Walmart on Tuesday announced that various stores had dropped the price of the iPhone 4 16GB version to just $147, slightly more than a 25% drop from the phones original $197 pricing structure.

The new pricing is available through June 30 and applies to both the black and white models of the phone. Our own Kim LaCapria picked her device up from a Walmart just outside New York City and she learned that it was the last white version of the product at that location which means they are going fast.

The offer “available only in select stories” requires a new AT&T or Verizon two-year contract and it is not available through the retail giants website.

It’s still unclear why Wal-Mart dropped the devices pricing, however with WWDC kicking off Apple hasn’t announced any price drops of their own.

Walmart Drops iPhone 4 To $147 In Select Stores is a post from: The Inquisitr

If there is one thing you can say about tech bloggers it is that they have this predilection to swallow tech hype without even stopping to burp. This is especially evident when we start taking about the various smart and extremely talented CEOs of the biggest tech companies.

However if there is one person where this is sometimes over the top it has to be Steve Jobs. No don’t get me wrong, the man deserves all the recognition in the world for saving the company he helped to start from disappearing into oblivion. He has also been the man responsible for changing our perceptions of what our computing devices should look like.

The thing is that because of these successes the Apple faithful hold him up as some sort of genius who has this uncanny ability to figure out where technology is heading.

Well let’s set one thing straight – no-one and I mean no-one knows where technology is headed. Hell some parts of our technological world can change within a day; but you can be assured that no-one knows where we will be a year from now when it comes to our technology.

Louis Gray in a post this morning trotted out this typical line of Steve Jobs as a master visionary which in the case of Apple products might be correct but in terms of technology going forward – well no more so than any other tech CEO. The second part of Louis’ statement about Jobs being a master salesman is right on the money and in that aspect Jobs reigns supreme.

In a world where technology is undergoing constant change Jobs is a visionary but only within the framework of Apple products. It is his vision that drives their products. Where he excels is as a incredible salesman trying to convince the world that Apple products are the future; and in this regard he has no peers.

That doesn’t make him any different from any other tech company CEO though who also has a vision of the company’s future and what their products will look like. It is then their job – just as it is Steve Jobs’ – to convince the world that their vision is the right one.

To claim though Steve Jobs has a lock on exactly what our tech future is going to look like is carrying the hype just a little too far.

The hyperbole of Steve Jobs as a tech visionary is a post from: The Inquisitr

The iPhone- is there anything it can’t do? A whole hell of a lot, thanks to AT&T.

Swiftly following WWDC coverage, particularly surrounding the iPhone 3gS, came an outpouring of unfettered rage in the blogosphere. The iPhone seems poised to remain the most buzzed about, sought after phone on the market, even with the Palm Pre’s attempts to cut in on market share. But will AT&T ever stop holding the iPhone back?

First up in a laundry list of grievances is cost-related. AT&T noobs can buy in on a 3G at $99. 3GS phones will set new customers and upgrade eligible customers back $199-299. Already sprung for an iPhone? Expect to be rewarded for your loyalty with an additional $200 penalty to get your grubby mitts on the shiny new models. Did I mention they’re faster and have slightly improved battery life?

Next on the list comes tethering- using your iPhone as a modem. Expect to see this feature delayed indefinitely until AT&T decides just how much they can wring out of us for it before we decide driving around for an open-WiFi connection at 2:30am is worth the hassle.

Another sore spot- MMS messaging. iPhone users have been deprived the privilege- nay, right- to ping-pong drunken kegstand pics about the airwaves as iPhones don’t support the ultra-basic function of picture messaging. AT&T gave users a target date of “sometime in late summer” but no solid information on when this will be available.

In a statement, AT&T said:

Based on independent market research, twice as many smartphone users have chosen AT&T over any other U.S. carrier.

I’m no business advisor, but I think they might want to look into ways to keep that whole momentum thing going.

AT&T: Working hard to ruin your iPhone experience is a post from: The Inquisitr

For those of you who haven’t placed themselves under some rock somewhere it is kind of hard to escape the fact that Apple hosted its World Wide Developer Conference today that saw line-ups around a whole city block. As usual the rumors and prognostications have been going strong leading up to this morning’s keynote speech and as expected primed up the troops for their dose of Apple goodness.

So I guess it’s kind of cool that they rebranded the current iPhone as … the iPhone but with a kill the Pre buzz price of $99.00. This of course opened up the way for the announcement every iPhone fan was waiting for – well at least some of what they had been hoping for. Video, Voice Control, Auto focus, and of course the holy grail of the one feature to rule them all – cut and paste. all this goodness that has existed on other smartphones for years for the price of $199 (16GB) or $299 (32GB).

Not to mention that for everywhere else except the US iPhone 3GS (S for speed WooHoo!) users would have MMS and tethering capabilities at some point after the 19th of June. For the AT&T suckers customers – well you’ll just have to wait for some undeclared future point in time.

Now the real interesting point for me was the announcement of Snow Leopard being available for $29.00. For those not familiar with this new release of OS X it is an upgrade to the existing Leopard release of the Apple operating system. For anyone else who is having to get it for the first time it’ll still cost you $149.00 (plus the cost of the Mac computer).

In other words they are issuing a service pack that has some enhancements included and you get to pay for the privilege – wow. I can just image the uproar if Microsoft started charging for their service packs, but then of course everyone knows how evil Microsoft is by selling an operating system that can run on just about any computer configuration on the market.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled Twitter love-fest and other such useful real-time ego puffing.

[picture courtesy of Digital Daily]

Apple yanks umbilical chord, fanboys get all jizzy is a post from: The Inquisitr

The iPhone 3G will be released July 11 in 22 countries: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK and the United States. The black 8GB model will be marketed at $199, while the 16GB version — to be made available in either black or white — will go for $299.

The new phone will be a smaller and sleeker design with solid metal buttons and the same large display. The added 3G support will mean data downloads almost three times faster than EDGE speeds, Jobs said. The iPhone 3G is also 36 percent faster than other comparable phones like the Nokia N95 and Treo 750, according to Apple. It will also add integrated GPS support, which will allow for “tracking” — a moving dot on a real-time Google map showing your location.

The updated model is said to have 300 hours of standby battery life and double the amount of talk-time as its predecessor, with five full hours. It will offer five to six hours of high-speed browsing, seven hours of video, or 24 hours of audio without the need to recharge.

Jobs said the updated phone will include fully built-in enterprise support, third-party application support, as well as support for more countries than ever — now 70 total — thanks to the many added features in the upcoming iPhone 2.0 software package, also announced Monday along with a slew of new third-party applications.

Apple is hanging onto its goal of 10 million iPhone sales by the end of 2008 — a mark that will no doubt be made easier once the new phones hit store shelves.

iPhone 3G To Start At $199 is a post from: The Inquisitr

Jobs’ keynote address at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference, at 10 a.m. PDT, is widely anticipated to contain the news of the new 3G-capable phone. Rumor has it the cost will drop down to $199, too, and could be available as soon as the summer.

We’ll be watching and will bring you the developments as they happen right here.

Countdown To iPhone 2.0 is a post from: The Inquisitr