Yeah, we know, it's very unseemly to jump all over every last iPhone 5 rumor that comes rolling off the assembly line. It's wrong, but it feels so right—and now the rumor mill has generated an actual date, Sept. 5, for the U.S. release of Apple's highly anticipated, next-generation smartphone.
Apple would then launch the iPhone 5 worldwide sometime in October, according to the rumor.
That information supposedly comes from an executive for Swisscom, the Swiss carrier, according to the Italian-language iPhone Italia blog, as spotted and translated on Tuesday by Computerworld's Jonny Evans.
Of course, as Evans points out, Sept. 5 is Labor Day in the U.S., making it "an unlikely date" for the release of a major new product.
The stars do seem to be aligning for the arrival of the iPhone 5 in September. Earlier in the week, Boy Genius Report "exclusively learned" that AT&T was prepping internally for a mid-September launch date for Apple's next edition of its smartphone.
A "proven source" tells BGR that AT&T is "asking managers to finish training in order to have employees available for the influx of foot traffic expected in September," while Apple itself is reportedly preparing to hire additional staff at its Apple Stores during the same timeframe.
Or the new iPhone could arrive even earlier, in mid-August no less, if this interpretation by CNET of a job listing for an "Apple iPhone Sales Specialist" in Ipswich, U.K. bears any resemblance to reality.
The only thing we can all be certain of is that whenever the iPhone 5 does actually arrive, it'll come just in time to start cranking up the iPhone 6 rumor mill.