Earthlink Teams Up With SK-Telecom

An anonymous reader writes "In a press release issued today, EarthLink, Inc and SK Telecom (Korea's leading mobile communications company) announced a definitive agreement to form a joint venture to market wireless voice and data services in the U.S called SK-Earthlink Hopefully this means we here in the US will finally get some of those cool phones we hear so much about in other countries..."

Comments

Re:This could be Huge

[bugbeak]

I agree that Americans are living in the past, with the small exteptions of the T-Mobile Sidekick and the N-Gage the vast majority of mobile phone users or just talking or texting.

Maybe that's because that's all Americans need?

Even in Britain...

[milohanrahan]

...we had affordable, widespread cross-network texting way before it was big in America. Strange.

Re:This could be Huge

[FrYGuY101]

I agree that Americans are living in the past, with the small exteptions of the T-Mobile Sidekick and the N-Gage the vast majority of mobile phone users or just talking or texting.

It's been said before, and I'm sure I won't be the last to say it, but the "cool phones" we hear about, and are all jealous of, won't sell big in the US market.

I remember when the first MP3 phones came out in the US at about the same time they came out in Japan. In Japan, they sold like hotcakes. In the US, nobody bought them. Why? Because nobody in the US was willing to shell out an extra $300 for a phone just because it has the ability to play MP3's (The ones I saw were around $450). So, the phone companies learned their lessons, and inroduces older models from Japan when the cost of manufacturing them goes down (And the Japanese don't want them anymore).

So why do the Japanese want such phones? In Japan a cell phone is a status symbol. Having a new phone means you're important, and status in Japan is everything. Couple that with the fact that most people have significantly more disposable income since people live with their parents for much longer, and you've got people willing to pay much more than Americans for a phone, as long as it has the new and flashy gadgets. It's nothing special or amazing, and neither is 'better' than the other, it's just a difference in the markets.

Besides, how many times have you hear people pining for a cell phone that was JUST a cell phone?