Day: June 10, 2008

Dad wrote in with an update on how the Alaskan cruise is going:

“Just letting you know that our trip is going well. We are in Juneau today .We have been sailing up until now. Greg and i went up 1850 ft. in a gondola today while everyone else shopped. Tomorrow we will stop in Skagway. The weather has been quite cool 10-12degrees C”
Now, I decided to check out Google Maps to see where they were at.  I have no idea what you all think about when you’re thinking of an Alaskan Cruise but I just thought about them travelling the ocean and then stopping in some ports along the way.
That’s what they are doing but I was surprised to see that Juneau and Skagway are off the beaten path and it looks like it’s inland quite a bit.  I guess I just assumed it would be on the sea most of the time.  Either way, it sounds like they are having a great time and the weather has been agreeable so far!

While I don’t have a cellphone, nor do I plan on getting one anytime soon, my curiosity was piqued when I saw that the new iPhone is being released next month and it will be available in Canada (legally) for the first time.

Now, a few of my friends already have the iPod Touch and it’s a killer gizmo. It’s basically an iPhone without the phone part (and a few other things missing, but very few). So I wanted to see how the new iPhone stacked up in comparison to the existing iPod Touch.

Well, the 16GB iPhone is planning to arrive at a $300USD pricepoint. Taking the current exchange rate into account, let’s assume that in Canada they will price it a) The same price but in Canadian dollars or b)People can just cross the border and pick it up for $300USD.

That being said, I just checked out the price for a 16GB iPod Touch and the lowest price I could find was $359 at Future Shop.

I don’t know if they have planned this, or if they are going to slash prices on the iPod Touch, but it seems to me that the better choice would be to buy the ‘more features, less priced’ iPhone which does exactly the same thing as the iPod Touch (if not more!).

The only caveat is that maybe the iPhone is only available if you purchase a cellphone plan but something tells me that won’t be the case. I’m sure if I enter the cellphone store and say “I want to fork out $300 for this iPhone but not activate the phone portion” they will be fine with that.

So, is there something up Apple’s sleeve? Are they finally putting the iPod to bed now that the price has come down on the iPhone to make the iPod obsolete? Or will there be a price slash in the near future on these iPods?

Either way, I know my iPod has been crapping out on me for the past six months but I’m going to keep it until it dies completely.  It still works if I give it a good old whack against a hard object or drop it to the floor from a three foot drop.  But it’s reassuring to see that the prices are coming down.