I have ranted on a few occasions about how Canadians get reamed with respect to wireless data plans, and their cost thereof (really high), particularly with *personal* inequity I feel about not having any unlimited data plans. This made sense in a sick sort of way; after all, how could anyone charge $15 for 2 megabytes with a $10/megabyte overage without requiring six figures for an “unlimited” data plan?

And yet — the unlimited data plan has finally come to Canada.

Seems like the heralding of the almighty Jesus phone iPhone to Rogers has forced its competitor Bell to bite the bullet and, in effect, blink. While its unclear exactly when the iPhone will be coming to Canada (surely not before Christmas), it seems like Bell wanted to get on top of the ball and offer something incredibly enticing — in effect, going “over the top”, in poker parlance, waiting for Rogers to try and top it.

You might love the iPhone for all kinds of reasons; I love it already because of the kind of “price war” this is going to start, which is a very *good* thing, as it has already put unlimited data on the table, which you can be _sure_ the other wireless carriers are going to have to match.

Which, again, is excellent. I mean, unlimited data should have been an option years ago — this isn’t 1997 after all.

In a somewhat shocking maneuver, it seems like Rogers, who is the mobile carrier in Canada slated to offer the iPhone when it arrives (my money’s on next year) will, in fact, not be able to ream Canadians as they’re often wont to do, with their astronomical data transfer rates.

I had commented on this discrepancy in a prior post, but its worth mentioning in brief: In the United States, Apple’s iPhone (via AT&T) data package *starts* with unlimited data.  Such a thing doesn’t really exist in Canada, but if it did, would, I’m sure, require you to hand over your first born child, in addition to the mortgage of your house.  In the meantime, we get the privilege of getting 20 megabytes per month for the same price, which really is a pissant sum of data.  If you start out at a lower data package (for the Blackberry, for example), you’ll pay through the nose as you’ll almost certainly go over 1 megabyte simply by checking email and the odd blog page {I speak through experience}.

It turns out that Apple is going to enforce some reasonable standard as it applies to data transfer packages, as it has done in the US, and in the soon-to-be-forthcoming UK and Germany.  And to this I say “bravo”, and “hooray”.

The oligopoly that exists in Canada as it refers to most things, but not limited to mobile carriers, means that the free market determines squat, and everyone gets the benefit of paying higher “we-swear-we’re-not-colluding” prices.

The snarky translation to this is that no one is ever going to make Rogers (or Fido, or Bell, or what have you) charge *less* because there is no real business reason to do so — until now.

So while I’ve been critical of Apple in the past, I am all for a company that improves the lot of consumers everywhere — at least all individuals who have a mobile phone that is.  Because make no mistake: if Rogers is forced to offer a more generous data package, it will necessarily have to start lowering / improving all of its mobile packages across the board, and all of the other mobile carriers will undoubtedly follow suit.

I mean, that would make sense, anyway — but, I’m sure the cynic in all of us (who are familiar with such shennanigans) aren’t quite holding their breath just yet.

I’ve heard from more than one place — including at work, oddly enough — that the Jesus Phone iPhone is coming to Canada via Rogers (one of our few wireless carriers) before Christmas.

Mat Ingram points out that the price might be around $CAD 499 for an 8 gigabyte phone for a 3 year plan.

Personally, I don’t think its coming before Christmas, if only that I would have expected there to be some kind of huge marketing run up well *before* Christmas for the iPhone. God knows that you can see enough of them in Canada already by the Canadian faithful who have purchased them across the border (or, who have gotten them through other enterprising Canadians).

There are two other issues, of course, which makes its debut here — versus the US — even more interesting.

Price: Given the recent surge of the Canadian dollar (above par compared to the USD on most days now) — or the fall of the US dollar — there’s a tremendous amount of consumer pressure these days to have comparable products priced similarly here as in the United States. Am I the only one curious to see how Rogers will actually price the iPhone? I’m sure there are daily debates going on at the highest level about the pressure to absolutely ream its customers on the price vs. the public outcry against the artificially high price bump, as we’re on par with the USD now. $499 for an 8 gig model would probably be right, but its still $100 more than the same piece of technology across the border.

Data plan: I’ve written about this before, but its worth mentioning — Canadians pay more per megabyte than almost any one else in the world as it applies to wireless data plans. Let’s compare the plans for the iPhone with AT&T and, for example, a comparable plan with the BlackBerry for Rogers.

The entry plan with AT&T starts at $59.99 and you get “unlimited data and text” with 450 minutes of voice. My eyes almost fell out their head when I read that the first time.

Rogers? For $60, you get 25 megabytes of data and *nothing* else (i.e. no voice). Oh, you do get the benefit of paying an extra $7 per MB for every megabyte you go over.

So am I waiting for the iPhone in Canada? Of course I am. But only because I’ll be interested to hear the consumer debate over the whole issue as, if history is any indication, Rogers will want to milk us for all its worth — and with the Canadian dollar being on par as it is, everyone will be able to quantify exactly *how* large a new one its ripping us.