Article aside, virtualization of the SIM means a few technically joyful possibilities:
* Potentially little more than a software tweak to add UI for automatic SIM swap while roaming. The current best solution for this is a dodgy Chinese dual SIM phone, or that just-before-landing step on the plane when the battery comes out and your phone loses its time, and fires all calendar reminders when switched back on again.
* Potentially user hardware gets a chance to intercept the Ki (subscriber authentication key) as it passes through iTunes. At this point all kinds of interesting things can be done (entirely outside of the mobile network's TOS, of course). Like an app that lets you rent a SIM in a target country for 24 hours, at local subscriber calling rates. While within 10 years Europe's roaming rates will be normalized, this would still be a killer feature for international travel.
Sadly chances are high they'll get this right, and the vSIM will be delivered encrypted to some security module on the handset. Sometimes incompetence is a desirable thing.
One nice feature of the iPhone right now (and the Nokia N9, but not any other phones I've used): you can simply hot-swap the SIM without any battery pulling or even rebooting. Just take out the tray, replace the SIM, and pop it back in.
Now to be fair, the oldest phone I've ever used is the Blackberry 8100, released in 2006, but I've never had a phone lose its clock when pulling the main battery.
* Potentially little more than a software tweak to add UI for automatic SIM swap while roaming. The current best solution for this is a dodgy Chinese dual SIM phone, or that just-before-landing step on the plane when the battery comes out and your phone loses its time, and fires all calendar reminders when switched back on again.
* Potentially user hardware gets a chance to intercept the Ki (subscriber authentication key) as it passes through iTunes. At this point all kinds of interesting things can be done (entirely outside of the mobile network's TOS, of course). Like an app that lets you rent a SIM in a target country for 24 hours, at local subscriber calling rates. While within 10 years Europe's roaming rates will be normalized, this would still be a killer feature for international travel.
Sadly chances are high they'll get this right, and the vSIM will be delivered encrypted to some security module on the handset. Sometimes incompetence is a desirable thing.