Post Orange and Vodafone iPhone announcements, everyone has started to ask us what network they should buy an iPhone 3G or iPhone 3GS on and we’ve struggled to come up with a decent answer — until now. We recently realised that picking a network for your iPhone is similar to picking a Mario character.
O2 is Yoshi, Vodafone is Mario and Orange is a tag team combo of Donkey Kong and Princess Peach. Confused? Let us explain. Similar to Yoshi, O2 is a vibrant, trendy character that’s quick off the mark — it was the first UK network to secure to the iPhone and now the Palm Pre, for example. Choosing Yoshi as your iPhone network means that you may see certain improvements added faster than the competition but be warned that it’s 3G coverage isn’t as good as the competition yet.
Vodafone is like Mario because it’s an old-school character and a powerful global brand. Similar to Mario, Vodafone has experienced a bit of a lull at times but like Mario’s triumphant return in Mario Galaxy on the Wii, Vodafone is also opening up to new ideas and hardware. Choosing Mario as your iPhone network means that you’ll get a slightly better 3G service than with Yoshi (O2), and access to services such as Vodafone Passport but you’ll have to wait until 2010 if reports are true.
Finally we get to Orange aka Donkey Kong, and due to its deal to pair up with T-Mobile, we’ve decided this is a tag team combo with Princess Peach — who needed rescuing. Donkey Kong and Orange share a powerful if not sometimes slow body that combined with Peach will hopefully mean a more refined but very powerful service. Choosing Donkey Kong and Peach as your iPhone network means that you’ll get great 3G coverage and possibly the most competitive deals if it can effectively leverage being a super-network.
Of course, this is all speculation and we’ll have to wait and see what these networks come up with but we hope this helps a bit. We’ll be keeping a close eye on all the networks, paying particular attention to Orange and T-Mobile, who are setting up to be the largest network in the UK.
Leave a Reply