Influential US blog Techcrunch is calling New Zealand "Land of LotR and high-priced data plans" after today's iPhone pricing announcements from Vodafone.

Oh my god! Are they insane? The Vodafone New Zealand site is choking right nowback up, and this appears to be the most god-awful money-grabbing exercise opportunity to manage supply and demand through fair pricing…  It' certainly highlights the value of Windows Mobile and storing applications on the device rather than in the cloud…IMHO..

Local users appear to be similarly discontented and the NZ Geekzone forums are rife!

Nick.