Via Twitter last night, I was able to take a peek at the new iPhone being released today. I’m not 100% sure if this is accurate or just an artist’s rendering, but if so, we’re in for a fun WWDC today:

I can’t wait to give Apple more money. My iPhone 3G contract is up, and I’m ready to throw down on a 64GB black iPhone. I’ll definitely be waiting in line for one!

When I hung up the phone, I started to run the numbers:

Kindle MSRP:  $399.00

Subscriptions, per month:

• Cost per syndicated blog: up to $.99
• Cost per newspaper: $9.99 – $13.99 (major papers)
• Cost per magazine: $1.25 – $2.49 (major magazines)
• Cost per book: $9.99

It just didn’t add up.  I couldn’t figure out how these devices would actually sell.  You pay $400 for the privilege to lug around a fairly ugly 4-color grayscale device that displays blog feeds, newspapers, magazines and books that you still have to pay for?  No thanks.  The Kindle is, to all intents and purposes, a one-dimensional device.  A one-dimensional device with a hefty price tag.

You can imagine my surprise when I saw a Michael Arrington post on TechCruch, where Citigroup Analyst Mark Mahaney forecasted that Amazon could generate $400M to $750M in revenue from the Kindle by 2010.

Those figures would represent roughly 1% – 3% of Amazon’s total yearly revenue.

In my humble opinion, there’s no way that Amazon will sell that many Kindles and generate that kind of revenue.  

No. Way.  

For starters, there’s the subscription-based model.  While I can certainly understand why someone would want to load up a Kindle with blog feeds, newspapers and e-books (really, who are we trying to fool?), the recurring cost becomes a serious barrier after months of use.

Just looking at my Google Reader, I subscribe to about 60 blogs.  Take that times $.99, and I’m suddenly spending $59.40 per month to read things I already get for free.  Keep in mind this is only blog usage.  Let’s say I want to order the new Kurt Vonnegut book at $9.99 and read the New York Times at $13.99 per month in addition to the blog feeds… I would have just spent $482.38 ($83.38 for the content and $399.00 for the Kindle) in the first month of owning the device, of which $73.39 was subscription-based.  Subscriptions that I could have pulled up on an iPhone (in color, no less) for the flat-rate cost of the rate plan and iPhone.  

But what of this Apple technology, you say?

In order to make the “up to $750M!” prediction somewhat valid, Citigroup’s Mahaney applied some *extremely* fuzzy logic, as pointed out by Arrington:

Citi took this indirect sales data and built a model based on the adoption curve of the iPod “Here’s what’s known. Launched in CQ4:01, the iPod went from 129,000 unit sales in its first quarter to becoming a mass market phenomenon, with a current installed base of approximately 100MM.”

They apply similar adoption rates to the Kindle that the iPod saw (starting at a much lower base: 129,000 iPods v. 10,000 – 30,000 Kindles in first three months on the market) and then discount the entire model by 50% – 75% to hedge risk in coming up with the three year revenue model. “So perhaps, if Amazon executes right with its Kindle product and marketing strategy, the iPod analogy for the Kindle won’t be too far stretched,” Mahaney says.

So I was mowing through my feeds today and I happened upon a post with a really detailed write-up on one of my favorite Mac OS X utilities for one of my favorite Mac OS X Leopard (10.5) features: Quick Look.  As a designer, I hate the fact that Apple almost forces you to open up Adobe Illustrated to view EPS files — or, worse yet, have them open in Preview as a PDF.

Thanks to EPSQuickLookPlugin, that minor annoyance is over.

You can read more about the plugin @ BittBox, but I wanted to put something on here for my designer friends.  This FREE plugin will save you tons of time, guaranteed.

For those of you looking to move beyond EPS files and branch out into other programs with Quick Look, there is an excellent resource available at the aptly-named QuickLookPlugins.com.

Brad Pitt and Jennifer Anniston. Bridget Moynahan and Tom Brady. Romeo and Juliet. And now, there’s Microsoft and Yahoo.

You can add the Microsoft-Yahoo love story to that list of famous break-ups and jilted lovers, as Steve Ballmer has officially withdrawn his three-month-old offer to combine the companies. According to a press release close to the deal, Ballmer still believes that the “proposed acquisition made sense for Microsoft, Yahoo! and the market as a whole,” and that Redmond was prepared to raise its offer from $31 a share to $33, but Yahoo wanted at least $37 per share. That dainty Internet portal proved very hard to please.

The real winner?  Google.  Take that, Microsoft.

So, does this leave the door open for Apple to swoop in and play ball? They’ve got a lot of cash on hand and a purchase of Yahoo would add to their already awesome suite of applications.  Keep your eyes peeled — I bet those rumors will start to surface soon.