing prices. Personally, I am against such a law because the iPhone is less than 1% of the market but is driven by hype. Such a law would effectively end the last of the oversight provided against these companies and protecting consumers from getting gouged. Sometimes the free market is not the best for the consumer.
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11-15-2007, 04:16 AM
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