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Cell Phone Purchasing: Drop Down?
walnut writes: "There is an interesting story on CNET about the future of cell phones, how the major players Erricson, Motorola and Nokia are beginning to have to face the realization that new sales are quickly tapering off. How they will entice people to buy new phones is becoming a big question."
You buy a phone because you buy cellular service. Going upscale isn't going to get more people into the game. Honestly - the idea of a $200-300-400 phone is just absurd. Compounding this is that most telcos tell you which phones you can use, typically the ones they sell else there is a penalty. If the phone man'f'trs want to sell more phones then they have to work to pressure the telcos in the US to do something about the tangled mess of the industry. There is no national standard or integration such as in Europe. The rates are an order of magnitude higher than in other parts of the world. Service and coverage is spotty at best. You can't integrate billing unless you get land line and mobile from the same telco and even that's hit or miss. The cost of phone insurance for your multihundred dollar phone is in the loan-shark range.
As far as the phone devices themselves are concerned did they even consider that I might not want to replace EVERY accessory if I buy a new phone? The power connectors are different, the headset plugs are different, the batteries are different - and these are from the same man'f'tr.
They will sell more phones when more people can use and afford the service plans.
This used to be my argument for not owning a cell phone. Well, now that I've had one for a few years, I know that it can be turned off or set to silent mode - and I do this. If I don't want to be reached, I won't be reached.
Technology should enable you to do things. If it forces you to a faster, less managable pace of life, then it's not working for you but against you. You said you got a call at 2am in the middle of the forest while camping.. Then you said "I don't want that.". Well, leave the phone at home, or turn it off. Hell, with any decent phone, you can set profiles to only let through certain numbers so that you can be reached by your friends but not by work if you want.
Wireless penetration in other countries is larger than in the U.S. The price per minute in the U.S. is still around 25/cents/minute unless you buy a very large bulk of minutes each month in advance and use or lose them. I've heard in Israel, for example, airtime is around a U.S. penny a minute.
It's also difficult for existing customers to upgrade their phones without paying through the nose. The carriers should realize the old model of trying to give away the phone to get customers doesn't work unless you are trying to jump start a market. It's already there. Lower your air rates across the board and charge a higher fee for the phone itself.
I mean, just try going into a cell store and tell them you want to buy a phone without activation and see what kind of looks you get...
One of the biggest challenges facing the mobile phone operators is the continued non-adoption of global standards in the States. From one hand this means the States is the world's wireless backwater, but from the other the most valuable single market is too important to miss.
If the States creates its own standards yet again then this will increase development costs for the phone manufacturers.
However as it is estimated at 2 years at least before the States get a sniff at 3G it could be that the rest of the world will be too far ahead.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
Most people don't realize the real costs of a cellular phone. I started out with a Nokia 2110i myself and after 3 years I wanted something more so I bought myself an Ericsson SH888 which I still own (mainly due to its irda & modem facilities) and I don't see myself changing phones very soon. I have all the access I need with my Psion series 5mx. I can easily send/receive SMS, email, fax. I can browse the Inet and all of that without any hassle like cables etc. What else would you need?
And then there is allways WAP. IMVHO a pathetic way to try and sell even more phones which I'm pretty sure will fail alltogether. The whole Gopher concept seems to have failed horribly on the (cheap) Internet, do you really think that it will re-live on another (expensive) medium? I don't think so...
If they really want to innovate they should move on IMHO. A lot of people start complaining about radiation emitting from phones so pick up the oppertunity and go on. Like you could see at the last CeBIT; sattelite phones with the size of an old(er) cellular. Who needs GSM antenna's when you can directly use a sattelite (which could send to some relaystation which could spreaden the signal using another frequency band)? If you want to make more money on phones I personally believe thats where to get it. Offcourse it needs investment (I don't keep up with the developments but I doubt that these products are 'consumer ready') but thats the case for everything nowadays.
In the future we can expect such wonderful features as:
1) A method to locate your position. Ostensibly for 911 services, phone companies will soon realize that they can make money by selling the service of blipping adverts from companies in your vicinity. Some bright soul will come up with the idea of having a signal emitted, say, your grocery when you're near. The grocery will then grep its records (Based on that discount card you have,) realize that milk you bought two weeks ago must be pretty rank, and pop up an ad on your phone reminding you that now would be a great time to get some new. No doubt they'll take a patent out on this idea, despite its obviousness. I'd consider this a great project for a high school programming class.
Radio Shak is already well positioned to do this (With batteries, not milk) since they already know your name, address and phone number as well as what you bought and when.
Of course, other people might also want to know your positions and movements. That suspicious spouse, stalkers and law enforcement will all benefit from this service. Remember: Deploying 911 hardware: $1.5 billion. Average cell phone: $45. Fingering the "Real Killers" from their cell phone locality records: Priceless.
2) Bluetooth: Now your cell phone can be 0wn3d, too. PDAs and other small devices don't have a lot of room, and the last thing the designers ever worry about is security.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Um, what you're talking about are FSM SIM cards. In countries with a developed and unified GSM network(s) such as most of the countries in Europe, Asia etc. GSM is the one standard. Therefore, all our phones have SIM cards that can be swaped. It works very, very, well.
Want a Nokia 7110 on One2One, but have an Erikson? No problem, pop the SIM out, and stick it in the 7110. Same network, same number, diferent phone.
If the US would/had settled on a single network standard, instead of the (Three?) systems they currently have, You Too could experience the benifits of such a system. As it is now, you sound pretty screwed.
Syllable : It's an Operating System
I am a computer geek, check my email every 3 minutes, cary a palm, etc. but I like to "disapear" sometimes..
Last week, my friend got a call at 2am in the middle of the forest while camping, one of his companies servers needed rebooted and the tech didn't know the command!! I don't want that..
Am i the only one who is offended by the idea of new mobile phones with GPS and blue-tooth in them being able to send you digital cupons as you walk by the store?
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A few years ago, I noticed bag phones showing up at thrift stores. They were asking like $35-$40 or so for them. Then the 9 inch brick phones started showing up. Now the handheld cellular phones are showing up, and the large quanitity of junked cell phones is starting to become a real problem. They're going for $6-$10 now, cheap enough to buy a junker just for its NIMH battery.
.us that is) I wouldn't mind a better plan than a new customer, or at least not having to sign a year contract in exchange for re-using a perfectly good cell phone. Even if I had to find one that was originally issued by my intended phone company, that wouldn't be too bad.
Hell, I was even given one AMPS analog (a really lightweight Motorola) and one PCS digital phone from my mom and stepdad because they hadn't liked the plans with which they got the phones, or something like that.
So does anyone know how easy it is to re-use such phones? (in
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1) feature boom: Introduce more & more features, so everyone will want the latest model (what? they already do that?)
2) baby babble phone: Lower the difficulty of usage, so that even babies can start using them (now there's an unexploited market)
3) Lower the quality: Let them automagically break down after 'warranty period + 1 day' (what, they already do that?)
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Exactly! And what is this crazy stuff I keep hearing about "e-mail"? Why would I ever want to use clumsy $2000 computer to send messages to people when I can fax, write or call them? And these "automobiles"...for godsakes, can't people just walk or ride a horse?!
No matter what the invention, a lot of people will initialy think its useless, but maybe it isn't. Time will tell.
Sometimes I amaze even myself.
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With those tiny smart-cards, it's trivial for anyone to trade in old cell phones for new ones, and it breaks the current phone companies monopoly, since currently there's a pretty darn high barrier of entry to switch phone providers (you have to get a new phone if you want to switch from ATT to Verizon).
For $30 US a month, you can get 2000 minutes in Hong Kong. Cheaper service means more customers, which means a larger market for cell phones.
I wish I could remember where, but I heard somewhere that in some places like Japan (I think), people get a new phone every 6 months for no other reason except to have the latest phone.
Maybe the bulk of new cellular technology markets are just going to stay in the regions of the world where image is so important in that way. To be honest I hope that never happens here. I hate mobile phones enough without them draining my bank account even more so I can look trendy in front of potential employers (who incidently can go to hell if they judge me on my phone. :)
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As long as there are new features to add, there are new customers. We are still in the very early stages of development of a "portable information device". PDA's, cellular phones, cameras, GPS's, computers, TV's etc. will all converge into one system (not necessarily one physical device).
When there is a device that allows you to talk to your friend, wirelessly, and see your friend in clear, sharp color picture, who will want an old crappy GSM phone anymore? When the phone transfers 10Mbps data and is online 24/7, who is going to use modems, ADSL or cable modems or even ethernet anymore? When the phone is small enough to embed into a shirt button, who will carry around the now-considered-small zippo sized phones? The only obstacle is price, and that too is dropping fast. I happily use my GSM phone to connect my Palm Pilot to the net to read and write email, check news, weather, sport scores and stock prices.
There is also a long way to go for software and services - ideas.. What if the phone knew where you are so it could tell you that, around the corner, your friend is sitting in a cafe? What if the phone could tell you that there is traffic ahead so you should get of the freeway or you will be stuck in the jam for 45 minutes? What if you could do your banking using the phone and order tickets? What if the phone had a Java virtual machine and a TCP/IP stack? All this already exists but isn't well integrated or conveniently usable yet (too expensive, too bulky, too slow etc.).
Quite soon we see that "phone" is not relevant anymore. We're talking about a whole new generation of information devices. You don't have to be Einstein to see that this is what - at least Nokia - i shooting for. Just look at their 3G pages, "media screens" etc.. Sun is talking about information appliances, Nokia has cooperation with Palm and Psion..
With low-power processors like the Crusoe, small computers like PDA's and phones will be used for *much* more in the not-so-distant future.. To say that "we're running out of features" is absurd.