(This post was originally posted on our miniListings blog. Since it contains pretty generic advice, we decided to post it here in case you missed it over there.)

After months (and months, and months, and months, and…) of rumors, Verizon and Apple announced yesterday that the iPhone will be available on Big Red starting February 10. The first question for many people now is what do I do? Well, it depends on your situation. Here are a few scenarios I’ve come up with and my personal recommendations based on reviewing the announcement and various media comments.

Scenario #1: I already have an iPhone, should I switch to Verizon?

I’ll spend the most time on this scenario, as it the one facing most of you. A lot of you are fed up with AT&T’s service, especially in cities like New York and San Francisco. However, in the majority of places, AT&T’s service has not been bad. My recommendation is that unless you are getting downright awful service from AT&T, don’t run out and switch. Keep in mind the following:

• If you upgraded to an iPhone 4 last summer, you will have to pay a hefty early termination fee to leave AT&T. Ask youself, is the AT&T service really that bad that I am willing to drop the $200 (or more) it may take to leave AT&T?
• Your existing iPhone is not compatible on the Verizon network, so you will also need to purchase a new phone when switching. This is going to cost you a minimum of $200 for the 16GB model. You may be able to offset some of the cost by selling your old phone, but I am guessing there will be a lot for sale in next couple of months, driving the price down.
• If you surf the net while on the phone, you will be very disappointed with the Verizon iPhone. Due to technology limitations on the Verizon network, you cannot access data services while talking on the iPhone.
• If you do a lot of travelling overseas, the Verizon iPhone will not work in countries that use GSM instead of Verizon’s CDMA technology. This includes all of Western Europe and the majority of Eastern Asia. Heavy overseas travelers are best served sticking it out with AT&T.
• In general, CDMA phones are slightly slower than GSM phones, so you may notice that the Verizon iPhone may be a little slower than your AT&T iPhone.

So when would it make sense to switch?

• Your iPhone is unusable in the places you need to use your phone most (like your home or office) because AT&T’s coverage is poor or non-existent. If Verizon’s coverage is better, spend the money so your phone is usable.
• If your company has a corporate Verizon plan, it may be cheaper to switch to Verizon rather than paying your own way on AT&T. You will need to do your own analysis to see how long it would take to break-even on the switch over.
• If you are no longer under contract with AT&T (meaning you have the iPhone 3G), then you are in the best position. AT&T and Verizon are in a brutal fight over market share to be #1, so you can play them off each other to get the best deal.

Scenario #2: I’m already a Verizon customer and have been waiting for the iPhone to upgrade.

To begin with, you are the big winner – your dreams have been answered! However, before getting caught up in the euphoria and immediately purchasing an iPhone, be aware that Apple regularly refreshes the iPhone every summer. I suspect this summer will be no different and that we will see the iPhone 5. What will it bring? It could bring support for Verizon’s upgraded LTE network, a faster processor, and/or a better form factor. No one knows for sure as Apple closely guards all future device plans. Rumor also has it that Verizon is putting some hefty termination fees and upgrade restrictions on the iPhone. Make sure you understand what the upgrade restrictions and fees are so you can make an informed decision about your purchase.

Consider this: The iPhone 5 will most likely be available in July. You’ve already waited 4 years for the iPhone to land on Verizon, what’s another 6 months?

Scenario #3: I just upgraded my phone on Verizon, should I switch to the iPhone?

In short, my answer is no, unless you are completely tied into the Apple environment with a Mac, iTunes, Apple TV and more. In other words, you are a die-hard Apple loyalist (or fanboy as many people refer to you). Android has significantly closed the gap on Apple in terms of functionality, and Verizon offers the best Android phones out there. Unless you have a really good reason for switching, you may be disappointed to find out that the iPhone is not that much better than the Android device you just got, and in some areas could even be worse (gasp!).

Scenario #4: I like the carrier I’m on (T-mobile or Sprint), but want the iPhone, should I jump to Verizon?

Wow, this is a good question and quite the dilemma to be in. Well, we know that the exclusivity with AT&T is over, so I would expect that it is only a matter of time before the iPhone shows up on Sprint and T-mobile. If you’re under contract, I would recommend waiting it out. If you’re not under contract, it’s a personal decision on how bad you want the iPhone. I suspect that if you weren’t already desperate enough to switch to AT&T, then you can wait – at least until the iPhone 5 comes out.

In summary

To be blunt, the iPhone showing up on Verizon is a bigger deal to the media and financial analysts than it should be to you. I am sure that you will see many pundits talking about how important this is for Apple and Verizon. I’m sure you will also see people lining up outside Verizon and Apple stores leading up to the February 10 launch.  Make sure you don’t get caught up in the hype and make an informed decision that you won’t soon after regret.

If there are any other scenarios you’d like me to weigh in on, feel free to ask in the comments. I’d be more than happy to give you my two cents and help you with your decision process!

In other comments at the conference, Verizon inidcated that tiered pricing for mobile data usage is coming within the next six months. With Sprint CEO Dan Hesse hinting at the same thing for his network, I am fearful that carrier greed could become the biggest impediment to mobile broadband adoption. I understand that the carriers need to make money, and that networks cost money to build, but if consumers start getting charged by the bit to download emails, access the web and watch streaming content, I suspect that mobile broadband adoption will slow – considerably. Lets face it, the internet as we know it today didn’t really take off until flat rate broadband pricing to the home was introduced. If the carriers begin metering users, many of the most innovative services that are being developed for mobile, like streaming content, will suffer and could die, killing innovation. In other words, the biggest impediment to carriers signing up more mobile broadband customers are most likely the carriers themselves.

Finally, I want to wrap up this week with another fun video featuring Dot, “the world’s smallest stop-motion animation character.” At first glance, this would appear off-topic on a blog focused on mobile, except for the fact that it was shot using a Nokia N8 cellphone equipped with a microscope attachment. I can still remember the days when my Dad had to carry around not only a TV studio-sized camera but also the entire VCR unit itself to shoot home movies. Now they can be shot on a device that not only produces better home movies than that old video camera but also takes pictures, plays music and lets you talk to anyone in the world at anytime. Truly amazing when you consider the progression of technology over the last 30 years!

In other handset news, Nokia and BlackBerry maker RIM, two manufacturers that are falling out of favor with investors, made major announcements last week. At their self-hosted Nokia World Show, Nokia touted that they are still the industry leader with 260,000 smartphone activations a day (compared to Android’s 200,000 and iOS’ 80,000). Unfortunately, perception is reality, and while Nokia still has the lead, they are suffering from a perception problem that John Biggs at MobileCrunch so eloquently describes. Along those same lines, RIM announced earnings last week. While the results blew past analyst expectations and a bright future was painted by management, the reality remains that Android continues to rapidly close the gap on RIM’s dominance in North America according to the latest ComScore stats. Both RIM and Nokia had better not be content to rest on their laurels because as they say in the mutual fund world – “past performance is not an indication of future performance.” I’m not surprised that Nokia and RIM are doing well when you look at past and current stats. When you look at trends, though, both Nokia and RIM should be concerned, and I mean very concerned.

As usual, I wanted to wrap up this week on a fun note. Motorola is launching a Star Wars themed R2-D2 Droid handset later this year on Verizon. While the hardware and wallpapers for the device look cool, they are not nearly as cool as this prototype Star Trek Communicator themed Nokia device. It’s quite a shame that only 14 were made back in 2008. I’m not even a Star Trek fan, and I found this concept prototype just too cool. Definitely worth spending the 9 minutes to watch the video.

Kicking things off, rumors about the iPhone becoming available outside of AT&T continue to grow, which given the results of a JD Power and Associates study highlighting AT&T’s poor network performance, can’t happen soon enough for many people. The chic rumor is that the iPhone is coming to Verizon given Apple’s orders for CDMA chipsets. While this is what most people want, another possibility raised last week is that Apple is creating a “world-phone” iPhone. In other words, one device that is compatible with mobile networks around the world. I think this a better possibility than a Verizon iPhone. A “world-phone” iPhone could also lead to the phone landing on T-mobile, which is another rumor that is gaining momentum. Of course, Apple’s lips are sealed, so I don’t suspect that we will know anything until the day after it happens, at best!

Speaking of AT&T, executives at the company have implied that the new BlackBerry Torch sales are not meeting expectations. Not a good sign for BlackBerry, who is continuing to struggle against the rising tide of Android devices. It is also rumored that many of BlackBerry’s best customers, like financial institutions, are starting to experiment with iPhone and Android devices. As I mentioned before, BlackBerry would be best served to keep their “bread-and-butter” enterprise customers happy and forget about competing in the consumer market.

In Android news, T-mobile announced the G2 device – the follow-on to the G1 who many consider “the original” Android device. The device looks great on paper, but the best part could be that it will run a stock Android build. In other words, no carrier crapware or special UI’s like Sense, TouchWiz or MotoBlur. If my NexusOne is any indication, this means that it will be one of the first devices to get new Android builds, which I’ve found to be one of the best, if not the best, feature of the NexusOne.

Another hot rumor last week is that Microsoft will launch Windows Phone 7 October 11 in a flashy New York City event. Microsoft has committed over $500MM to the launch of their latest mobile OS, so I would expect this event to be quite the party. Unfortunately, I don’t think that I’ll be on the invite list, but I’m willing to tag along as someone’s guest if you need company for the week….

Finally, Nokia is preparing to launch the Nokia N8, their latest attempt to head off the iPhone and Android juggernaut. In order to build buzz for the device, they released a rather racy, but not over the top, interactive video featuring a self-described “sizzling hot” model. Is Nokia worried that the N8 cannot stand on its own, or is this a genius move by Nokia to create buzz about the device? I’ve embedded the video below, and I’ll let you be the judge.

The prevailing opinion is that Verizon will help Apple sell a lot more iPhones. While I am sure that there would be an opening weekend feeding frenzy for the devices, I don’t see Apple as the big winner – Android will be.

Why?

1. The iPhone is a shiny object
Apple is exactly what Verizon wants to lure more people into its stores. Once there, they will see lots of great phones, Android phones: the Droid Incredible, the Droid X, the Fascinate, and the Droid 2. All of these devices can hold their own with the iPhone. Plus most of these phones will be cheaper than the iPhone. I’m willing to bet a lot of casual buyers will get drawn into a Verizon store because of the iPhone but leave with an Android device.

2. Verizon’s bait-and-switch strategy
Verizon will heavily market the iPhone to draw people into their stores, but once there, people will see signs pushing Android, and lots of them. Verizon has clearly aligned itself with Google. Verizon and Google’s joint net neutrality proposal and rumors of a Google Chrome tablet exclusive for Verizon should indicate who Verizon’s real partner is.

3. Just another face in the crowd
At an AT&T store, the best device was an iPhone, hands down. Not the case in the Verizon store. Instead of being the top dog, the iPhone will be just another smartphone. In fact, people will notice greater diversity with Android handsets with regards to form factor and screen size as well as features like a slide out keyboard. Android offers a lot more versatility over the one-size-fits-all iPhone approach.

4. There’s no reason to wait
If someone really wanted the iPhone, they should already have it from AT&T. Sure AT&T service on the iPhone is poor, but people who want the iPhone  have already moved past that and just sucked it up – they’ve had four years to switch carriers. The only place there could be some pent-up demand is on corporate Verizon accounts where it was cost prohibitive for people to switch.

5. New customers, but only for Verizon
The majority of people who want the iPhone on Verizon want to switch from AT&T. A recent study showed that 1 in 3 AT&T iPhone users want to switch. I believe this is the same group who are feeding the rumors as well. They must think that if they wish it hard enough, Verizon will pick up the iPhone and give them freedom from AT&T. In fact, if the Verizon iPhone winner is Android, the loser is AT&T.

The bottom line – it’s inevitable that the iPhone, or an Apple equivalent, will make it to Verizon. It would be silly for Apple not to let it happen. If I was Google, I wouldn’t be concerned. In fact, I’d relish it. It will only fuel Android’s rapid growth.

Following up on last week’s statistics, two more interesting reports were released last week. The first I’d like to highlight is from Chetan Sharma, a consultant in the mobile industry. He reports on mobile statistics quarterly, and his latest report indicated that mobile phone penetration is the US is nearing 100%. The number needs to be taken with a grain of salt as a lot of people these days are carrying two phones (me included), so the real number is likely lower – probably around 75-80%. Still yet, even at 80%, it’s clear that the mobile market in the US is nearing saturation and that brands and companies who do not have a mobile marketing strategy are missing out on a great opportunity to connect with consumers.

The other interesting report was released by the Gartner Group. The first statistic to highlight from the report is that mobile device sales grew 13.8% last quarter, so the market is definitely healthy and growing. A more telling statistic was that Android surpassed the iPhone in units sold worldwide last quarter, and outsold RIM in the US. As I pointed out in last week’s wrap-up, Android just keeps on rolling. Units sold is a clear trend of future overall marketshare, so I would expect to see Android make more gains in overall handset marketshare in the coming quarters.

Speaking of Android, two new Android handsets of note were released last week – the Motorola Droid 2 on Verizon and the Dell Streak on AT&T. The Droid 2 is a refresh of the original Droid while the Streak is an interesting “hybrid” device. I say “hybrid” because it sports a 5″ screen which makes it much larger than what people consider a phone but smaller than the new tablet form factor established by the iPad. It seems like an awkward tweener size, so I’m expecting it to be a device people will use a companion to a simple flip phone rather than their primary device. Either way, the diversity of Android devices in terms of screen sizes, features and form factors is exactly why Android is dominating the market. As opposed to the one size fits all Apple approach and the flavor of the month QWERTY keyboard BlackBerry approach, Android devices are available in all sorts of shapes and sizes at all types of price ranges. It’s easy to find an Android device that has the features you want to fit your budget.

Finally for this week is a fun survey that was released by dating site OK Cupid. The survey talks about how to make yourself look more attractive in digital photos (seems like it would be important for online dating). So what does this have to do with mobile? Well, about halfway down the page is a claim that iPhone users have more sex than Android and BlackBerry owners. So here’s the question, are the results of the survey accurate, or do iPhone users just tend to stretch the truth more than their smartphone counterparts?

With the hot summer handset releases behind us, who is the worldwide leader in the market? According to Strategy Analytics, Nokia (remember them?) sold the greatest share of the 308M handsets sold in Q2. Nokia’s share was 36.1%, follwed by Samsung at 20.7%, and LG at 10%. RIM, the only dedicated smartphone maker in the top 5, came in fourth at 3.6%. So while smartphones grab all of the media attention, the low-end of the market accounts for all the volume. If the market is largest at the low end, then why are all the manufacturers chasing the smartphone market? Because that’s where all the profits are. For example, Apple is nowhere to be seen on the market share list, yet they are far and away the most profitable mobile phone company.

Speaking of market share, a report on mobile search was released by StatCounter last week. At the top of the heap was Google, with a whopping 98.29% share of the market. I’m not sure how accurate the numbers are, but even if they are off by 20%, that’s still a dominant share of the market. If that doesn’t convince you that you should have a mobile presence that Google can index, then you’re losing lots of business to your competitors who do have one - without even knowing about it! Both Yahoo! and Bing, the two other big mobile search providers, account for just 1.25% of the market. On the bright side, I guess Yahoo! and Bing’s share can only get bigger, because it certainly can’t get any smaller!

Finally, just to kick start everyone’s favorite rumor mill, I am going to jump on the bandwagon and say that AT&T’s iPhone exclusivity may be coming to an end this year. Why? Well, AT&T made a statement that they are going to be the premier vendor for Microsoft’s latest mobile operating system, Windows Phone 7. I don’t understand why AT&T would back a competitor to the iPhone unless their exclusivity is coming to an end. It’s time to place your bets. I say that the iPhone is available on another carrier for the holidays, and I’ll predict T-mobile over Verizon since T-mobile’s GSM technology is the most compatible with AT&T and Apple, out of spite, wants to stick it to Verizon for their Android promoting, iPhone-bashing ads. What do you think? Feel free to sound off in the comments!

The releases of these new smartphones have not been without troubles. Even the iPhone 4.0 has had its share of issues, primarily with reception. The issue got so bad that it forced Apple to hold a press conference with Steve Jobs responding to the criticism. In Apple style, they did a great job of spinning the problem and declaring the iPhone reception as good (or as bad, depending on your viewpoint) as every other smartphone. I thought the point of paying the “Apple tax” was to be a cut above everyone else, not as good as the competition. Either way, the iPhone 4.0 is still the class of the field these days, and it certainly helped Apple post great earnings for last quarter. Whether you love Apple or hate them, one thing is certain – they are posting impressive results!

In addition to the iPhone 4.0, the Droid X from Motorola that launched on Verizon has also run into its share of issues. Screen problems are plaguing the device, although both Motorola and Verizon have been quick to step in and remedy the issue. The increasing problems with smartphone introductions leads me to believe that manufacturers are rushing devices out the door prematurely to save/gain marketshare at the expense of quality. Manufacturers need to start doing a better job of quality control in order to preserve consumers’ trust in purchasing new devices.

Finally, one large player that has been absent from all of the mobile discussion has been Microsoft. Once a leader in the smartphone market, they have become a laggard. They are trying to stem their losses with a new OS called Windows Phone 7 (WP7). Microsoft is working to push out the OS by the end of the year, and it appears on schedule as they released hardware last week to Microsoft employees and select press members for review. Initial reviews have been mixed, and I get the feeling that the first release of WP7 will be half-baked with rapid improvements planned, similar to Apple’s original iPhone release strategy in 2007. Unfortunately for Microsoft, the market has shifted dramatically since 2007. iOS and Android are mature enough that I’d be surprised if users are willing to adopt an immature smartphone platform. While Microsoft has lots of resources to place behind WP7, I predict that they will compete with HP/Palm for third place in the smartphone market behind leaders Apple (iOS) and Google (Android).

If you’ve picked up one these, or a different, handset this summer, leave a comment – I’d like to hear how your experience has been. I’d be particularly interested in hearing from anyone who picked up a Samsung Vibrant on T-mobile. It’s the most underrated phone on the market in my opinion, and variants of the device will be available on AT&T, Sprint and Verizon by this fall.

In the US, AdMob is reporting 10.7M iPhone OS and 8.7M Android devices accessed its network in April. That is a ratio of 1.2 iPhones for every one Android device. In the rest of the world, 16.8M iPhone OS and 2.9M Android devices accessed its network in April. That is a ration of 5.8 iPhones for every one Android device.

Why the big difference? The iPhone does not have a carrier exclusive relationship in the rest of the world as it does here in the US with AT&T. In fact, lets look at the ratio of iPhones to Android devices in a few select countries to show just how dominant the iPhone is in countries with no exclusivity:

Source data: AdMob Mobile Metrics Report, April 2010

I sure hope that Apple is getting paid well by AT&T, because the data confirms what I pointed out earlier this month – Apple is losing the opportunity to dominate the US smartphone market through its exclusive AT&T arrangement.

Head over to the Admob blog at metrics.admob.com to download the April 2010 Mobile Metrics report and the country specific data.

I have to believe that Apple felt a little sting from the NPD report. Even though Apple is printing money these days, losing market share for them is embarrassing considering their inflated egos. This week, articles resurfaced about the exclusivity deal between Apple and AT&T. If you haven’t seen it yet… you better sit down…the exclusivity was for 5 years which means the evil cult and service-deficient service provider are best buds until 2012. All I can think is, why? Apple had a huge opportunity in front of them and let it pass. Just think about how many Android handsets Verizon, T-mobile, and Sprint can get into the marketplace by then. Gregg wrote a great article this week with his analysis on Apple’s lost opportunity.

I want to end this week’s update with a video that provides a sneak-peek of the future. Imagine the possibilities if you could choose a phone based on its form factor, specs, etc… and then load the OS of your choice. Well, one developer started a project that demonstrates the future isn’t that far. He started work to get Android running on the iPhone and has successfully demoed limited functionality on the 3GS. I definitely encourage you to watch it and start dreaming of the future.

As always, if you see or hear anything else interesting in mobile, let us know by leaving a comment below.