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Leading Japanese Carrier NTT DoCoMo Losing Customers as iPhone Deal Remains Elusive
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This is stupid. What you want carrier branding and preloaded junk? What's next, carrier enforced updates so we have the same issue BB10 users have now?Kinda hoping the same for NTT DoCoMo, showing that Apple cannot dictate every carrier they want
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No *****. Isn't this what the news items is about. Not a question.
Kinda hoping the same for NTT DoCoMo, showing that Apple cannot dictate every carrier they want
DoCoMo: "We require that you allow us to pre-install all sorts of crapware and advertising-sponsored bloatware on your iPhones. Deal?"
Apple: "No deal."
Jibbajabba: "Pick me, DoCoMo! Pick me!! I would love to subscribe with your crapware and bloatware-loaded phones!! Pick me! Don't listen to Apple! There are thousands of dopes like me who would love to be your customer!!"
They are going to loose either way. If they give in, it's just as you say.. If they don't, they will lose customers and cause permanent damage to their business.
My guess is that the executive at DoCoMo who convinced everybody that "lifestyle" proprietary software is the key to future growth is gonna end up in a Harakiri ceremony. Lol
Docomo's coverage is good but that's only because well, it's NTT.
Other than that, they suck and their monthly bills are always higher than other carriers. NTT charges 2 times more than other ISPs for home internet as well. They can kiss my azz.
These days even their cellular coverage doesn't matter though as it's only in the country side where they might have better coverage. It's only the big cities that matter anyway so no loss to Apple.
Apple can easily hold out here. Bye Bye NTT.
Other than that, they suck and their monthly bills are always higher than other carriers. NTT charges 2 times more than other ISPs for home internet as well. They can kiss my azz.
These days even their cellular coverage doesn't matter though as it's only in the country side where they might have better coverage. It's only the big cities that matter anyway so no loss to Apple.
Apple can easily hold out here. Bye Bye NTT.
Kinda hoping the same for NTT DoCoMo, showing that Apple cannot dictate every carrier they want
You need to educate yourself better.
Apple does not, cannot "dictate" to carriers what features must be enabled. Carrier are free to use or not use and carrier-side iPhone features. For example Apple does not mandate to carriers that Visual VM or tethering or iChat over wireless be enabled.
But iOS is a walled garden. It was conceived that way, it will stay that way. It has many objectives, but most importantly it insures there is a more unified user experience to the basic OS functionality. Therefore, no, carriers are not allowed to cram crapware onto iPhones.
However, if carriers to want to do this they can modify Android phones all day long. This "solution," however, doesn't see to be helping DoCoMo too much as all those defecting customers seem to prefer the iPhone.
Kinda hoping the same for NTT DoCoMo, showing that Apple cannot dictate every carrier they want
I think history shows that we'd rather have Apple dictating than the carriers. The carriers disable features that handset manufacturers design into their phones in order to force their users to buy competitive (and usually inferior) services from them.
Even today, Verizon tries to sell me data services that my iPhone already provides better for free.
Kinda hoping the same for NTT DoCoMo, showing that Apple cannot dictate every carrier they want
Seriously, if you have lived in Japan and experienced NTT and DoCoMo you would understand that when it comes to telling partners and customers how it is going to be NTT is on a whole other playing field than Apple. Imagine the FCC, AT&T, Microsoft and the NFL all rolled up into one.
I don't know about your carriers, but I pay the same wether I'm on a contract or not, so as long as I'm willing to commit to a carrier for 1-3 years I come ahead and save money by paying the same monthly bills and a discount on the phone.
Telus used to disable picture messaging (mms) on blackberry devices so that you HAD TO use data even though you'd paid for an unlimited text/MMS plan.
Seems all carriers have done this kind of greasy stuff before or still do it today.
Lack of bloatware is one of the big reasons I buy macs/iPhones and will continue to do so. Bloatware is almost indistinguishable from viruses anyways!!
For anyone interested wikipedia says that DoCoMo holds a little over half the market share in Japan, so it is pretty significant.
Revenge of the Regency TR-1
The fact that DoCoMo has been a stick in the mud over the iPhone for going on five years now shows the corporate inertia that has had Japan in a recession for over ten years. In the 80's the consumer electronics market was almost all Japanese with the exception of a few niches. Then the cost of battery powered CPUs started to drop where the personal computer business model became viable on handheld devices.
The early innovators, GRiD, General Magic and Palm to name a few, moved in with devices where third parties could write and load apps freely. This gave rise to a huge consumer market. Loved it when I saw three story tall Palm banners on buildings in Akiabara in Tokyo. For the first time in over forty years, American consumer electronic products were surpassing domestic consumer systems in that market. The wave continued with others entering the fray. Small rebellious, out of mainline, "Bijinesu hanran" (ビジネス反乱) distributors popped up very small stores all over the Japanese isles selling these American products. Softbank being the only distributor of the iPhone in Japan has totally cleaned up!
DoCoMo's position, IMO show that large "planned" businesses don't work and only keep incompetent management isolated and artificially empowered.
The fact that DoCoMo has been a stick in the mud over the iPhone for going on five years now shows the corporate inertia that has had Japan in a recession for over ten years. In the 80's the consumer electronics market was almost all Japanese with the exception of a few niches. Then the cost of battery powered CPUs started to drop where the personal computer business model became viable on handheld devices.
The early innovators, GRiD, General Magic and Palm to name a few, moved in with devices where third parties could write and load apps freely. This gave rise to a huge consumer market. Loved it when I saw three story tall Palm banners on buildings in Akiabara in Tokyo. For the first time in over forty years, American consumer electronic products were surpassing domestic consumer systems in that market. The wave continued with others entering the fray. Small rebellious, out of mainline, "Bijinesu hanran" (ビジネス反乱) distributors popped up very small stores all over the Japanese isles selling these American products. Softbank being the only distributor of the iPhone in Japan has totally cleaned up!
DoCoMo's position, IMO show that large "planned" businesses don't work and only keep incompetent management isolated and artificially empowered.
Agreed and agreed.
Sounds like a reasonable challenge.
Kinda hoping the same for NTT DoCoMo, showing that Apple cannot dictate every carrier they want
I think you're rooting for the wrong underdog here. (As far as world-wide smartphone sales go, I believe APPLE currently still is the underdog). Before APPLE's iPhone came along, the carriers were dictating all the rules, and it's only because of APPLE's negotiations with those carriers, that we are now able to buy, if we choose so, an unlocked iPhone, and go to the carrier of our liking, and change carriers, if we so desire. That option was held up for years by the carriers, who wanted their customers locked-in until they bought another phone.
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DNS shouldn't redirect to a search page at all; it should return the correct error code and let your browser sort out what to do next.
Back on topic: How much influence do carriers actually have? Here in NZ, Telecom preloads a link to the "T-World portal", account management, some preloaded customer service phone numbers, a Telecom menu in Settings that provides prepaid balance checks, a roaming settings menu, and another link to T-World from the Settings app.
Apple obviously allows all of that, but is that the limit or can carriers do more than that if they want to?
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So many iFanboys rally in defense of Apple, it's pathetic. Like flocks of sheep being led to a slaughterhouse.
If NTT's pricing is bad, look at Rogers in Canada - only saving grace on Big Red here is retentions, really.
While I don't like the terms NTT is imposing on Apple, I don't think Apple can play hardball anymore. Cupertino lost a lot of bargaining leverage in the span of six years. Used to be the only game in town for a good smartphone... no longer.
If NTT's pricing is bad, look at Rogers in Canada - only saving grace on Big Red here is retentions, really.
While I don't like the terms NTT is imposing on Apple, I don't think Apple can play hardball anymore. Cupertino lost a lot of bargaining leverage in the span of six years. Used to be the only game in town for a good smartphone... no longer.
You must be really wet behind the ears (young) because you obviously do not remember how bad it was on Rogers before the iPhone.So many iFanboys rally in defense of Apple, it's pathetic. Like flocks of sheep being led to a slaughterhouse.
If NTT's pricing is bad, look at Rogers in Canada - only saving grace on Big Red here is retentions, really.
While I don't like the terms NTT is imposing on Apple, I don't think Apple can play hardball anymore. Cupertino lost a lot of bargaining leverage in the span of six years. Used to be the only game in town for a good smartphone... no longer.
Rogers was a lot like NTT DoCoMo or Verizon as all of their phones were permanently locked into their Ringtone store, their application/game store and even music store. You could not load MP3's or MP3 ringtones into their phones even though the base install allowed for MP3 playback. Songs cost around 4 bucks each as did the ringtones that they sold.
I actually "jailbroke" my Samsung feature phone from Rogers allowing me to load Mp3 ringtones and songs using a microSD card.
I have been using cellphones in Canada since the old Motorola flip phones with the heavy detachable batteries. I had a thick extra capacity battery for mine.
It was a Microtac http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_MicroTAC
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This is the one thing that Apple shines above the rest by sticking to a vanilla approach. All these years since the birth of Android, Apple haters have had to endure restrictions by carriers. I would also venture to say only .01% of users of Android is trained in IT field to know how to root a device or write their own applets. Nevertheless, these people still insist on having the freedom or capacity to do more with Android, all the while only a small percent of them actually know how to do it. Now if one is truly an IT person, one can open up any OS for that matter. As far as brands are concerned (Samsung, HTC, etc.), that is strictly a personal choice.
Because the Motorola ROKR E1 wasn't a good enough example of how bad Rogers was before the iPhone. I don't need to know - I had that as my first Big Red phone, and I know how suckage all those carrier bloatware are.
As the guy who writes for japanmobiletech.com said a few months ago: this is what happens when the world's most arrogant telco meets the world's most arrogant hardware vendor.
Neither is ever going to back down or agree. Don't make the mistake of thinking this is only a loss for Docomo either. They're still number one in Japan and part of the uber powerful NTT group. I've lost count of the number of people here who have steadfastly refused to buy an Apple mobile device until it's available on Docomo (because they have the fastest, most reliable network in most people's eyes). They're also far and away the network of choice for business, to the point of a virtual monopoly over corporate sales. So Apple is denying themselves a lot of customers too.
Neither is ever going to back down or agree. Don't make the mistake of thinking this is only a loss for Docomo either. They're still number one in Japan and part of the uber powerful NTT group. I've lost count of the number of people here who have steadfastly refused to buy an Apple mobile device until it's available on Docomo (because they have the fastest, most reliable network in most people's eyes). They're also far and away the network of choice for business, to the point of a virtual monopoly over corporate sales. So Apple is denying themselves a lot of customers too.
That's why it's nice to have choice. Go Android or shut up. Docomo is delusional. Once Apple releases the less expensive iPhone in Asia Docomo will probably have to submit. It will be tough bowing to the Imperialists.
Apple simply needs to continue it's course: "Pretend inferiority and encourage his arrogance." -- Sun Tzu
Thanks for mentioning the volume requirement. While I read somewhere that the volume requirement was actually low as a % of sales, the other 2 big Japanese carriers are not having any problems with it.
I'm not sure how long the volume requirement has been in place, but it seems to serve at least two purposes now.
1st - The original requirement helped Apple plan their production capacity.
2nd - A maybe unintentional but useful aspect of volume requirements is to ensure the carriers do not favor/push other phone brands too much in place of Apple.
While it has never been admitted, most industry analysts suspect that Samsung is using their massive $12 Billion marketing budget in the form of spiffs/kickbacks/rebates. Some suspect that Samsung is literally buying market share to the detriment of other Android OEMs.
This is bad for consumers that want "open" and choices, when Samsung starts running other Android OEMs out of business. Imagine a day when consumers have a choice of 50 different Android phones, but 40 are made by Samsung.
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They have decided that they have certain requirements to carry a phone & Apple does not meet those requirements. The same goes for Apple. Now we just need Samsung & Google;s Android to work better together with my Mac & I could have a decent sized screen on my cell phone.