One of the big points of the Jobsnote yesterday when introducing the latest version of the iPhone was affordability. He noted 56% of potential buyers stayed away because of the daunting price point. However, that’s not why I waited til version 2 to buy. Regardless the following tagline was introduced by Apple - “Twice as fast, half the price”. Twice as fast has yet to be confirmed as it varies on your location, signal, etc (ie AT&T has yet to roll out 3G in Des Moines, IA, and I’ve had a 3G phone for almost two years). It seems, too, that “half the price” may not be all that it’s cut out to be either.

Philip Elmer-DeWitt posted today on iPhone’s new business model. He finds, after AT&T’s press release, that the long-term cost of the iPhone actually costs $40 more. How is this? I’ll let him explain…

This is a big change. Gone is that nice revenue sharing deal where Apple socked it away as deferred income over the life of a 24-month contract — a comfortable cushion against lean quarters in the company’s future, should they ever arise.

Gone too is the nice iPhone bonanza AT&T got upfront last summer by selling nearly a million smartphones for $599 each (minus a small commission, perhaps $80, to Apple).

But don’t cry for AT&T. As its press release made clear, it’s going to make up for that by raising the $20 monthly fee customers pay for unlimited data services to $30. That works out to $240 extra over the life of a two-year contract.

“Half the price,” it turns out, is actually $40 more.

But most people look only at the purchase price when they buy cell phones, and at $199 for the 8GB model, the iPhone is going look a whole lot more affordable to a lot more people. Munster, for one, believes that Apple will more than make up in volume what it’s losing in revenue sharing.

Another brilliant marketing strategy by Jobs. Charge more, and claim it is less. Beautiful. That’s how you sell 10 million phones.

Meanwhile, UK carrier O2 is subsidizing the cost of the phone on some plans.

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