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The Many Faces of 3G
An anonymous reader writes "Did you ever notice how each new generation of cell-phone tech gets branded '3G,' and the previous thing is retroactively downgraded to some lesser number of Gs? An MIT engineer explains why in this brilliant essay about '3G' over the last 10 years, showing how the cell carriers have kept offering it and swiping it away to sell more stuff. He cites numerous Cingular/AT&T and Sprint press releases showing how the companies have made '3G' into a brand name ideally suited for amnesiac consumers. Meanwhile, no cell carrier is foolish enough to sell you bottom-line throughput like an ISP in 1996 — you could actually hold them to that (PDF)."
The Sprint HTC EVO is 4G, but the iPhone 4 is definitely not 4G. You might want to pay more attention, especially if you plan on being a sarcastic douche about it later.
Yes, new "GSM" phones (phones that use SIM cards) use W-CDMA. That doesn't mean they use "CDMA", even if they use that modulation. Can Verizon use an iPhone? They use the same frequencies. Oh, they can't? Oh, it must not be "CDMA" then.
It is common to refer to phones that us SIM cards as "GSM" phones, because they work on networks that are GSM. And it is common to refer to phones that use no SIM cards as "CDMA", because they work on networks that are CDMA. So you're still an idiot, you may be right, but you're still an idiot.