Meet George Jetson, er, Steve Jobs, who wants to video chat with you the way his 60s cartoon hero could.

Jobs’ dreams of face time via technology are beginning to come true with the official unveiling of his latest version of the iPhone, previewed this week in San Francisco.

Jobs cited Jetson’s prescient video chatting in his announcement at Apple’s World Wide Developer Conference. He also provided a target date for the new phone’s availability: June 24.

That’s three days before existing iPhone owners will get their free upgrade to Apple’s mobile operating system, OS4, on June 21.

For customers who are annoyed with AT&T (which would be a lot of customers, in the face of recent changes to data plans and continuing spotting service by the carrier), a bone of sorts is being tossed. Anyone with an AT&T contract who’s eligible for a phone upgrade in 2010 can get the upgrade price for the iPhone right away.

Which is probably a smart move. Plenty of iPhone users have been frustrated by AT&T’s unreliable service and death grip on the popular phone. In fact, during Jobs’ demo, when there was a problem loading a page, an audience member shouted “Verizon” when Jobs asked for suggestions resolving the problem. (He was, in fact, using a WiFi connection, but you get the point.)

As further evidence of AT&Ts disappointing infrastructure provisions, that video chat feature Jobs likes so much won’t be supported initially using the carrier’s network. It will only be available between iPhone users, both of whom have to be using a WiFi connection.

George would be so disappointed.

Tags: Apple, George Jetson, iphone, OS4, Steve Jobs