Interest is high in the phone – but I have not met a single person who said they are going to buy one.. And I speak to well over 300 Japanese every week. Even I, a total self confessed Mac Head am having second thoughts… the phone is just not up to scratch in Japan – lacking some of the features I mentioned above.

It is also nearly double the cost per month (for me and Im a reasonably heavy user), locked into a contract for 2 years… making it difficult to upgrade to a new handset next year.

Ultimately I think that the iPhone in Japan will be about status and brand… and not about functionality… so it will depend how much people are willing to pay for that… And Im not sure it is worth the 115/month.

But even if it's true, 9% said the “plan to buy one”–that's a plan to buy, not a faint, conditional interest, and that represents millions of people “planning” to buy an iPhone before most people in Japan had even *heard* of the iPhone. Once it starts selling and gets a lot of publicity, sales should go up. Like with the iPod in Japan, it will be a bit slow to catch on at first, but will then take off quickly. I doubt that as many as 9% will buy it, even in the first 2 years–but if even half that number buy an iPhone in the first year after it is released, it will be a huge success for Apple.

Why don't people reporting on this bogus survey get these points? They should be obvious….

Interest is high in the phone – but I have not met a single person who said they are going to buy one.. And I speak to well over 300 Japanese every week. Even I, a total self confessed Mac Head am having second thoughts… the phone is just not up to scratch in Japan – lacking some of the features I mentioned above.

It is also nearly double the cost per month (for me and Im a reasonably heavy user), locked into a contract for 2 years… making it difficult to upgrade to a new handset next year.

Ultimately I think that the iPhone in Japan will be about status and brand… and not about functionality… so it will depend how much people are willing to pay for that… And Im not sure it is worth the 115/month.

But even if it's true, 9% said the “plan to buy one”–that's a plan to buy, not a faint, conditional interest, and that represents millions of people “planning” to buy an iPhone before most people in Japan had even *heard* of the iPhone. Once it starts selling and gets a lot of publicity, sales should go up. Like with the iPod in Japan, it will be a bit slow to catch on at first, but will then take off quickly. I doubt that as many as 9% will buy it, even in the first 2 years–but if even half that number buy an iPhone in the first year after it is released, it will be a huge success for Apple.

Why don't people reporting on this bogus survey get these points? They should be obvious….

As for UV breaking the news on the price – even your article links to the blog that did… and then that blog links to the Japanese blog that did.. so credit where it is due huh!!