Apple may have dodged a bullet, but I'm not so sure the whole virtual network business was ever in the cards. If anything, it may have been a bargaining chip us

Apple may have dodged a bullet, but I'm not so sure the whole virtual network business was ever in the cards. If anything, it may have been a bargaining chip used to grease the wheels of early conversations with carriers. Think about it. If you're a carrier, do you want to sell a bunch of high volume, low margin commodity pipe each month to one company? Or would you rather enjoy subscriber growth, reduce your churn, and sell a bunch of high margin data plans? Unless I'm missing a huge piece of the puzzle, I think carriers would rather have direct billing relationships with high value subscribers. So that's how you chum the water, if you're Apple and you want to get away with murder, relative to normal manufacturer/carrier relations. Make it look like this is going to do down no matter what, so line up now and join the fun or watch from outside. They can do this very credibly at that point – the iPod nano was heating up and people were noticing Apple's consumer mojo. But would Apple really want to be an MVNO? I say not in a million years. Consider: Apple has spent a lot of time explaining their position on vertical integration. They like to have complete control over everything that exists between themselves and the user experience. Whether it's Thoughts on Flash, their position on licensing their OSes, or internal antenna testing facilities on their campus, this is a resounding theme. Being an MVNO completely runs counter to that. For all the control they gain cutting the carrier out of the customer experience, Apple doesn't even control the most essential component of the business – the wireless infrastructure. That leaves them entirely at the mercy of the carrier for the wireless phone experience they are directly selling to the user. This isn't like the manufacturing relationships they already have to build their stuff – if a manufacturer doesn't work out, the worst that happens is a batch of iDevice X doesn't reach US shores. Consumers never see the gaffe, except as buzz-worthy "omg they're out of stock" news. The outcome they chose makes it clear who sells what, letting Apple pass the buck when they're not involved in a shitty portion of the iPhone experience. Apple made the right move, but culturally, I don't think they'd have played it any other way.