DigiTimes reports that both Asus and Acer are working on deals with mobile service providers to provide cheap (as in practically free) computers with a wireless plan.
This isn’t the first time we’ve heard of someone offering a $300 computer as incentive for customers to sign up for long term service plans. The Royal Bank of Canada is offering free Eee PCs to customers who sign up for certain accounts (I’m visiting family in Canada this week and I actually ran across a bank with a sign for a free Eee PC in the window!), and we already knew that Asus was talking to UK mobile carrier Orange. But now it looks like Asus is working on a similar deal in Japan, while Acer is talking with carriers about providing free Aspire One computers to mobile customers.
According to DigiTimes, eventually you may be able to pick up an Eee PC for as little as $0.91, or a free Acer Aspire One when you sign up for a wireless service plan. The Aspire One sounds like a better deal to me, since you not only save a whopping $1, but you also get a machine with an Intel Atom CPU and a bit more storage capacity.
This happened in the UK earlier this month.
Carphone Warehouse give away the Elonex webbook with 3G mobile broadband contracts. https://www.theopensourcerer.com/2008/08/08/ubuntu-webbook-now-available-online-at-cpw/
They’re doing this in Europe already, I think. I saw an EEE – looked like a 900 – in a ‘Phone Hut’ store in Paris. I suspect it comes with some sort of plan, but I didn’t ask about it further (I’m a US res.)