And Whitmore isn’t the only one whose analyst sense is tingling. (Most people don’t realize where analysts come from: they’re people who, while in high school, were bitten by other, radioactive analysts).

Nature, or Wall Street anyway, apparently abhors a low-cost iPhone vacuum and analysts weren’t done trying to jam something into the category. Not without cause, though, as Apple COO Tim Cook himself said that . Compared to Whitmore's flight of fancy, though, these analysts had their feet firmly on the ground and were completely making up far more sensible scenarios.

Indeed, you almost have to hold up to the light just right to make out the second iPhone on the grassy knoll.

that when Apple ships the iPhone 5 in September, the company will continue to ship the 3GS, but for free.

At half the RAM of the iPhone 4, it’s somewhat questionable how long the 3GS will continue to be able to run the current release of iOS, but the Macalope has long been more sympathetic to the idea that the low-end iPhone would follow the track of the MacBook as a cheaper, but full-sized and fully-functional plastic unit. The 3G and the 3GS never felt good enough in his hoof to be the iPhone standard bearer.