The iPhone on Verizon du jour report this week comes to you courtesy of Bloomberg News. Yes, that’s the company owned by the same guy who is now mayor of New York City.

Now this has been an ongoing rumor for months now, that once Apple’s exclusive deal with AT&T expires, the iPhone will be available to other carriers in the U.S. However, the real question has always been not if but when, because nobody outside of Apple, AT&T, their lawyers and a few others under deep cover or an ironclad DNA can give you an accurate answer.

It is understandable that a lot of people would like to see Apple expand your purchase options. AT&T doesn’t get good marks for connection quality in many of the larger cities, despite claims that they are spending billions of dollars to enhance their networks. Yes, there are reports that network reliability is now much better in New York City, and they’re working on Chicago, San Francisco and other trouble spots, but I’d rather hear confirmation from you. I don’t just accept corporate spin without some confirmation.

The usual problems from saturated networks include dropped calls and subpar Internet download speeds. Supposedly, AT&T was caught flat-footed when they embraced the iPhone, not anticipating how fast it would take off, nor the amount of data customers would consume.

The skeptical minded among us might mention that AT&T has long been cursed with bad ratings for their network, so they should have anticipated that there was trouble afoot from this move. It may also be that AT&T was the only major cell carrier to accede to Apple’s penchant for ironclad control, at a time when few expected the iPhone to take off as quickly as it did. Verizon Wireless allegedly insisted that the iPhone become just another commodity product in their smartphone lineup.

This is not to say that a Verizon version of the iPhone wouldn’t have some shortcomings. For one thing, AT&T touts the ability to take a phone call and do something else, such as checking your email, at the same time. Verizon’s CDMA network doesn’t allow for that form of multitasking, even though the Android phones they offer tout the ability to run more than one app at the same time. I don’t pretend to know if this limitation can be addressed with firmware or cheap hardware upgrades to the network, or they have to wait for the rollout of LTE, the next generation system that will also be embraced by AT&T and other carriers.

With LTE, Apple wouldn’t even have to build separate versions of the iPhone in the U.S. They could survive with just one.

But even if Apple doesn’t wait for LTE, which Verizon is expected to begin to deploy next year, I suppose millions of potential customers will survive the lack of simultaneous telephone call and email functionality. There is, of course, Verizon’s fabulous network, which is supposedly freer of dropped calls and other problems.

On the other hand, I wouldn’t be tempted to switch after my AT&T contract expires. My experience with Verizon customer service has been totally unfavorable. Yes, the surveys give them good marks, but I have rarely seen such a collection of uninformed, ill-mannered support people anywhere.

Even though I’m not a Verizon customer, my sister-in-law is, and, being the technical expert in the family, I’m often called upon to help when they encounter problems. On several occasions, after trying to deal with a niggling billing problem, I was promised by a supervisor that a manager would call back “within 48 hours.” That promise was repeated over four telephone calls, and it never happened. The fifth attempt was a charm, but that’s no excuse.

I also recall one instance where I talked to an ill-tempered billing rep who, after being asked why I hadn’t gotten a callback from management, pronounced me deluded. Two days later, they disconnected my sister-in-law’s service not over of a billing issue, but because of a single employee’s nasty disposition. Yes, folks, I did get my sister-in-law a month’s credit for her misery. So even if Verizon Wireless has the better network, their toxic customer support more than convinces me not to become one of their customers.

Oh well, I guess I just lost a potential advertiser, but those are the breaks.

Of course, when Apple finally makes that deal with Verizon, it’s likely they will insist on a certain level of customer support. As it stands now, when you call AT&T about a number for which you’re using an iPhone, you have the option of talking with Apple about your handset, or AT&T about the network and billing. I expect the same will be true for Verizon.

In the end, yes, I believe the deal will happen. It may already be set in stone, becoming effective at the conclusion of the AT&T exclusive. But don’t assume that jumping ship will give you a better experience. Once Verizon is saturated with iPhone traffic, they may have problems too.

In the days when Apple was really down in the dumps, facing near-immediate doom, Michael Dell, CEO of the company he founded, suggested that Apple’s stockholders should get their money back. The company should then be shut down.

Of course, that was before Dell ran into its own problems with service and sales. And it appears, if you take an investigative story from The New York Times as an example, their problems are far worse than you might have imagined.

Among the blatant examples is the report that they shipped an estimated 11.8 million defective OptiPlex computers between May 2003 and July 2005. Worse, defective computers were often replaced with units that Dell knew were also defective.

A key reason for these failures were bad capacitors on the motherboard. Now in all fairness, other PC makers, including Apple, have been afflicted with similar ills, due to bad batches of parts from a specific supplier. But it appears Dell handled the situation badly, because customers were deceived and, in turn, lost money because they were saddled with loads of broken boxes.

Worse, we’re not talking about small companies being victimized by defective PCs. The list of customers includes such major firms as Wal-Mart, Wells Fargo and even the Mayo Clinic.

Even more interesting is that Michael Dell, who returned as CEO some time back to help rescue the company after surrendering those chores to someone else, may personally be in a heap of trouble. The article states: “Dell set aside $100 million this month to handle a potential settlement with the Securities and Exchange Commission over a five-year-old investigation into its books, which will most likely result in federal accusations of fraud and misconduct against the company’s founder, Michael S. Dell.”

So in short, maybe Dell should be closing the company and giving the stockholders their money back. This is pathetic performance from a tech firm that once prided itself on having great customer support.

Then again, I can’t say my close encounters with Dell’s support people over the years have been all that encouraging. Here’s an example:

Some years ago, I was helping a client who was trying to configure his computer network to recognize his new broadband connection.

Now his Macs, then running one of the early versions of Mac OS X, just worked. The PC, a recently installed Dell, didn’t. When the normal diagnostics failed, I got Dell’s support on the line hoping for a fast answer. I expected to reach a knowledgeable person who’d have the solution at his or her fingertips.

Instead, I got a tragically untrained individual who kept trying to read off a cheat sheet to direct me through a set of simple troubleshooting steps that any imbecile would have done already. Alas, every single time I told him to stop and just answer my questions, he stumbled and returned to his prefabricated responses.

Finally, I requested a supervisor, and as I waited for someone to pick up the call, I went through a couple of Windows command line tricks that, in the end resolved the problem even before anyone answered. Surprisingly, when the supervisor finally did respond, he actually gave a wrong answer!

With a smile, this dedicated Mac user set him straight!

Thank heavens they didn’t ask me to complete a questionnaire to rate the quality of their support, because it would have scored zero from end to end.

Now to make matters worse, I wasn’t dealing with an offshore support team here. Based on the command of English and the lack of a distinctive foreign or regional accent, it would appear both support people were USA-based, but that made them no less incompetent.

To Dell’s credit, they claim to be spending huge sums of money to shore up their support and regain that lost reputation. However, a recent Consumer Reports reader survey of the quality of tech support indicates Dell is still pretty bad, but that’s true of just about every PC company other than Apple.

Of course, few are demanding that the FTC investigate the goings on at Dell, even though it is clear that, over the years, they have been cheating their customers. Despite these issues, Dell’s market share in the U.S. remains high. They are still one of the two PC makers on the planet, behind HP. Unfortunately, far too many companies appear to be falling for Dell’s sales pitches and buying up truckloads of boxes from them rather than consider their very real problems.

Before some of you suggest that The New York Times is just another alleged “liberal media” institution that’s dedicated to trashing any tech company that isn’t Apple, take a look at the facts. The newspaper hasn’t hidden stories about the FTC probes into Apple’s affairs, nor the early teething problems with the new iPhone, such as that apparent reception issue if you hold it the “wrong way.”

Now I don’t really expect that Dell will be shut down and Michael Dell transported to the nearest jail cell to pay for his alleged crimes. At worst, maybe he’ll have to pay some fines, promise to be a good boy, and that will be the end of the case.

As far as Dell customers are concerned, if you really need a generic Windows box, there are loads of better options. You don’t need to buy a Mac if you prefer something without the Apple logo on it.

I read an interesting article from the Daring Fireball’s John Gruber in a recent issue of Macworld that, better than most any other opinion piece, appears to accurately nail Apple’s long range goals.

In that article, Gruber pointed out that each Apple hardware or software update appears, at best, to be a minor change from a previous model, but when you examine the overall impact over a period of several years, you’ll find that they have actually delivered huge changes.

Take the original iPhone, and examine the one released on June 24 of this year — which sold some 1.7 million copies as of Saturday — and you’ll see a world of difference, even though there’s that strong family resemblance. Indeed, the iOS desktop with its tiny Dock has come to resemble the iPad design, which, in turn, mimics the look of the latest Mac OS X desktop.

But Apple didn’t get from there to here in gigantic leaps, although I grant that the iPhone is itself a major product initiative that few expected to succeed. At the core, it shows that Steve Jobs and crew have long-range goals in mind and it often takes several years to get a sense of their intended direction.

This doesn’t mean that the iPhone, iPad or Mac lineup for, say, 2015 — not to mention the various OS revisions — are fully architected right now. But there is certainly a vision as to where Apple wants to be, even if many of the specifics have yet to be finalized.

Contrast that to most PC makers who can only think in terms of this and the next quarter, and whatever new parts their component suppliers will have ready, assuming there’s no new Windows release in the hopper.

Unfortunately, the journalist community is so wedded to our 24/7 news cycle that they can’t see the forest from the trees, and thus they fail to see what directions Apple might take even if they do drop broad hints from time to time.

You know, for example, that when Apple said they wouldn’t build a cheap Mac because they didn’t want to sell junk, they fully intended to deliver a more elegant solution. Yes, there are generic PCs that make the latest Mac mini seem mighty expensive, but that package is superb and a tremendous value for the money. It took several years before they got around to redesigning the case in any significant way, even though the critics kept harping on the treacherous memory upgrade process that required finesse with putty knives and similar implements.

Yes, in retrospect maybe you could rightly say that Apple should have had today’s Mac mini out in 2006, when they first moved to Intel processors. Maybe there should have been a cut and paste feature in the very first iPhone, and why did Apple wait three years to craft a limited multitasking system into the iOS when competitors had it years ago?

One reason for Apple to take extra time is just to get things right, another concept that competitors fail to understand. Yes, I realize Apple still screws up, but not as often as other companies.

I suppose you can also see why many remain frustrated with Apple’s apparent leisurely approach to updating their products, almost as if they add only as little as they can get away with while still calling it a new version. Of course, iPhone 4 is very much changed from the 3GS, owning to the availability of much better parts for almost the same money (actually slightly higher according to current teardowns).

And, yes, I realize there’s that niggling antenna issue that appears to impact those of you who use your left hand to hold your handset. Although I’m principally a southpaw, I mastered the mouse with my right hand, and use either for phones. There’s also a published report that originated with our frequent show guest, commentator Daniel Eran Dilger, that Apple is readying a fast software update to fix some of the reception issues. Steve Jobs has also offered a pithy “Stay Tuned” response to one iPhone owner who expressed concerns about the problem. So there you go.

On the long haul, knowing that Apple’s transition into the future will be gradual, you can still look at the things they’ve done to glean at least portions the game plan, not to mention that fascinating hobby of dissecting statements from Jobs himself about various and sundry topics.

Although the iPad impresses many as a grown-up iPod touch, it is already selling roughly the same number of copies as a regular Mac. More to the point, Jobs has told you the company’s direction. The day of the PC is ending, and we won’t need as many of those trucks in the future, not when we can buy a sleek compact car — the iPad.

There may indeed be more integration between the iOS and the regular version of Mac OS X, although touch doesn’t make so much sense when you have to reach out to a big screen to make things happen.

On the long haul, I am ever more convinced about my predictions of the future of personal computing. Come 2015, most consumers will own an iPad or similar device, and the traditional personal computer, with mouse and keyboard, will be largely the province of businesses and individual content creators. Yes, you may connect a keyboard to your mobile device, but not very often. It’s not such a travel-friendly concept.

But you won’t see how these things will come to be until you take the long view and explore the lessons of history.

Despite having loads of loyal customers, it’s hard to say that Apple has consistently received good press over the years. Sure the products get high marks, but there are always “killer” gadgets from competing companies that are sure to take over the market, or so they say.

Of course in the old days, there was that notorious “Apple Death Watch” stories, where some media commentators with a more morbid bend — or who may have been influenced somehow to favor Microsoft — kept suggesting Apple was over and done for. It was only a matter of time before the company ran out of steam and bought the farm.

The truth is that the naysayers were frighteningly close to the truth at one time. Steve Jobs has revealed that, shortly after he took over as CEO (his title was then iCEO), Apple was within 90 days of closing down.

Say what you want about the immense Jobsian ego and his mercurial ways. He found a way forward to save the company, by cutting out unproductive product lines and focusing on Apple’s core competency, which was to make great personal computers.

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