Wireless Carriers Moving Toward Shared Data Plans Across Devices

[ChristianVirtual]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8J2 Safari/6533.18.5)

A nice idea which hopefully also make it to Japan. Though I doubt.

But actually I anyway want to get a LTE wifi router and then connect by iPad and MBA on it. And maybe even my iPhone.

 

[ArcaneDevice]

I really don't see the point in this. In my country, you get tethering for "free". I find it funny that anyone would actually charge for tethering of a LIMITED data plan. If I paid for 2GB, I can use 2GB.

Charging for tethering is bull ****. Just another way US corporations are more concerned with paying CEOs and shareholders than offering value to their customers.

Television, internet, telecoms ... all of them are ruled by a few corporations, much of the time in a monopoly bubble, and all of them hold back evolution by trying to take as much money out of the consumer as possible first at the expense of the country's global technological standing.

In ten years time the USA is going to be in the bottom tier for internet and digital infrastructure and consumer reach.

 

[tasset]

Charging for tethering is bull ****. Just another way US corporations are more concerned with paying CEOs and shareholders than offering value to their customers.

Television, internet, telecoms ... all of them are ruled by a few corporations, much of the time in a monopoly bubble, and all of them hold back evolution by trying to take as much money out of the consumer as possible first at the expense of the country's global technological standing.

In ten years time the USA is going to be in the bottom tier for internet and digital infrastructure and consumer reach.

I agree and try to preach this to friends and coworkers, but their eyes just glaze over and say "yeah but capitalism rules and this is just the free market at work." They have totally drunk the Koolaid. Probably will be at a Palin 2012 rally as well.
I still hold out hope that Sprint will realize they will never catch up to AT&T/Verizon and go out in a blaze a glory with an all-you-can eat data all the time plan. Or maybe that LightSquared will be a player.

 

[ArcaneDevice]

I agree and try to preach this to friends and coworkers, but their eyes just glaze over and say "yeah but capitalism rules and this is just the free market at work." They have totally drunk the Koolaid. Probably will be at a Palin 2012 rally as well.
I still hold out hope that Sprint will realize they will never catch up to AT&T/Verizon and go out in a blaze a glory with an all-you-can eat data all the time plan. Or maybe that LightSquared will be a player.

When you tell people in other countries you are charged for tethering it gets the same bemused and laughable response that telling people that US cell phone users are charged for incoming calls and text messages does.

This is why it's taken over ten years for the US to begin to appreciate the value of SMS when European countries were communicating via thumbs en masse in the late 90's.

As time goes on the US is just going to fall further and further behind and charge the consumer more and more for the privilege.

 

[tasset]

When you tell people in other countries you are charged for tethering it gets the same bemused and laughable response that telling people that US cell phone users are charged for incoming calls and text messages does.

This is why it's taken over ten years for the US to begin to appreciate the value of SMS when European countries were communicating via thumbs en masse in the late 90's.

As time goes on the US is just going to fall further and further behind and charge the consumer more and more for the privilege.

In my eyes the carriers' revenue streams are a three-legged stool. Voice, messaging, and data. Other specialized services like ringtones or guided GPS probably don't contribute much and less so now with app stores provided by Apple and Google.
I can see two of those revenue streams, voice and messaging, being squeezed more and more by Skype/GoogleVoice/iMessage/FaceTime/WhatsApp etc etc. And the carriers must see this too, and that to me is the real reason we are getting data caps. Sure, wireless bandwidth is constrained, but that is a convenient excuse to ensure their ARPU is not reduced from $50+ to $20-$30 from customers only buying a data plan.
LTE is the carriers' way of resetting expectations by charging for data tiers and tethering.

 

[Undecided]

I never understood the additional charge for devices pulling from the same data pool.

What does it matter which devices uses the data? My iPhone, my iPad, tethered to my Macbook or if my hamster McSnickety wants to surf the web?

D.

I don't get that either. I mean, I get that it's greed run amok, of course, but it makes no logical sense.

If only there was a more efficient competitive marketplace.

 

[riverfreak]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_8 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8E401 Safari/6533.18.5)

What's up with that ad? It's completely unintelligible.

At the top, it says £99 for a bundle. In the red callout box, it says £65.

And the matrix at the bottom is just BIZARRE. Depending on the configuration of your iPhone or iPad the costs change? Why would the amount of storage on your device influence the bandwidth charge?

 

[peskaa]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_8 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8E401 Safari/6533.18.5)

What's up with that ad? It's completely unintelligible.

At the top, it says £99 for a bundle. In the red callout box, it says £65.

And the matrix at the bottom is just BIZARRE. Depending on the configuration of your iPhone or iPad the costs change? Why would the amount of storage on your device influence the bandwidth charge?

No, you're reading it wrong. Your monthly charge is £65, and the matrix shows the up-front cost of each device, which goes up as the capacity increases.

 

[iStudentUK]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_2_8 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8E401 Safari/6533.18.5)

What's up with that ad? It's completely unintelligible.

At the top, it says £99 for a bundle. In the red callout box, it says £65.

And the matrix at the bottom is just BIZARRE. Depending on the configuration of your iPhone or iPad the costs change? Why would the amount of storage on your device influence the bandwidth charge?

The £99 is the upfront, one off charge. If you increase the capacity of the iPhone or iPad that goes up. The £65 is the monthly charge for data/minutes/texts which is fixed.