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For Those Buying the iPhone 5 and Grandfathered Unlimited Data

Will You Skip Subsidized Price to Keep Unlimited Data?

  • Yes

    Votes: 84 54.9%

  • No

    Votes: 45 29.4%

  • I Have Sprint/Someone else w/ Pseudo-LTE (U.S Standards)

    Votes: 10 6.5%

  • I'm not getting iPhone 5/Results?

    Votes: 14 9.2%
  • Total voters
    153
:rolleyes: First of all, those companies bought public airwaves under certain conditions. They can't even meet those and you cry that they're being unduly burdened? Seriously?!
FYI, I do want regulation against the abuses our telecoms have perpetuated on the public. These companies should not be allowed to fleece us for every service, especially considering that we sold these airwaves to them for a discounted price.

Since I'm on at&t, I'm glad I don't have to worry about losing unlimited due to an upgrade.
Spectrum Abuser said:
You don't want Government intervention in the private sector. The FCC is telling Verizon how they can operate their own network. They shouldn't have that authority. It should be up to the board of directors to decide what happens with the company.

Should carriers have the right to block tethering applications? Absolutely. If you don't like how a specific company does business then switch to a competitor that has a similar mindset as you. Competition should move the industry, not the FCC.
Click to expand...
 
dontwalkhand and eastercat, glad someone finally realizes/acknowledging what I am saying! Sadly, I feel like AT&T is stalling until the iPhone 5 is announced. Then will slowly creep to the inevitable cut off of unlimited. But they can't enforce it quickly enough so you are safe. Come 2013, AT&T will follow suit.
 
eastercat said:
:rolleyes: First of all, those companies bought public airwaves under certain conditions. They can't even meet those and you cry that they're being unduly burdened? Seriously?!
FYI, I do want regulation against the abuses our telecoms have perpetuated on the public. These companies should not be allowed to fleece us for every service, especially considering that we sold these airwaves to them for a discounted price.

Since I'm on at&t, I'm glad I don't have to worry about losing unlimited due to an upgrade.
Click to expand...

I wasn't aware of the exact conditions that Verizon had to abide by at the time of posting. My mistake there.

A little push here or there that will benefit the public is fine. Examples of this would be the fact that phone numbers can be ported with ease now to different providers and even if your cellphone is not activated you can still dial and reach 911. To regulate a business on what it can and can't charge for, though, is bad. Lets say you were running an ISP business [Company A] and were able to successfully charge $70 a month for service. [Company B] overseas was offering the same service for $50 a month. The operating costs of both companies were similar, but your business was achieving much higher profit margins. Would it be fair for your business to be penalized by the authority of your region and be forced to lower prices? No.

If people were truly fed up with the current pricing structure then you would see dramatic changes virtually over night. The average consumer, though, is still buying and therefor business is doing fine. When business is doing fine there's no reason to give more incentives for potential new customers.
 
AT&T doesn't really have unlimited data, even for the people who think they are "grandfathered". They will throttle you after a certain point, which makes your connection horribly slow.
 
For some reason I thought when I upgrade next month I was gonna be forced to lose unlimited data on AT&T.

So glad that's not the case.

Throttling is way better than overage charges or full on data stoppage anyways.
 
skidbubble said:
AT&T doesn't really have unlimited data, even for the people who think they are "grandfathered". They will throttle you after a certain point, which makes your connection horribly slow.
Click to expand...

they will throttle after 5 gb on lte. good enough for me...
 
i did the math on subsidized and full priced iphones for verizon when they announced the end of grandfathered unlimited data earlier in the year. if you don't use much data you'll save some money on a subsidized iPhone. if yr like me and use 3GB or more a month, it won't matter. they will either squeeze more money out of you by making up buy the full-priced iPhone, or you will pay more in excessive data usage charges - either way they will get around the same amount of money in a 2-year period.

personally, i'm going to try and get that $30 a month t-mobile account and dump verizon altogether. although, i don't know how good their service is in my area. i'll probably try them out for a month and see.
 
I'm not getting a 5 since I'm still in contract but it still applies. I'll give up my unlimited next year to upgrade. $750 times two phones just isn't feasible on this public servants salaray. Yeah, keeping unlimited would be preferabe but we use on average 2GB's a month and even if we tripled that usage to 6GB's with LTE and tethering(which we don't have yet in our area) I would still be comfortable with the bill.
 
skidbubble said:
AT&T doesn't really have unlimited data, even for the people who think they are "grandfathered". They will throttle you after a certain point, which makes your connection horribly slow.
Click to expand...

having unlimited w/ LTE throttles you at 5gb for the price of $30....if you were to pay for 5gb of data it would cost you $50......it is very very much worth having.
 
Spectrum Abuser said:
You don't want Government intervention in the private sector. The FCC is telling Verizon how they can operate their own network. They shouldn't have that authority. It should be up to the board of directors to decide what happens with the company.

Should carriers have the right to block tethering applications? Absolutely. If you don't like how a specific company does business then switch to a competitor that has a similar mindset as you. Competition should move the industry, not the FCC.
Click to expand...


I would usually 100% agree with you, but with cellular companies, cable providers, etc.. it's a different ballgame. The response below is spot on:


dontwalkhand said:
This idea would be fine, had we had some real competition around here. Instead we have the Big 4, all with the same agenda, and probably are guilty of price fixing with each other.

If we had an interoperable GSM network like Europe, then your idea is perfect, and I should be able to use ANY phone on ANY network I choose, that includes an iPhone on Metro PCS if I really wanted to.

What some people say is, "oh well the market will work itself out".....yeah it will in 20 years or so....tell me, do you want to wait 20 years for the iPhone 5 while every other country is enjoying the freedom of taking their phone to any carrier? When companies have too much control, you have anything but freedom. America is about freedom for the PEOPLE, not for the corporations.
Click to expand...
 
It's irrelevant that you were unaware of the conditions that all telecoms have to abide by. My issue is that you seem to be an apologist for the bad behavior, because you think regulation is bad.
My issue is not so much with the pricing, although I would like lower prices and more pricing options such as that found in Europe. The issue is that companies like Verizon are fighting against services that should be intrinsic to mobile service. For example, I shudder to think how long it took to get number porting enabled when that should've been offered from the very beginning. If it weren't for regulations, we never would've gotten it.

Here's an example of a service that we should be offered: the ability to bring an unlocked phone into any carrier and use it at a discounted rate. Right now, if you brought in the unlocked iphone to Verizon or any other cdma carrier, they wouldn't accept it. It has the correct radios, but they've locked down their database so they won't accept phones you didn't buy from them. That is the biggest pile of BS.
Even if you do bring a phone to someone like AT&T, you don't get a discount. How are either of these situations right? Unfortunately, neither will get fixed without regulation.

You're incorrect that we can affect change, especially with corporate personhood. The corporations have lobbying money that we can never approach. We'll never be able to overcome that until we can force the government to recognize that corporations aren't people and don't deserve the rights of people.
Spectrum Abuser said:
I wasn't aware of the exact conditions that Verizon had to abide by at the time of posting. My mistake there.

A little push here or there that will benefit the public is fine. Examples of this would be the fact that phone numbers can be ported with ease now to different providers and even if your cellphone is not activated you can still dial and reach 911. To regulate a business on what it can and can't charge for, though, is bad. Lets say you were running an ISP business [Company A] and were able to successfully charge $70 a month for service. [Company B] overseas was offering the same service for $50 a month. The operating costs of both companies were similar, but your business was achieving much higher profit margins. Would it be fair for your business to be penalized by the authority of your region and be forced to lower prices? No.

If people were truly fed up with the current pricing structure then you would see dramatic changes virtually over night. The average consumer, though, is still buying and therefor business is doing fine. When business is doing fine there's no reason to give more incentives for potential new customers.
Click to expand...
 
I'm grandfathered in to an unlimited (LTE) data plan, so I'll be buying on contract and still getting my unlimited data (ATT)
 
rillrill said:
i did the math on subsidized and full priced iphones for verizon when they announced the end of grandfathered unlimited data earlier in the year. if you don't use much data you'll save some money on a subsidized iPhone. if yr like me and use 3GB or more a month, it won't matter. they will either squeeze more money out of you by making up buy the full-priced iPhone, or you will pay more in excessive data usage charges - either way they will get around the same amount of money in a 2-year period.

personally, i'm going to try and get that $30 a month t-mobile account and dump verizon altogether. although, i don't know how good their service is in my area. i'll probably try them out for a month and see.
Click to expand...

Indeed, I don't use a lot of data now only because my DROID X will die quicker/freeze up and become sluggish faster than you can say Long Term Evolution. But with the iPhone 5, I certainly plan on using Netflix and other data hogging applications a lot more with the experience the iPhone 5 will give me, e.g. better battery life, faster, better screen, etc. I certainly do not want to have to be constantly checking my data usage or be paranoid that my movie is too long for me to finish while sitting shotgun on a long road trip.

The math makes sense, the phone pays for itself if you go over 2GB a month, and I know 100% I will do that. No watered down iPhone 5 experience for me.
 
Last edited:
irDigital0l said:
If you buy the iphone with the 2 year contract discount you cant keep your unlimited.
Click to expand...

Edit: this was VZW btw

This isn't necessarily true. I've upgraded three lines, one of them twice, at provisioned price and have kept my "unlimited blackberry internet". (despite not having had a blackberry in 4 years) The last time I upgraded was 3 weeks ago, and I even asked the rep on the phone (I never go to commission based retail stores) if he was sure I wasn't supposed to go to 2gb. He stated that they make exceptions for "valued customers". When asked to define he said "accounts with more than 2 lines in good standing for more than 5 years".

Surprised, I asked what was going to happen when I upgrade another line in December and he replied "Nothing if you don't want it to change".

There is wiggle room. Just don't expect it from sales people in a brick and mortar store that rely on new contract numbers.
 
I have a question. Isn't the grandfathered unlimited plan with AT&T 3G/4G only? So if you get the iPhone 5 and want LTE you'll have no choice but to lose the grandfathered plan?
 
xFiGGiE said:
Who here is going to bypass upgrading on Verizon to keep their unlimited? With the FCC telling Verizon they can't block tethering apps and 4G LTE on the iPhone 5, I am highly considering buying my phone out-right. I will tether my iPhone 5 to my iPad 2, rMBP, etc. when on the road. With apps like Netflix, Google Music, Pandora, HBO GO, etc. I don't see myself upgrading. I fear that Verizon one day will just take unlimited data away from everybody regardless if they upgrade or not, but that won't happen for at LEAST another year IMO.

For those questioning the FCC ruling/want a source:

http://www.engadget.com/2012/07/31/verizon-to-stop-blocking-tethering-apps-settles-with-fcc-for-1/

Added opinion: I am glad FCC ruled that Verizon can't block tethering apps. Seriously the USA is so far behind cell phone technology compared to Europe. They get phones for free, hotspot capability for free, tethering no extra charge, etc. USA carriers really **** us in the ass without asking and skip the lube.

I can't wait for Google or Apple or somebody to open their own network. I don't see that happening anytime soon but I am more excited for the future. When my generation (I am 22 almost 23 years old/"generation TECH") runs congress and the government, all these big cell phone and internet providers will get cracked down on with legislation and we will finally catch up to the rest of the high-tech world.

/soapbox :apple:
Click to expand...

I love how everyone loves to compare Europe's mobile networks option to the USA when European countries are TINY landmass-wise compared to USA. Hmmm, US companies probably don't charge more for services because they have to cover millions of more square miles....No, that can't be it.....

The US is 40 ( FORTTTTTYYYYYY) times bigger than the UK so shouldn't our cell phone plans cost 40 times as much since our plans let us talk in 40 times as many places as the UK plans??

That is only considering ONE factor of difference. Please stop these stupid, useless comparisons PLEASE!
 
andross77 said:
I love how everyone loves to compare Europe's mobile networks option to the USA when European countries are TINY landmass-wise compared to USA. Hmmm, US companies probably don't charge more for services because they have to cover millions of more square miles....No, that can't be it.....

The US is 40 ( FORTTTTTYYYYYY) times bigger than the UK so shouldn't our cell phone plans cost 40 times as much since our plans let us talk in 40 times as many places as the UK plans??

That is only considering ONE factor of difference. Please stop these stupid, useless comparisons PLEASE!
Click to expand...


That is the most asinine comment on so many levels I don't even know where to begin. Why are you talking about the UK specifically? You do realize the EU consists of 27 different countries and companies such as Orange, Vodafone, Telenor, etc.? All these companies together blanket the EU, and the surrounding areas...so you can take your stupid comment and keep being a sheep that follows the herd.

Ignorance is bliss.
 
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