At AT&T you pay for the data you use, but you can use as much as you want without limit.
Oh, well, then absolutely no one on the planet has a download cap. Not even Comcast, where you pay the same for 250 GB a month as you do on anyone else to get infinity GB a month.
Prices have gone down? When did that happen? An iPhone plan is almost $100 a month. My truck payment is $225 a month.
When ATT refers to prices falling they mean voice. Actually making calls on your cellphone has gotten much cheaper than it used to be.
Then bring in the loophole of data, who's prices are going nothing but up if your intent on taking advantage of the many internet enabled services out today.
Oh, well, then absolutely no one on the planet has a download cap. Not even Comcast, where you pay the same for 250 GB a month as you do on anyone else to get infinity GB a month.
Yeah, that's not a download cap.
My friend you seem to be confusing Download caps with data caps. DATA caps are the 2GB in placement, unless download caps=data caps now? Or I'm missing the abstract reference.(forgive me if that is the case)
ATT has had download caps, although I'm not even sure if those are still there. This happened when ATT was advertising the Atrix and was promising buyers speeds of something like 5 mbps down minimum or something. Then users found out that no matter where they went they only got like 300 kbps. The Rooting community had to start taking away Atrixes from ATT via Rooting because ATT was so slow in rolling out the updates.
Really? What makes it illegal? It wouldn't form a monopoly, not with VZW still out there... Unless you think that being the only carrier supporting CDMA constitutes a monopoly, although that would be like saying that nintendo has a monopoly because they make the only system that supports Wii games. Or that Republicans have a monopoly because the Democrats can't string together logical thoughts... Or daring fireball has a monopoly because Gruber only writes for them... Or, you get the point.
If you have Tmo, and don't like AT&T, you will still have choices, off the top of my head there's:
1. Verizon
2. Sprint
3. Cricket
4. US Cellular
5. Metro PCS
you might not like any of those choices, but you do have them.
Sincerely,
Dim
Metro is not available in much of the Midwest, nor is US Cell (cant get it in Indiana except in the Chicago area like Gary) and Cricket IIRC just resells sprint bandwidth and is so cheap bc u can only use the primary network and not roam...ti is also per their website, not availible in Indiana except near Chicago...
We have no choices here other than ATT, Tmobile, VZW and Sprint...and VZW and ATT clearly collude on pricing.
The fear isnt monopoly, the fear is duaopoly...and your examples are not great either - some blogger only writes for one site, who cares - you go to other sites if you dont like him and you can get the same info...and hell, you dont even need to read tech opinion sites but everyone needs a phone in modern society and we learned 40 years ago why one company controlling it is bad bad bad. 2 in this case is just as bad because we don't care about collusion in this country cause the FCC, SEC and FTC are weak because the companies own the senate, house and president.
When ATT refers to prices falling they mean voice. Actually making calls on your cellphone has gotten much cheaper than it used to be.
.
hmm, I got my first cell in 2004 and paid like $30 for 500 minutes, I now pay $39 for the 450 minutes on ATT as part of my plan on my iphone 4 so while one case is anecdotal, it seems to me that you may not be correct.
Metro is not available in much of the Midwest, nor is US Cell (cant get it in Indiana except in the Chicago area like Gary) and Cricket IIRC just resells sprint bandwidth and is so cheap bc u can only use the primary network and not roam...ti is also per their website, not availible in Indiana except near Chicago...
We have no choices here other than ATT, Tmobile, VZW and Sprint...and VZW and ATT clearly collude on pricing.
The fear isnt monopoly, the fear is duaopoly...and your examples are not great either - some blogger only writes for one site, who cares - you go to other sites if you dont like him and you can get the same info...and hell, you dont even need to read tech opinion sites but everyone needs a phone in modern society and we learned 40 years ago why one company controlling it is bad bad bad. 2 in this case is just as bad because we don't care about collusion in this country cause the FCC, SEC and FTC are weak because the companies own the senate, house and president.
A cap means you're cut off when you reach it. None of the carriers have caps. They do charge in tiered amounts, which is not a cap.
Just because a restaurant charges for individual items doesn't mean the amount you can eat is limited or capped. You simply pay for what you order. The data plans are the same.
Frankly, the US had the world's best -- and most reasonably priced -- phone service that was the envy of the world.
Sorry, but that middle part is nonsense. US phone service under Ma Bell was reasonably priced only compared to the wildly inefficient government phone utilities then prevalent in the rest of the industrialized world. In the absolute it was ridiculously expensive. Hell, you weren't even allowed to use your own phone handsets.
Service was certainly good, but so it should have been for the money.
Sour grapes by Hesse. Sprint had also explored buying TM, but they don't have the money to do it and their respective cellular systems (CDMA vs. GSM) are incompatible.
US phone service under Ma Bell was reasonably priced only compared to the wildly inefficient government phone utilities then prevalent in the rest of the industrialized world
Care to name one major utility that was then not government-owned?
If you can't, what's factually incorrect about the 'middle part' of my sentence? If it's not factually incorrect, what's nonsensical about my claim? Perhaps your retort is what is nonsensical?
A related point: US phone services are more expensive than those in many other parts of the world today.
Care to name one major utility that was then not government-owned?
If you can't, what's factually incorrect about the 'middle part' of my sentence? If it's not factually incorrect, what's nonsensical about my claim? Perhaps your retort is what is nonsensical?
A related point: US phone services are more expensive than those in many other parts of the world today.
What's factually incorrect? Why not you provide some facts to support your assertion that MaBell had the most reasonably priced phone system in the world?
Regardless, I don't think there's anyone out there claiming that land-line service costs more today (inflation adjusted) than it did 30 years ago.
I am curious what you would be comparing this to? There has not been significant innovation by the carriers for over a decade or more. All improvements are/have been incremental, not innovations. Your idea of improvement has faltered badly and doesn't reflect the reality of the carrier market for cellular services. There is no intensive process of these companies working to win and service new and existing customers. As the carriers struggle to fight commoditization of their wireless pipes, the era of service innovation has passed them by. They had the opportunity to become bona fide service providers, but squandered that in the race to consolidate and gobble up regionals. They have relied on the handset makers to develop hardware that would entice users to bounce from their current competitor to their service set.
It is Sprint that made the claim that the telco market in the the US is innovative. It is not.
In competitive markets there is an obvious and intensive process of working to win customers that goes beyond consolidation.
What's factually incorrect? Why not you provide some facts to support your assertion that MaBell had the most reasonably priced phone system in the world?
Regardless, I don't think there's anyone out there claiming that land-line service costs more today (inflation adjusted) than it did 30 years ago.
What are you trying to say here? You're not making any sense.....
[QUOTE=Dimwit;1890594]Or that Republicans have a monopoly because the Democrats can't string together logical thoughts... .
Huh? Democrats can't string together logical thoughts? Where on earth did that come from? The Republicans tell us that the best way to balance the budget is to give $2 trillion of tax breaks to corporations and millionaires. And that's logical? Or how about their positively delusional denial of climate science? It appears that the author of the above referenced quote may be named "Dim" for a reason....
I think we need something else to wireless industry altogether.
1. We will only have 2 real carriers with awesome phones on them, fine I've accepted that.
2. But the reason is lack of spectrum, cellular technology can't handle all the people who want to use it, and we only got like 300,000 people, which is a joke compared to china and india. Bangladesh has 150 mil and the size of Illinois.
3. This means that we need a new tech, otherwise china is screwed, so why not work on that. Why not come up with a different way to deliver calling and data that can accomodate more carriers.
4. Just as an idea, and a dumb one, WiFi is not running out of spectrum, so why not pay those with WiFi routers to have a special channel which is capable of carrying voice and data over their home network up to a certain limit. Or have special purpose wifi in big cities that handles all the calling and data on mobile, but at speeds similar to 4G LTE and laptop can't join those using some restricted chip.
If the choice is two carriers that have real 4G, or 4 that have "4G" I pick the first option. But I hope there is another solution.
Comments
That said, I know AT&T doesn't have download caps
2GB a month doesn't sound like a cap to you?
At AT&T you pay for the data you use, but you can use as much as you want without limit.
Oh, well, then absolutely no one on the planet has a download cap. Not even Comcast, where you pay the same for 250 GB a month as you do on anyone else to get infinity GB a month.
Yeah, that's not a download cap.
Prices have gone down? When did that happen? An iPhone plan is almost $100 a month. My truck payment is $225 a month.
When ATT refers to prices falling they mean voice. Actually making calls on your cellphone has gotten much cheaper than it used to be.
Then bring in the loophole of data, who's prices are going nothing but up if your intent on taking advantage of the many internet enabled services out today.
2GB a month doesn't sound like a cap to you?
Oh, well, then absolutely no one on the planet has a download cap. Not even Comcast, where you pay the same for 250 GB a month as you do on anyone else to get infinity GB a month.
Yeah, that's not a download cap.
My friend you seem to be confusing Download caps with data caps. DATA caps are the 2GB in placement, unless download caps=data caps now? Or I'm missing the abstract reference.(forgive me if that is the case)
ATT has had download caps, although I'm not even sure if those are still there. This happened when ATT was advertising the Atrix and was promising buyers speeds of something like 5 mbps down minimum or something. Then users found out that no matter where they went they only got like 300 kbps. The Rooting community had to start taking away Atrixes from ATT via Rooting because ATT was so slow in rolling out the updates.
Really? What makes it illegal? It wouldn't form a monopoly, not with VZW still out there... Unless you think that being the only carrier supporting CDMA constitutes a monopoly, although that would be like saying that nintendo has a monopoly because they make the only system that supports Wii games. Or that Republicans have a monopoly because the Democrats can't string together logical thoughts... Or daring fireball has a monopoly because Gruber only writes for them... Or, you get the point.
If you have Tmo, and don't like AT&T, you will still have choices, off the top of my head there's:
1. Verizon
2. Sprint
3. Cricket
4. US Cellular
5. Metro PCS
you might not like any of those choices, but you do have them.
Sincerely,
Dim
Metro is not available in much of the Midwest, nor is US Cell (cant get it in Indiana except in the Chicago area like Gary) and Cricket IIRC just resells sprint bandwidth and is so cheap bc u can only use the primary network and not roam...ti is also per their website, not availible in Indiana except near Chicago...
We have no choices here other than ATT, Tmobile, VZW and Sprint...and VZW and ATT clearly collude on pricing.
The fear isnt monopoly, the fear is duaopoly...and your examples are not great either - some blogger only writes for one site, who cares - you go to other sites if you dont like him and you can get the same info...and hell, you dont even need to read tech opinion sites but everyone needs a phone in modern society and we learned 40 years ago why one company controlling it is bad bad bad. 2 in this case is just as bad because we don't care about collusion in this country cause the FCC, SEC and FTC are weak because the companies own the senate, house and president.
My friend you seem to be confusing Download caps with data caps.
You're confusing download caps with speed caps.
You're confusing download caps with speed caps.
Indeed, My bad then.
When ATT refers to prices falling they mean voice. Actually making calls on your cellphone has gotten much cheaper than it used to be.
.
hmm, I got my first cell in 2004 and paid like $30 for 500 minutes, I now pay $39 for the 450 minutes on ATT as part of my plan on my iphone 4 so while one case is anecdotal, it seems to me that you may not be correct.
Metro is not available in much of the Midwest, nor is US Cell (cant get it in Indiana except in the Chicago area like Gary) and Cricket IIRC just resells sprint bandwidth and is so cheap bc u can only use the primary network and not roam...ti is also per their website, not availible in Indiana except near Chicago...
We have no choices here other than ATT, Tmobile, VZW and Sprint...and VZW and ATT clearly collude on pricing.
The fear isnt monopoly, the fear is duaopoly...and your examples are not great either - some blogger only writes for one site, who cares - you go to other sites if you dont like him and you can get the same info...and hell, you dont even need to read tech opinion sites but everyone needs a phone in modern society and we learned 40 years ago why one company controlling it is bad bad bad. 2 in this case is just as bad because we don't care about collusion in this country cause the FCC, SEC and FTC are weak because the companies own the senate, house and president.
So who are you using and how did you select them?
Just because a restaurant charges for individual items doesn't mean the amount you can eat is limited or capped. You simply pay for what you order. The data plans are the same.
Frankly, the US had the world's best -- and most reasonably priced -- phone service that was the envy of the world.
Sorry, but that middle part is nonsense. US phone service under Ma Bell was reasonably priced only compared to the wildly inefficient government phone utilities then prevalent in the rest of the industrialized world. In the absolute it was ridiculously expensive. Hell, you weren't even allowed to use your own phone handsets.
Service was certainly good, but so it should have been for the money.
US phone service under Ma Bell was reasonably priced only compared to the wildly inefficient government phone utilities then prevalent in the rest of the industrialized world
Care to name one major utility that was then not government-owned?
If you can't, what's factually incorrect about the 'middle part' of my sentence? If it's not factually incorrect, what's nonsensical about my claim? Perhaps your retort is what is nonsensical?
A related point: US phone services are more expensive than those in many other parts of the world today.
Anyone else find Dan Hesse's arguments rather odd? Normally, CEOs are ecstatic over the number of significant competitors shrinking from three to two.
He wanted to buy the towers and customers for Sprint. He's bitter that they failed.
Care to name one major utility that was then not government-owned?
If you can't, what's factually incorrect about the 'middle part' of my sentence? If it's not factually incorrect, what's nonsensical about my claim? Perhaps your retort is what is nonsensical?
A related point: US phone services are more expensive than those in many other parts of the world today.
What's factually incorrect? Why not you provide some facts to support your assertion that MaBell had the most reasonably priced phone system in the world?
Regardless, I don't think there's anyone out there claiming that land-line service costs more today (inflation adjusted) than it did 30 years ago.
I am curious what you would be comparing this to? There has not been significant innovation by the carriers for over a decade or more. All improvements are/have been incremental, not innovations. Your idea of improvement has faltered badly and doesn't reflect the reality of the carrier market for cellular services. There is no intensive process of these companies working to win and service new and existing customers. As the carriers struggle to fight commoditization of their wireless pipes, the era of service innovation has passed them by. They had the opportunity to become bona fide service providers, but squandered that in the race to consolidate and gobble up regionals. They have relied on the handset makers to develop hardware that would entice users to bounce from their current competitor to their service set.
It is Sprint that made the claim that the telco market in the the US is innovative. It is not.
In competitive markets there is an obvious and intensive process of working to win customers that goes beyond consolidation.
What's factually incorrect? Why not you provide some facts to support your assertion that MaBell had the most reasonably priced phone system in the world?
Regardless, I don't think there's anyone out there claiming that land-line service costs more today (inflation adjusted) than it did 30 years ago.
What are you trying to say here? You're not making any sense.....
Huh? Democrats can't string together logical thoughts? Where on earth did that come from? The Republicans tell us that the best way to balance the budget is to give $2 trillion of tax breaks to corporations and millionaires. And that's logical? Or how about their positively delusional denial of climate science? It appears that the author of the above referenced quote may be named "Dim" for a reason....
1. We will only have 2 real carriers with awesome phones on them, fine I've accepted that.
2. But the reason is lack of spectrum, cellular technology can't handle all the people who want to use it, and we only got like 300,000 people, which is a joke compared to china and india. Bangladesh has 150 mil and the size of Illinois.
3. This means that we need a new tech, otherwise china is screwed, so why not work on that. Why not come up with a different way to deliver calling and data that can accomodate more carriers.
4. Just as an idea, and a dumb one, WiFi is not running out of spectrum, so why not pay those with WiFi routers to have a special channel which is capable of carrying voice and data over their home network up to a certain limit. Or have special purpose wifi in big cities that handles all the calling and data on mobile, but at speeds similar to 4G LTE and laptop can't join those using some restricted chip.
If the choice is two carriers that have real 4G, or 4 that have "4G" I pick the first option. But I hope there is another solution.