Apple Inc (AAPL)

[langostino]

"the fact that Apple said ..."

roni, your confusion stems from the false premise you've stated. What you state as "fact" is not. Apple is getting a share of the revenue collected by ATT for the wireless service and internet access. Apple is electing to treat THAT revenue as subscription revenue attached the the iPhone hardware. (Incidentally, it is NOT required by GAAP to do so, that is an election on Apple's part).

Apple can sell software for the iPhone (OS and other software) if it chooses to. And when it does, it can choose to account for it via either methodology -- although it becomes an increasing stretch to drive software sales into "subscription" mode, unless it is truly sold as a subscription, paid monthly, as ATT's wireless and data plans are. Either way, though, whether Apple chooses to charge for something or not, and how it chooses to account for it if it charges, are two entirely different things.