The stories I've seen have been all saying they don't think there will be an iPhone for Verizon till they roll out their new LTE network in a couple of years. The Droid move seems to confirm this, they would not want to offer the iphone to a bunch of people they just committed to two years with something else, that won't work at all.

I actually like the ads, and believe Verizon will become much stronger with the negative ads. They need to win back some of the people who left them for the iPhone and AT&T, and the only way they can do that without actually having an iPhone is somehow try to convince everybody they offer way better coverage and something iPhone like.

I don't think the current ads though are meant to steal iPhone users back, I think they are for the holiday market of people looking to upgrade phones who are thinking do I want this or that? I don't really see how the droid phones will compete with the Pre they will be offering in the spring, that's gonna make for some interesting marketing.