US Greed?!?
Ok, don't get me wrong here - I'm American and proud of it - but this AT&T and Verizon thing is absolutely ludicrous. In most European countries, there is not a single model of phone or tablet that is not available unlocked for full price. All carriers operate on the same GSM technology, so all devices sold here are compatible for use with any one of the carriers servicing that country.
What this creates is a competitive market where a carrier trying to pull the backhanded obvious price gouging that US carriers - in this case AT&T and Verizon - get away with everyday would swept aside by competitors inside the financial quarter!
When iOS 4.3 came out here in Sweden for example, my current carrier, 3, didn't publish new tethering plans. It just worked, and it takes away from my data usage limit that I already subscribe to. The industry standard in this country is 10 GB and even then you don't get charged extra for going over, your speed is just crippled to about one third of the bandwidth.
The other side of the coin is that a contract is a contract. If I sign up for a two year contract, I am bound to pay the balance of it no matter what. There is no such thing as an early termination fee. If I want to terminate my contract I have to buy it out in full.
Fair is fair though - I know I am not going to get any nasty surprises on my bill, and I know that the data I pay for is truly mine to use as I see fit. If my phone offers tethering, I get to use that function.
The speed crippling feature does a much better job of curtailing data hoggers than charging more for overages, because things like streaming music and video, and downloading torrents are either not practical or even possible at the choked bandwidth that results after you go over. Plus it is an automatic bandwidth manager, ensuring that there is enough to give good reliable bandwidth for every customer up to the limit they have paid for, and not those that would hog bandwidth and then try to sue or complain about unfair prices for overages.
Most iPhone plans here, if you decide to go subsidized with a long term contract, have at least 5 GB of data included on it and at regular exchange rates start at $50 a month for voice/data service. The even nicer tng is that you can use that $50 however you want and can buy services, like sms/text packages, international calling packages, TV services, etc. prices from $2 to $10 and then you use whatever you have left for voice charges that typically have a $0.10 initiation fee with $0.05 a minute.
I just got an iPhone 4 subsidized that I didn't have to pay a cent for, but instead signed up for a 2 year plan for $80 a month that includes 10GB of data, and using that $80 I purchased an sms package of 1,000 messages sent for $5 a month and another $15 a month for an awesome international calling plan that gives me $0.05 a minute to the USA where all of my family still is. I can tether wirelessly on my morning commute to my iPad 2 without restriction, so no need for a 3G iPad.
Sorry for the long and drawn out post, and I'm definitely not trying to say "look at how I have it compared to you guys" but rather highlight how the lack of competition in the US cell phone industry is just shafting the consumer royally.
The whole point is that what the carriers in the US are doing is bordering on criminal in my eyes, but you guys just have to grin and bear it, it seems like. Very sad. All of you who are saying that you pay it, so why shouldn't everyone else - have completely lost sight of the point here. You guys are being totally taken advantage of by monopolistic-like practices.
The combination of fragmented carrier network technologies and greed has left you all trapped. If you want a certain type of phone, you have a very limited carrier choice, and as such are vulnerable to these large corporations.
The EU may be an entity bogged down with regulation, but they do come down hard on the corporations in defence of the consumer, which I for one think is a good thing. Heck, Apple can't even sell refurbished products here because of the stringent regulations that those products can't meet, even with the 1 year guarantee!
I know it isn't going to change anytime soon, but it gets really frustrating as an American reading all this crap you guys have to go through back home getting raped through the rear end and being forced to resort to jailbreaking and getting around the system to not have to spend a ridiculous amount of money just for your phone, because I too agree with some posters that these iDevices are best used the way they are intended, without interference from outside third parties like data/cell phone carriers.
