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Verizon Customers: Say So Long To Unlimited Data
BogenDorpher writes "Verizon will be eliminating its unlimited smartphone data plan this summer. No longer will one be able to pay $30 a month to have unlimited data. This move is designed to 'force heavy data users to pay more for mobile data.'"
No, the plans will make most people pay more for data - they'll just really rape the people who actually used what they pay for.
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." ~Thomas Jefferson
Why not just turn us upside down and shake us? There would be slightly more dignity in that, at least.
That virgin mobile has unlimited internet plans starting at $25 a month, plus you can carry over your existing number.
Once they work every angle for increasing profits they go after the handful using more than the average. Once they screw over that handful where will they go next to increase their bonuses? The companies are profitable it's it's this sick need to increase profits every year so they can justify multi-million dollar bonuses. Millions suffer so a handful can claim big bonuses.
A finite price for something "unlimited"? Interesting. Tragedy of the commons comes to wireless.
Shai Schticks:"You don't make peace with friends, you make peace with enemies"
Does your phone download all the ads from mass media sites like your regular browser?
If so, for what it's worth, you all should raise holy hell about it... or use only the wifi, if the phone has it... then watch them raise their rates to make up for lack of use.. like the water companies are doing due to 'excessive conservation'..
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
"This move is designed to 'force heavy data users to pay more for mobile data.'""
No, this move is a result of the recent mergers in the industry and the reduced competition.
Aussie telcos raped(still rape) their customers with DATA prices. Only recently have we started to get unlimited caps for mobile, but even then as soon as you roam you get charged through the teeth. It's sad that the US companies decided to go down this path, but they're gonna start posting some record profits so maybe it's a good time to invest.
My internetting is no good.
This move is designed to 'force heavy data users to find a better phone vendor'.
We're also upgrading your service with Oceanic Lag, shaped broadband, taking 100 or so of your cable channels and cutting off Huvu.
All complaints are to be directed to 'Telstra', which I've been assured is Australian for 'Know Your Place, You Filthy Peasant'.
Communications is a basic government service, as spelled out in the US constitution.
At this point, government should just buy-out Verizon. They're only a 100 billion company, tiny compared to the annual federal budget.
Let's limit the power of private companies to create megabusinesses through government intervention.
We need more government in our lives, and less freedom of choice.
Remember, freedom is code-word for corporate control.
I trust the hard-working government more than I trust lazy private companies.
Time to make the move. I thought Verizon would at least have the courtesy to grandfather all current data plans and let us stick with the $30 unlimited plan, but I guess not.
It's not that I'm a data whore and that I plan on slurping 10GB a month on my phone (I actually use under 300MB a month), it's more just the concept of being metered and having to check and worry about what I'm using.
That said, all major phone carriers are really making terrible decisions right now, and I should just move back to my silver Motorola Razr that I had 3 years ago and have a few hundred minutes and texting.
And I don't even know why.
Its as if all the joy and light is being sucked out of the world one by one. And I'm running out of places to turn because the general public is stupid enough to accept it.
We used to complain that service providers advertise "unlimited dataplan" while putting cap and implementing "fair use". Now they admit that they can't sell you unlimited dataplan, why do we keep complaining?
How can it be a problem if everyone has the same 5 gig cap.
I dont understand can someone explain.
It takes resources to provide the bandwidth so what is so unreasonable about charging for the bandwidth? Otherwise the light users are subsidising the heavy users. There are always scarce resources to be shared. At least this model provides a way for costs to be recovered without screwing with priority of data or throttling.
...doesn't this just mean they're finally being honest about the product they're selling?
please just forget all flatrates. IMHO Flatrates should be forbidden, because they are misleading at best. Flatrates are bets that 50% of the users will never go close to the limit where it would be not profitable (you dont need more than 1GB if you just have private email and open a few times per month a web page - but hey, exactly these people are the ones you can scare in the shop - they will overpay you to be sure not to overpay even more). This bet is not getting fairer by declaring "heavy users" afterwards and changing the contract conditions.
If mobile providers would be forced to compete by a single, transparent Money/GB value (maybe slightly regressive with amount of data, but *not* a factor of 10 or 100), and the customers would be free to choose the mobile phones independently, we would be spared from all this shit.
Along with this, VZW was also working on changing billing, so you would also get charged for the data you consumed when using Verizon's own applications. In short double-dipping... charging you for the application, and then charging you for the data their application used.
It was full steam ahead, and only a couple months from implementation across the board, when the federal government stepped in and started "investigating" with the obvious threat of legal action. VZW immediately took it off the table, and never spoke of it again. The pieces are all still in-place, though. Though I can't predict with any certainty, I fully expect this to come out of hiding the moment a more "business-friendly" (lazy, harried, corrupt, Republican, whichever) administration takes over the helm of the US Gov.
So, this post will be here with my prediction, and a solid rebuttal the next time someone tells you the government never does anything good for the people, that we should eliminate the government and trust big corporations to do the right thing, or that all political parties are the same.
For years phone companies have been selling data plans advertised as "all you can eat", but pricing them based on assumptions of low average use. This obviously doesn't add up.
The companies have the following choices:
1) Choke off data rates according to a secret amount of (un)fair use
2) Be honest about this ("data rate reduced to xMB/s after yMB of download per month")
3) Price the plans according the belief people will actually use them as advertised (duh!)
or
4) Get out of the "all you can eat" market altogether.
Personally I'd prefer (2), but I guess the companies think they can't compete by being honest in their advertising...
Wasn't this what the damn $30 "unlimited" plan was doing already?
Oh wait. Nobody likes when one points out the elephant in the room. Silly me!
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
To all you Verizon customers who laughed at us AT&T customers when we lost our unlimited data plans... ... suck it!
-David
Just get a laptop with wi-fi and a magic jack.
As long as there are traditional ISPs with unlimited data, there will be mobile providers with unlimited data.
But I guess I'll be moving to Sprint this summer. That Evo 4G is looking mighty sexy right about now.
With spending like this, exactly what are "conservatives" conserving?
Over the past 3 years or so, nearly every nationwide Mobile provider in the USA has castrated their data service. "Unlimited" data used to be slower, EDGE or early 3G a couple years back, but despite the expense you didn't have to worry about overages. Now it seems only Sprint (perhaps?) has an "unlimited" plan. ATT and Verizon, switching over to these capped bandwidth isn't simply to save money or keep network congestion down, but rather its the same impetus that had the 80s and 90s phone companies charging 25/c a minute for long distance - to jack up fees on a monopolized industry under the guise of "paying what you use". While true "unlimited" plans were few and far between over the last decade, they usually simply transitioned to slowing your connection speed if you were using a ton more data than most at an inconvenient time. Now, you're paying per kilobyte for overages, on top of stupidly high costs of data plans. Look at how even the iPhone 1's original data plan compares to those today - it was a $20/month unlimited option with 200 included SMS! Now, you're looking at well over $80, plus SMS packages for the high-end "5gb of transfer" plan! .
The problem is simple greed and it infests our entire system. Corporate giants for years told users "buy our new DSL/Cable/Fiber/3G/4G service.. and download more, more more! Get your movies! Get your music! Play Games" (Even when there wasn't much legal digital distribution, mind you). Not only did they benefit from upping subscription fees and only selectively rolling out broadband to the highest ROI areas, they also petitioned (read as: bought) government subsidy for "infrastructure improvements", common carrier agreements and more. Now, they figured out that instead of actually using our double-dipped tax dollars and subscription fees to actually expand infrastructure and give people the connectivity they want, its simpler to simply say "Sorry, you just can't download more than X per month. Yeah" and pocket the rest. Prices go up, service comes down and the user is meant to lick the boots of telecoms that have fucked over this nation's information infrastructure. There is only one solution.
We need to take that money and control out of the hands of private companies, and invest it in We The People. Nationalize our entire information infrastructure. Prior to Eisenhower's Interstate, the physical roadway system was heading towards the same kind of mess as today's information highways - unpaved roads, shoddy maintenance, only serviceable where profitable, and tolls were levied constantly. Even the fucking ROMANS figured out that the first thing to do when expanding their empire was to nationalize the roadway system and kick all the bandits collecting tolls along travel pathways the hell out. Those bandits are just named ATT and Comcast today! Right now, the wire in the ground, despite the fact its is lain with my tax dollars, is the property of a private company, which squelches competition. There's not a piece of "Big 4" infrastructure that is not taxpayer funded in some way, so we need to simply nationalize what we already own! Then we can start rolling out true universal broadband initiatives and give our nation competitive speeds and coverage. There can be a role to play for private industry, able to lease access to the public hardware to create ISPs, with the stipulation that they must simply be a "dumb pipe" and maintain neutrality - however, private industry should never forget who their masters are - We The People through our Government - rather than the Government being a toy of private moneyed interests. Some form of this is how most European and Asian nations have ascended to gigabit broadband speeds while much of our nation is floundering with 256k and big spenders in the most cosmopolitan areas are paying $50+ monthly for 20mb.
Telecoms aren't going to stop clenching their grip until we break their fingers.
But not in the UK.
One operator here has recently introduced true unlimited data with no "fair usage" policy or caps.
For £15 (~$24) per month on pay as you go, you get 300 minutes, 3000 texts and unlimited data.
They also offer a pay monthly option with a rolling 1 month contract. For £25 (~$40), you get 2000 any network minutes, 5000 same network minutes, 5000 texts, and unlimited data. Plus with this tariff, you are allowed to tether.
Or you can sign for a 2 year contract, and get a free (albeit low end) smartphone for the same price per month (or you can pay extra and get a better phone etc).
Hopefully other companies will follow their lead.
I signed a two year contract with verizon about a year ago while under the impression that I had an unlimited data plan. They really should not be allowed to change their end of the deal and expect me to stick around. In my mind, there are two ways to make this move legitimate - either grandfather in everyone that already has a contract our give of them a chance to terminate their account with no penalties. If they do anything other than this it is nothing more than as bait and switch. Of course, as they have the US legislature in their pocket they will get away with it...
To the haters: You can't win. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
The companies are like telling us here is an unlimited access plan that you pay for.. But we really don't like you to use it unlimited... You guys took "unlimited" way too serious
My contract is up this summer... guess where Verizon can stick it.
I guess when my contract is up on my smart phone I will be getting another cheap normal phone. I got it for the use it anywhere side of it but if I'm going to be limited on it then I don't even want it.
Moved to to AT&T when Verizon cost too much and had lousy coverage in the area I'm in most. Left AT&T because of their lousy network and tiered-data and while my coverage in this area still sucks on Verizon, when I traveled I had coverage - but I'm in this area most. Since T-mobile is AT&T - that leaves Sprint so I guess I'll be going with them since Verizon is pricing itself out of the market.
Love Europe where you can jump carriers based on price - that is what they need to do here - outlaw the contracts and phone locking. This country is so far behind the technology curve on phones it really is disgusting...
I think that the data cap moves we are seeing in the data communications sector represent a market-wide trend to protect the existing profitable "value added" services such as voice calling and premium television services. Companies seem to be afraid of becoming just another "dumb pipe" as connection speeds get fast enough to handle third party "value added" services (e.g. Netflix and Google Voice). These companies believe that, by using data caps and unregulated third party data usage meters, they can ensure the protection of their highly profitable "value added" service sector. In many respects, this practice represents a trend of "predatory pricing" and "refusal to deal" in the communications industry.
For example... In the cellular world, the 5 GB data cap effectively tolls previously "free" services such as Google Voice. On the broadband side of things, a 150 to 250 GB cap effectively limits the ability of Netflix and Hulu to compete with the first party in providing premium high definition video content.
In many ways, these data cap moves are representative of an anti-competitive protectionist oligopoly. They also represent an end-run around the principals of network neutrality. By using unregulated meters that only bill for third party network usage, these companies have effectively "rigged the pump" to ensure that they can charge almost any rate for almost any service. Better regulation and oversight is needed at the Federal Government level to ensure fairness and competition in this otherwise anti-competitive industry.
-Valen
Sprint still has reasonable and UNLIMITED V-T-D plans.
No, they don't have the iPhone. They DO have some pretty sweet Android phones though. Let the iSheep get raped for bandwidth, come ride the unlimited airwaves on Sprint!
(No, I'm not affiliated with Sprint at all. Just want to see my carrier of choice do well.)
Official Heretic from the "Church of Global Warming". Proven right thanks to whistle blowers. AGW = Flat Earth Theory
From experience with Verizon, the general policy seems to be "We're not happy until you're not happy".
Yes, your world and your usage patterns are the only ones that matter. The world does indeed revolve around you! Anyone that could possibly complain is just plain wrong. Since you have no reason to complain no one else should either!
I've never really understood why I should get a smartphone. Sure, there are times it'd be nice to have the Internet capabilities, but I hate using a smartphone as, get this, a phone. I've got a 6-year old simple phone that just does that, making phone calls for the small amount I use my cell phone for. The plan is still dirt cheap for virtually unlimited calling. I don't use SMS of any kind, so why do I want any of that bundled in? The only thing I want a smartphone for is mobile internet. But no carriers seem to want to just sell me a data plan, even if I come to them with an unlocked phone they can support. And now that even more caps are going into place, my desire to spend multiple hundreds of dollars on a phone and a plan drops even more.
Which would be good for me. I currently pay $30/month per phone for unlimited data for my phone and my wife's phone. I use ~1.5GB/month, she uses ~100MB/month. I have no issue paying $30 for my usage,but it sucks that I have to pay the same amount for my wife that uses less than 1/10th the amount of data. I think (hope?) that a 2GB family plan would be less than $60/month.
I've shied away from getting data plans because I don't see how I could afford $60 a month ($30 for my phone and $30 for my wife's). If they get a plan like AT&T's 200MB for $15 a month, then my data plan costs would be halved and I might just consider it. (I don't think we would use smartphones for anything other than Twitter, Google searches, Facebook and the like.)
Of course, then the article said this:
This is something I've been waiting for for awhile now. I get a family plan with shared texting across all phones, but need to pay per-phone for data plans? Why not simply say "You've paid $X and now have 2GB for your account; use it between your phones as you wish"? Of course, the CFO's statement doesn't mean they'll actually roll anything like this out (or that it would be reasonably priced), but it does at least indicate that they are aware of this need.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
If you think customer service from your ISP or wireless carrier is bad now, just wait until the equivalent of the DMV is in charge. "Oh, you have a problem with your service? We should have someone availible within 6-8 weeks. Thank you for choosing Govopoly."
If private monopolies are a bad thing, then why would monopolizing an industry under an unresponsive, inefficient, bureaucratic government be a good thing?
Remember, data just doesn't magically stream to your device. There are hundreds of thousands of miles of fiber optic and copper cables, as well as routing/switching centers, transmission towers, amplifiers, nodes, routers, and backup power supply systems. It takes millions of man-hours to monitor and maintain this infrastructure. It isn't free.
With the price of gas going up... I can see the need to raise the prices of data usage. I just never new they put my data on trucks and shipped it to my phone. You would have thought I would have seen that coming.
"Be wary of the man who urges an action in which he himself incurs no risk."
~Joaquin Setanti
'force heavy data users to pay more for mobile data.'
I bet the same people who came up with this idea are also against the rich bearing a higher tax burden.
Well, it looks like I'll be giving Sprint some heavy consideration in the near future. Especially if Verizon changes my contract. Sprint seems to be the most Android friendly anyway, but from what I've seen their coverage is a bit lacking.
That sucks ass. Good thing i have virgin mobile. My fear is that most carriers(and ISPs) will get on this lame bandwagon.
150MB for two people is a joke!
I suspect that installing and upgrading apps would exceed that. Do they actually have smartphones or did they think that texting ability qualifies it as a smartphone?
My usage is 1GB/month and I had no idea it was that high until I just checked it now. I'm just guessing, but most of my bandwidth is probably maps/navigator, web browsing, and installs/updates. I view an average of 5 youtube videos per month, if I went video crazy I guess I could really abuse the bandwidth, some people probably watch 2 hours of video while commuting to work and back on the train.
And now Amazon and Google are offering cloud based music playing, holy crap, how much bandwidth is that going to burn? I'm going to take a wild guess that cloud based music is as good as dead! Listening to your music 30 minutes a day will probably put you over your cap. Netflix is going to be available on Droids soon and they're already the number one bandwidth user on the internet, now they can be number one on the airwaves!
I'm not complaining, I actually like the idea of caps as long as they're reasonable. I suspect that there's a minority of people who abuse bandwidth as if it was an unlimited resource. If you live someplace with a great signal you can do everything with your cell phone. You can skip having a landline and use skype on your cell phone, skip cable internet and just tether, skip cable tv and just hook your Droid X hdmi cable to your flatscreen. I have the unlimited data plan(is it really unlimited?), but I prefer actual HD channels, faster internet connection(I only get 1.5Mb/s tethering), and decent phone capability that isn't owned by Microsoft.
When people abuse unlimited, it goes away! If water was free there would probably be people running water 24/7 to power their paddle-wheel generators.
You mean like they've been paying more already. What a joke. This amounts to nothing more but collusion in the wireless space.
Sprint is the only carrier committed to unlimited bandwidth. They will be the carrier that emerges victorious from this band-cap war. Why is that? Because while everyone else is fighting over pennies, dollars, and bandwidth, Sprint will be fighting over users. They want users, and they'll whore themselves out 'till they get them.
The real reason for bandwidth caps is we allowed the pipes owners to also own the services on the pipes. This used to be a big no no here in the U.S. The ISP's are also the pipes owners now, and guess what, they also all own cable television and or broadcasting companies. These companies are in direct competition with services such as Netflix, Huluu, and believe it or not Pandora. Music Choice channels and other premium content channels are huge revenue makers for these companies. Rather than compete, they will exclude. This is why we are getting bandwidth caps. This is why we are paying more now for internet than we ever have. These behemoth companies are protecting their own bottom line the only way they know how. Overcharge the customer. Sell them a service that when people actually use it, the Cableclown providers cry foul and tell us we're being unfair. Unfair for using the very services they schlepped us, at the rates they advertised. That, to them, is unfair. How dare we use the thing they sold us for the price they sold it to us, especially since they can make more now. Silly Sheeples.
Does this mean people are going to have to argue with their math-illiterate sales and marketing idiots about if there's a difference between 0.002 dollars and 0.002 cents per kB, and which it is they charge, again?!?
Why doesn't the gene pool have a life guard?
Wasn't the truly unlimited data one of the advantages given by Verizon for getting an iPhone with them instead of with AT&T? Or was that never an "official" claim?
"I'm not sure I like the fugnutish tone you used in your post!" -RogL (608926)-
For ever less service and products, of course. Until, one day, you find yourself paying monthly fees for the priviledge of being cybertattooed with the corporations's dancing, singing, rf-scanning, malware, rf-id Logo.
What fun!
You can get unlimited data and 3G on Sprint; it's just branded Virgin mobile (Virgin used to be a partner, but Sprint bought them out). There are other trade-offs to going with Virgin (like lower end phones), but I've been happy with the service.
This move is designed to 'force heavy data users to pay more for mobile data.'
All I see is:
This move is designed to 'allow us to use bait-and-switch tactics to make a metric fuck-ton of money by screwing our customer base in ways we hope they won't notice overly much'
Maybe I'm just jaded ...
Oh god, that woman is John Romero!
Turned off my Cell phone plan.
Look, this whole Cell Phone internet shit is stupid. How fucking fast do we need stupid ass shit to get to our cell phones? You have the corporations, making it so crap is bigger, streaming is important, while the cell phone co's are putting limits on downloads and charging more for over small amounts. They don't care if they sell more data plans even though there's isn't enough resources.
What is so fucking important today that needs this tech, that wasn't important 10 years ago? By the way people are, you'd think we didn't survive before the internet.
Be seeing you...
I'm going to the Sprint store tonight. Say goodbye to me.
Slashdot folks, Sprint is running a promotion right now to convert unhappy people like me with a $125 credit to leave and come to them. I'm going to reward the company that has the best business model.
I very nearly got an Android phone last year, but didn't at the last minute because I learned that Verizon mandated the $30 a month unlimited Internet/Email plan with any smartphone. 1) I didn't intend to use the phone for Internet access all that much, and 2) I simply couldn't afford that. So instead, I opted for a multimedia phone (eNV touch) and pay just $10 a month for limited net/email access. As is, I hardly ever go on the 'net with my phone, or do email, I don't even use anywhere near the allowance I'm given - for one thing, even with an eNV touch, the screen is just too small for browsing -not because of eyesight (being myopic, I can read fine print), but general preference.. though it's good enough for GPS maps.
So for me and probably quite a few like me, this is not a bad thing -I'd still like an Android phone or an iPhone, and now I'll be able to get a cheaper plan.
I realize it's different strokes for different people; I can access the net anytime of day or night, from work or home, having a tower and large screen in front of my face all the time, but for many people that's simply not a viable option, so they rely on their phones.
Verizon hasn't yet announced it's plans and pricing, but if they want to remain competitive, they won't be able to gouge customers.
Look back up at my post, now look back down, you're on the Internet. Now look back up. I'm a signature.
It sometimes seems 25% of the posts here on /. somehow mention the growing phone market and the amazing technology its bringing. Apple, Google, Microsoft, are all fighting to become the head of this new technology, now other big names like Intel are completely changing their focus to the phone market because thats where they see all the money going.
In truth after all these companies battle it out they will now be under the control of their new masters AT&T and Verizon. Both companies have the power to effectively kill the smartphone market in the US. I understand that the networks cant handle as much as we would like to throw at them, I have seen people running multiple apps transferring relatively large amounts of data 24/7. But the phone companies are just using this as an excuse to better segregate the market and milk it for all its worth.
My question is why is everybody letting them? (1) the big phone makers are putting their futures in the phone market without first striking any deals with the network providers that they stick to certain standards and not raise the prices and reduce the quality yearly. (2) Us users, after AT&T got rid of their unlimited data I waited for my contract to end and went to Verizon, now that Verizon is going to start tying the rope around my neck Sprint is looking much better. If the customer base moves the the phone makers will follow, but what am I saying, people would have to give up their iPhone for a while... (3) Government, why aren't they stepping in, Verizon and AT&T are already treating this like a Duopoly and there are still a number of good providers out there. But it wont stay like that for long as TMobile gets swallowed up, and I'm sure Verizon has its eyes on Sprint, this is why we have the government involved in corporate affairs, so they can stop all the power from accumulating in one place.
This isn't that hard. They'll get the message when people start leaving vendors in DROVES. Reward the companies that still provide what you want, and punish the ones that don't by not giving them your $$$. They'll get the message when their people leave. Don't cling to your 'grandfather' clause. Go now. (and no, I don't work for Sprint).
But whatever you do, don't WHINE about it until you no longer *have* choices.
-- You can't idiot-proof anything, because they're always coming out with better idiots.
I like (generous) data caps, they insulate >95% of us from the 5% who use massive amounts of data and drive costs up. I don't want a socialist phone company model where the masses subsidize the usage of the few.
Now I pay $25/month for my 2GB of data on AT&T. Before they introduced data caps, the only option was $30/month for unlimited data. I prefer it this way. It's cheaper, and I never ever come close to hitting my limits.
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
Which is one reason why I won't be buying a Verizon smartphone when my current Verizon cellphone contract expires.
When the local cable and telcos repeatedly refused the request of local governments to install Fiber Optic cables in order to offer affordable high bandwidth internet connections to everyone, the local govenments, like mine, started laying their own Fiber Optic cable. I watched with anticipation as the cable was laid in my yard. It was never hooked up. The cable and telcos whined (and bribed) Congress to pass legislation to forbid local governments from "competing" with their cable and telcos. The legislation also gave the cable and telcos over $200 BILLION to fund and finish what the local governments had started -- conversion from Copper wire to Fiber Optic. Unfortunately, and probably deliberately, the legislation did not include penalty clauses for non-compliance. The GREEDY cable and telcos pocketed the money and returned to squeezing maximum profits out of their Copper wire.
Flash forward 20 years. Internet usage has exploded, creating a perfect storm for greedy cable and telcos to maximize their profit by introducing a "Neutral Internet" PR storm which actually resulted in the ISPs being able to break their Copper wire traffic into "tiers", which aren't tiers at all, but merely ways of marking an Internet packet so as to allow software/hardware on their backbone to let certain packets to go unimpeded (if the customer paid a higher premium), while the others had their packets TTL count reduced or were dropped altogether, forcing resend, thus "slowing" down the cheap connections. The result: for Internet, TV and smartphone services combined consumers in the US now pay $130 AND MORE for CAPPED service. For comparison, France installed Fiber Optic throughout their country, and users can get an uncapped 40Gb Internet connection, 200 channels of TV and unlimited smartphone connections to any other phone in their country for $30/month.
Only Americans would be so ill-informed and sheepish as to allow their current Internet situation to have developed. All because they now have a Cabal, not a Republic.
Running with Linux for over 20 years!
The free market will provide. Haha! Would that be the free market that maximizes profit? You know, by delivering as little as possible for the greatest possible price? Competition would mitigate this, but to compete is to eliminate (or co-opt) competition, so this is it. Welcome to the FUTURE! Future.. future...
Paranoia is a Survival Trait!
I will. Been with Verizon since the first tower went up in my county in '86 I think. This was before they became Verizon. Got 2 Droids that will be on someone else's system soon. They can also say goodbye to being top dog in short order. It is bad when you start running fiercely loyal customers into the arms of your competitor.
So does anybody know if current unlimited data plans are grandfathered? Or has this not been announced yet?
"UNIX is very simple, it just needs a genius to understand its simplicity." -Dennis Ritchie
This just came to my mind about phone companies trying going towards these per usage plans.Will this take away revenue from the android market and apple's app store? Honestly this making android/apple app development look real slim because some customers will not pay Verizon/AT&Ts fees to download an app.