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AT&T Rolls Out Cheaper Unlimited Plans, iPhone Monthly Rate Drops $30
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Unless they drop other plans this means nada. Not to mention the fact that I'd venture to guess few people have unlimited plans in comparison to every other plan.
For me I'll never go over my minutes because my calls are dropped so frequently. By the time it happens twice I give up on the call entirely b
For me I'll never go over my minutes because my calls are dropped so frequently. By the time it happens twice I give up on the call entirely b
LOL, this. Take all the things you mention, plus rollover, and I already HAVE unlimited everything! Heck, I've got thousands of rollover minutes I'll never use.
Leave the plans where they are, drop them a bit where it makes sense, and INCLUDE TEXTING for cryin' out loud!
And I'm on track to use a whopping 150 min max over the next month with 3999 rollover minutes available.
Nice to have unlimited discounted but it's meaningless to me.
I wonder how discounts will be applied to this. If you have, what do they call it, a FAN?, which I think does not discount the iPhone data plan, how will it work on this new plan.
My point exactly. I'm on my iPhone constantly, and my wife & I still racked up nearly 2,000 rollover minutes on our 700-minute family plan just over the past several months, and our bill (after taxes) still comes to just under $170 each month, even with my wife's gov't employee discount. We have unlimited texting as the only options were either a measly 200 per month for the both of us (yeah right) or unlimited texts. Way to utilize shrewd business tactics there, AT&T.
The only unlimited features I want are data & texting. I do all my personal & work communication from my iPhone, and we still end up with rollover minutes at the end of the month. Not that I'm complaining about rollover minutes (except for the fact that we have yet to dip into that stash), but I think the 700-minute plan deserves a price break just as much as the unlimited-everything plan.That is how I understood it...I switched from a 900 plan to 450 a few days ago (after 5 months on the 900 plan)...the woman really didn't explain it well but essentially I dropped from 2000 mins to 450. Not a huge deal in my case since I have yet to use 1 rollover min (and I think they expire after 12 months somehow anyway) but I feel I DID PAY FOR THEM when I had the higher-rate plan. I really only use about 100-300 mins a month primetime (7am-7pm I think is their primetime)
Whatever. As long as I have some rollover mins to cover me.
-Eric
How about just cheaper plans overall? That would be nice. That, or I pay the % of my bill that corresponds to the % of calls that go through and come through in Manhattan. I'll leave the data success rate out of the equation so that AT&T doesn't go belly up in a month...
desperation.
Looks like it's a done deal that the iPhone exclusivity ends this year. Why else would they drop their rates SO LOW when they have resisted being reasonable for SO LONG.
I hope AT&T goes down in flames when the iPhone is available to other carriers.
FTW
I"M confused by this.... AT&T only did it to match what Verizon did, now we'd be having another conversation if AT&T did it first....
This is a baby step from those 2 - we will see if they "kick it up a notch" later in the year...
desperation.
Looks like it's a done deal that the iPhone exclusivity ends this year. Why else would they drop their rates SO LOW when they have resisted being reasonable for SO LONG.
I hope AT&T goes down in flames when the iPhone is available to other carriers.
Huh? Not sure how this price cut gets you to the end of iPhone exclusivity.
Here are the reasons - Android, Droid, Nexus. They have gotten lots of attention. Maybe you noticed. Even Woz likes his Nexus -- WOZ! Verizon, which has lots of Android phones, and will have the Nexus soon, changed up its pricing, so what is ATT suppose to do? Not compete?
ATT's move doesn't require an advanced degree or reading tea leaves, tarot cards, or midnight seances to figure out. Verizon shot across the bow, ATT fired back. It has nothing to do with the iPhone other than iPhones qualify for the new pricing w/o penalty.
Attention which may not be turning into actual sales, if this report last week is even close to accurate:
http://mobile.venturebeat.com/2010/...e-phone-sells-a-mere-20000-in-its-first-week/
20,000 in launch week??? Ouch.
Why are you so sure iPhone will never support it?
Just heard on Buzz Out Loud that WiMax towers are going on top of every WalMart in the country. I think they said this year, but not sure on that part. Consensus of the talking heads was that this put WiMax back in the picture as a contender.
Tragic.
That is correct. As I switch sim cards around my devices from time to time, it is just a matter of minutes before AT&T's website reflects what device is actually on that SIM.
Why? Seriously, what network is better in every way? None of them.
T-Mobile = great pricing but absolute horrible coverage everywhere, mediocre call quality.
Sprint = good pricing, good clean CDMA signal, but not very good coverage, no simultaneous voice/data.
Verizon = great coverage, good clean CDMA signal, no simultaneous voice/data, good pricing plans, draconian lock down of devices and service, and if you believe David Pogue and others some of the sleaziest nickel & dime you billing practices on the face of the earth.
AT&T = decent coverage for most of the population, mediocre call quality, pricing that's competitive with AT&T for every plan I've ever heard.
THEY ALL SUCK in the end. I can find just as many "I'll never go back to Verizon" posts in the tech forums as "I'll never go back to AT&T." I think it really is just a case of the grass is always greener...
Your personal location is probably the biggest factor for any of these. AT&T in my area is just fine. I don't drop calls, I get a signal all over town. No complaints.
FAN stands for Foundation Account Number. FAN discounts only apply to the voice plan. You're correct that they don't apply to iPhone data plans. I imagine the FAN discount will still apply, but they're generally a percentage discount, so obviously if they drop the price, the real $$ amount of the discount will decrease.
Pay % of your bill is basically a-la-carte like the 1970s and offers far less value.
I would rather see ATT simply lower all their plans...maybe $10-20/month.
I have a feeling one of the reasons that lead to this press release is ATT's contract with Apple ends in a few months...so ATT/Apple and others may know that other carriers are getting the iPhone...which means immediate competition. There are a lot of consumers that believe Verizon is getting the iPhone this June (thanks to major news outlets like Newsweek, Time, NY Times, CNET, etc.)...and if they (like many) are Verizon followers and ATT haters, they will simply wait for the 1)newest iPhone and 2)better carrier (Verizon).
I think ATT is deeply worried...coverage stinks, iPhone exclusivity contract is ending, everyone on the East Coast knows that VZ kills ATT in coverage and pricing, etc. IMO, the iPhone was the only reason why ATT has kept customers and made money.
-Eric
Woz likes every gadget. He's like a gadget junky. Woz likes his Nexus, and his two Crackberries, and everything else on his batman belt of gadgetry.
If you read the updates on all the "Woz likes Nexus" blog entries, you'll notice that Woz made a point of correcting the original article by stating his iPhone is still his favorite and primary device, and that he usually has two or more devices in his pocket. Now, maybe a chastising phone call from Steve Jobs got Woz to issue the correction, but I don't doubt that Woz likes all of the gadgets just for his love of gadgetry.
Woz correction.
I think this low number may have actually been by design. Think about it. Google's had a tough enough time fulfilling orders and support issues with just 20k phones out there. Maybe they weren't as dumb as everyone thought and kept the sales artificially low to see how well they're untested fulfillment system worked.
The Nexus One had precious little mainstream news coverage, and outside of the geek blogs doesn't get talked about. There's been ZERO advertising on television or radio that I've seen. ZERO print advertising that I've heard of. The only sites I even see on online ad for the Nexus One is tech blogs like this where we chat about iPhones.
Google didn't even leave the very low key Nexus One link on their home page for more than a couple of days.
This sure doesn't sound like a company that is trying very hard to sell the thing, whatever the reason behind that is.
Nothing new here. U.S. service providers use the oldest equipment, with the worst service, at the highest prices. I still can't get over paying to receive calls.
AT&T price drops
Hey, I've always been happy with my T-Mobile service and the prices are better than any other major GSM service in the US I believe. I am happy that AT&T is changing their prices, there needs to be more competition. I still beleive that texting should be part of your internet plan though. I can't see how companies charge for texting, which is just data, if you already are paying $20-$30 a month for crappy mobile internet service.
Hey, I've always been happy with my T-Mobile service and the prices are better than any other major GSM service in the US I believe. I am happy that AT&T is changing their prices, there needs to be more competition. I still beleive that texting should be part of your internet plan though. I can't see how companies charge for texting, which is just data, if you already are paying $20-$30 a month for crappy mobile internet service.
Incoming calls..
Well, you can always get US Cellular here which includes incoming calls (and maybe text's I'm not sure??) amazingly. The only problem with US Cellular is their phone selection sucks, and it isn't GSM so have fun trying to get a good unlocked phone for it.
Nothing new here. U.S. service providers use the oldest equipment, with the worst service, at the highest prices. I still can't get over paying to receive calls.
Well, you can always get US Cellular here which includes incoming calls (and maybe text's I'm not sure??) amazingly. The only problem with US Cellular is their phone selection sucks, and it isn't GSM so have fun trying to get a good unlocked phone for it.
Simply an announcement that makes the casual reader think that, gee whiz, rates are coming down!
Advertising is cheaper than actually doing something positive for the customer like actual reception or fair rates for every level of use.
Simply another color label on the bottle of lubricant.
Advertising is cheaper than actually doing something positive for the customer like actual reception or fair rates for every level of use.
Simply another color label on the bottle of lubricant.
Tis true, it's all about where you live. I live in Chicago and my friends with AT&T have horrible internet service and the call quality is ridiculous. I used to have Sprint, the call quality was really great, IF you were near one of their towers. I ended up getting rid of it only because I had had really poor service around my city.
AT&T could specifically allow tethering for the purpose of "occasional use" as defined by under 200mb/mo (or whatever), so if you are specifically allowed to tether, say for a $5 monthly fee to tag your account, you also agree to be a modest user.
The studies I have read involve something like 2% of users hogging 50% of bandwidth. Mostly on jailbroken phones and switched SIM cards.
It's pretty hard to stop abusive behavior on mobile devices without a fairly active plan of cancellations, but allowing regular, good users a feature they desire for actual convenience might be reasonable.
The main thing that concerns me is how low average use is, yet we still have the network slammed. It may simply be a technical limit of TOWER bandwidth in densely populated locales. I believe one issue is you are using branded towers for data and not "roaming". If AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon allowed data roaming, they would all have better overall experiences. A treaty could allow for size and usage descrepencies.
Such a treaty would initially disfavor AT&T since they have the largest base of heavy data users and a slightly smaller 3G data network than Verizon. Given they seem willing to lower prices anyway for "all users", they may also consider this to spread the load a bit and give them time to do build-outs.
Rocketman
We get a FAN of 27%. It most definately applies to both voice and data plan. The discounts for each are broken out on our plan.
I wasn't suggesting a pay-per-call type agreement. Acutely, I wasn't suggesting anything, but was just kidding. But the point was that, if I can use their service, e.g., 80% of the time I wish to, but AT&T insinuates that I can use it 100% of the time, then I should I only pay 80% of my bill since they have failed to fill their end of the bargain. That's all...