I had always thought that iPhone would come to Canada before it hit Europe, mainly just because Canada is closer to Apple’s home turf, and because the current iPhone is actually, in some ways, an inferior product in Europe’s advanced GSM phone market. I thought that Apple would develop a new, more advanced version of iPhone first (at least add 3G/UMTS to it) before marketing it in Europe.

But now iPhone is hitting Europe this week, and no one knows for sure when it comes to Canada. This article in The Globe and Mail tells that “European carriers will offer service plans that start at the equivalent of $70 a month. A rough calculation based on Rogers’ current fees for its existing cellphone services indicates that similar features are more than double the price here, based on the cheapest plan.”

Rogers and other Canadian operators will really need to rethink their strategies with wireless data services. What sense does it make to keep rates high, when that prevents consumers from becoming interested in using the services? If consumers don’t use the services, the operators’ revenues can’t go up, either.