Ross Rubin, in the Switched On Engadget column:

But now the indications are stronger than ever that Apple will imbue its music player-turned-mobile platform into a carrier-free vehicle for bridging the space of face-to-face communications and the time between capturing video and editing it.

Apple (together with Nokia) is indeed the mobile phone manufacturer that’s closest to it. But this is not the carrier-free that matters the most. The carrier-free that’s still waiting to happen is when mobile device sales and data access services are totally decoupled, a model that will succeed when carriers are brave enough to design a valid go to market strategy for the growing number of data-connected devices.

The challenge is to stop controlling and subsidizing the terminal and start adding value to their side of things, that is, the access. As the number of connected devices per person grows, a competent contract model that’s appealing for both the end and corporate user is needed. Just thing about the cost of having a laptop 3G USB modem, a 3G-enabled phone and a 3G-enabled iPad. All of this when already paying for a DSL connection.

They know what to do. They just don’t have what it takes yet.