More cell towers has become a political issue. If you live in an area controlled by ignorant democrats there may not be an opportunity to build more towers. You could very well have your bandwidth limited by politics in many areas right now.
really? making this political?
large urban areas in the US have a large concentration of cell phone antennas.
large urban areas are overwhelmingly Democratic in terms of voting.
Heck, Philadelphia hasn't had a Republican mayor since the 1940s, and we installed an outdoor distributed antenna system on street light poles that is leased to cell phone companies.
It is not very hard if you are not trying to avoid. We have an AT&T family plan with 30GB+rollover. We went into a month with 50gb and came out of it going a couple of gigs over. 90% of it got used by one person streaming Tidal during something like 72 hours of driving during two different weekends.
Admittedly that is an unusual circumstance (with questionable merit I might add). I have used 20 gb in a month streaming video in hotels with terrible WiFi. There are lots of ways and 23GB is actually not that much data.
This does seem like a fair plan if they implement it as they described.
Sure. It depends on your plan. We have a family plan with Verizon. We don't have unlimited, but 15GB per month. We also have LTE on our iPads. It doesn't happen every month, but there are months where we need to be careful the last several days. I can see us using 23GB if we're freer with our usage. My wife is the one who uses little. It's my daughter and I who use 80% of the data. So if my wife used more, then we'd easily be pushing past 20GB.
But still, for most Accounts with a single user, 23GB is an awful lot. They'd need to be watching a lot of video.
Still, AT&T used to throttle at about 4GB, if people here remember, so this is vastly better.
Me and my middle son use most of the data in a typical month for us (we have 5 phones and 2 iPads all together in the 30GB+). We typically only one about 10GB leaving us sitting in the high 40s available every month. The month we went over, my Wife use 47GB and she typically uses less than 1. Keep an eye out .
If I were Verizon or ATT I'd just kill all unlimited plans. It seems to only get them bad publicity year after year. Doesn't seem to be much upside. Of the 3% of your customer base how much would you lose? And in two years no one will still be hammering them about this otherwise.
It doesn't matter how much an individual with a "unlimited plan" downloads. He/she bought a contract that required them to pay in exchange for an advertised product of unlimited data at an advertised speed.
If Sprint wants to change the contract the customer should have the right to have a reduced price BUT also the right to maintain the status quo.
It is a slippery slope when Sprint etc can unilaterally change their agreement. This will lead to further misrepresentation of offers only to be changed when the customer is too fully committed to switch or there is no longer a competitive offer available.
And to those idiots out there who think that Sprint would not do something that would alienate their client base, have you heard of UNITED, DELTA, SPIRIT, AMERICAN, etc?
I don't know where you get your information but it has never meant that. It originally started out meaning giving up a landline phone connection for a cell phone. Later it was also applied to people cutting off their cable connection due to many reasons including the nonsense of the cable companies.
Not really. People generally make the decision to cut landlines due to the expense.
Sure it is. If all you have is an iPhone or iPad that is your internet solution. It really doesn't make sense to pay for multiple internet providers for many people, so LTE becomes the sole connection to the web. For many this works out really well.
Sorry wiz ou are dead wrong and pkabir is correct. A cord cutter refers to cutting subscription content services (cable/sat) and going with web based content. (google it)
...make unlimited unlimited. Get rid of the data caps. Institute throttling across ALL users. Divide resources by X number of users.
If no one is using the network at 3am why not allow users to stream Netflix without data penalties.
ummm....that is what Sprint says they are doing, but only for the absolute highest users:
"Prioritization windows are calculated every 20 milliseconds, and throttled users will see services restored to normal operating speeds once traffic conditions at a particular cell site clear."
It doesn't matter how much an individual with a "unlimited plan" downloads. He/she bought a contract that required them to pay in exchange for an advertised product of unlimited data at an advertised speed.
If Sprint wants to change the contract the customer should have the right to have a reduced price BUT also the right to maintain the status quo.
It is a slippery slope when Sprint etc can unilaterally change their agreement. This will lead to further misrepresentation of offers only to be changed when the customer is too fully committed to switch or there is no longer a competitive offer available.
And to those idiots out there who think that Sprint would not do something that would alienate their client base, have you heard of UNITED, DELTA, SPIRIT, AMERICAN, etc?
It doesn't matter how much an individual with a "unlimited plan" downloads. He/she bought a contract that required them to pay in exchange for an advertised product of unlimited data at an advertised speed.
If you are not under contract, and pay month-to-month, your payment will be your acceptance of Sprint's terms.
"Quality of Service Practices (QoS): To help protect against the possibility that customers may occupy an unfair share of network resources, unlimited data plan customers who use more than 23GB of data during a billing cycle will be prioritized below other customers for the remainder of their billing cycle, in times and locations where the availability of network resources is constrained. Affected unlimited data plan customers may notice temporary changes in the performance of certain applications when they are on constrained sites as compared to other users especially if such affected users are engaged in data-intensive activities. Performance will return to normal when the cell site is no longer constrained or the customer moves to a non-constrained location. Affected unlimited customers will still be able to enjoy unlimited quantities of data without overage charges or data caps even if their usage exceeds the threshold for Sprint’s QoS practices. In addition, Sprint may adjust periodically the applicable threshold for Sprint’s QoS practices. See sprint.com/networkmanagement for additional details."
It doesn't matter how much an individual with a "unlimited plan" downloads. He/she bought a contract that required them to pay in exchange for an advertised product of unlimited data at an advertised speed.
If Sprint wants to change the contract the customer should have the right to have a reduced price BUT also the right to maintain the status quo.
It is a slippery slope when Sprint etc can unilaterally change their agreement. This will lead to further misrepresentation of offers only to be changed when the customer is too fully committed to switch or there is no longer a competitive offer available.
And to those idiots out there who think that Sprint would not do something that would alienate their client base, have you heard of UNITED, DELTA, SPIRIT, AMERICAN, etc?
This problem is happening because most people with unlimited plans got them when 3G was in use. Downloads were much slower. When LTE came out, and download speed doubled, and even quadrupled, people started to use much more data. The carriers were caught flat footed. If LTE was in use when unlimited plans weren't yet offered, I doubt they would have been.
It doesn't matter how much an individual with a "unlimited plan" downloads. He/she bought a contract that required them to pay in exchange for an advertised product of unlimited data at an advertised speed.
If Sprint wants to change the contract the customer should have the right to have a reduced price BUT also the right to maintain the status quo.
It is a slippery slope when Sprint etc can unilaterally change their agreement. This will lead to further misrepresentation of offers only to be changed when the customer is too fully committed to switch or there is no longer a competitive offer available.
And to those idiots out there who think that Sprint would not do something that would alienate their client base, have you heard of UNITED, DELTA, SPIRIT, AMERICAN, etc?
So because 'unlimited' was offered while under contract you think the customer is entitled to 'unlimited' even after the contract has been fulfilled?
There are soft and often hard limits imposed in basically all services. Landlines moved to unlimited calling plans to compete with mobile phones a bit longer, but certain caps still exist. To go above them without service cancellation, you need a business account. Cable based internet service is the same way. Usually they allot something around 200GB/month for a single family residence, but it varies by provider. If you go over you'll probably receive a warning of some kind.
As long as you are paying your monthly fees you are still entitled to the deal. Contracts were established only for the purpose of purchasing the phone. I have been out of contract for three years and maintain my unlimited plan and pay full price for a new phone inorder to maintain my current plan.
Comments
So it's limited after all.
no, you can still consume an unlimited amount of data.
i bet all of these companies contracts allow unlimited data transfer, but *not* unlimited data speed. you are misconstruing the two.
but like the US road system, you can drive as far as you want, but in areas of congestion, the speed may be dropped.
That is a Lot of data. The most mobile data I've ever used in a month was about 9.5GB. And that was when I was traveling extensively for a month.
This really makes me consider jumping ship from Verizon.
More cell towers has become a political issue. If you live in an area controlled by ignorant democrats there may not be an opportunity to build more towers. You could very well have your bandwidth limited by politics in many areas right now.
really? making this political?
large urban areas in the US have a large concentration of cell phone antennas.
large urban areas are overwhelmingly Democratic in terms of voting.
Heck, Philadelphia hasn't had a Republican mayor since the 1940s, and we installed an outdoor distributed antenna system on street light poles that is leased to cell phone companies.
Admittedly that is an unusual circumstance (with questionable merit I might add). I have used 20 gb in a month streaming video in hotels with terrible WiFi. There are lots of ways and 23GB is actually not that much data.
This does seem like a fair plan if they implement it as they described.
Me and my middle son use most of the data in a typical month for us (we have 5 phones and 2 iPads all together in the 30GB+). We typically only one about 10GB leaving us sitting in the high 40s available every month. The month we went over, my Wife use 47GB and she typically uses less than 1. Keep an eye out
If Sprint wants to change the contract the customer should have the right to have a reduced price BUT also the right to maintain the status quo.
It is a slippery slope when Sprint etc can unilaterally change their agreement. This will lead to further misrepresentation of offers only to be changed when the customer is too fully committed to switch or there is no longer a competitive offer available.
And to those idiots out there who think that Sprint would not do something that would alienate their client base, have you heard of UNITED, DELTA, SPIRIT, AMERICAN, etc?
I don't know where you get your information but it has never meant that. It originally started out meaning giving up a landline phone connection for a cell phone. Later it was also applied to people cutting off their cable connection due to many reasons including the nonsense of the cable companies.
Not really. People generally make the decision to cut landlines due to the expense.
Sure it is. If all you have is an iPhone or iPad that is your internet solution. It really doesn't make sense to pay for multiple internet providers for many people, so LTE becomes the sole connection to the web. For many this works out really well.
Sorry wiz ou are dead wrong and pkabir is correct. A cord cutter refers to cutting subscription content services (cable/sat) and going with web based content. (google it)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cord-cutting
...make unlimited unlimited. Get rid of the data caps. Institute throttling across ALL users. Divide resources by X number of users.
If no one is using the network at 3am why not allow users to stream Netflix without data penalties.
ummm....that is what Sprint says they are doing, but only for the absolute highest users:
"Prioritization windows are calculated every 20 milliseconds, and throttled users will see services restored to normal operating speeds once traffic conditions at a particular cell site clear."
if your tower is empty, you won't see any change.
The contract probably says they can
It doesn't matter how much an individual with a "unlimited plan" downloads. He/she bought a contract that required them to pay in exchange for an advertised product of unlimited data at an advertised speed.
If you are not under contract, and pay month-to-month, your payment will be your acceptance of Sprint's terms.
http://shop2.sprint.com/en/legal/legal_terms_privacy_popup.shtml?ECID=vanity:termsandconditions
"Quality of Service Practices (QoS): To help protect against the possibility that customers may occupy an unfair share of network resources, unlimited data plan customers who use more than 23GB of data during a billing cycle will be prioritized below other customers for the remainder of their billing cycle, in times and locations where the availability of network resources is constrained. Affected unlimited data plan customers may notice temporary changes in the performance of certain applications when they are on constrained sites as compared to other users especially if such affected users are engaged in data-intensive activities. Performance will return to normal when the cell site is no longer constrained or the customer moves to a non-constrained location. Affected unlimited customers will still be able to enjoy unlimited quantities of data without overage charges or data caps even if their usage exceeds the threshold for Sprint’s QoS practices. In addition, Sprint may adjust periodically the applicable threshold for Sprint’s QoS practices. See sprint.com/networkmanagement for additional details."
This problem is happening because most people with unlimited plans got them when 3G was in use. Downloads were much slower. When LTE came out, and download speed doubled, and even quadrupled, people started to use much more data. The carriers were caught flat footed. If LTE was in use when unlimited plans weren't yet offered, I doubt they would have been.
So because 'unlimited' was offered while under contract you think the customer is entitled to 'unlimited' even after the contract has been fulfilled?
So it's limited after all.
There are soft and often hard limits imposed in basically all services. Landlines moved to unlimited calling plans to compete with mobile phones a bit longer, but certain caps still exist. To go above them without service cancellation, you need a business account. Cable based internet service is the same way. Usually they allot something around 200GB/month for a single family residence, but it varies by provider. If you go over you'll probably receive a warning of some kind.
As long as you are paying your monthly fees you are still entitled to the deal. Contracts were established only for the purpose of purchasing the phone. I have been out of contract for three years and maintain my unlimited plan and pay full price for a new phone inorder to maintain my current plan.