Verizon To Offer iPhone Users Unlimited Data 327
Hugh Pickens writes "The WSJ reports that Verizon Wireless, the country's largest wireless carrier, is confident enough in its network that it will offer unlimited data-use plans when it starts selling the iPhone around the end of this month, a person familiar with the matter says. Such plans would provide a key means of distinguishing its service from rival AT&T Inc., which limits how much Internet data its customers may use each month. Verizon has a lot at stake as it starts to carry the iPhone, which it is expected to announce Tuesday at an event in New York City. Verizon, more than any other US carrier, has built its reputation on its network quality, and any stumble in handling iPhone traffic will call into question Verizon's major selling point. On the other hand, if it does handle the iPhone well, then AT&T will have a harder time arguing it didn't mismanage its own network. Anthony J. Melone, Verizon's chief technology officer, says the company has invested heavily in its 3G network to handle surging smartphone traffic, including nine million Android subscribers, up from none a year earlier.'"
Competition again? (Score:4, Insightful)
Perhaps that means they will compete for business and we consumers will win?
I know, fat chance but we can still wish.. right?
Not Sure I'm Buying It (Score:2, Insightful)
It's a fun rumor, but I'm not sure I believe it.
Verizon certainly does not want a bunch of data-sucking iPhones on their network unless they can make money off of them. So, yes, I could believe that Verizon my offer an unlimited plan for $20 more than what their 2MB/month plan costs. But I tend to doubt they're going to be offering unlimited for the same cost as AT&T 2MB/month plan.
Yeah, right. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Maybe... (Score:3, Insightful)
iPhone has been "Coming to Verizon" for almost 3 years now. Always according to a "person close to the matter".
Maybe they'll bundle it with Duke Nukem.
Re:Maybe... (Score:4, Insightful)
I think it's rather like predicting earthquakes. If each week a different person says there's going to be a big one, statistically speaking, eventually one of them will be right. :-)
Re:Not Sure I'm Buying It (Score:4, Insightful)
If Verizon can offer an unlimited (or, you know, unlimited until you read the fine print) data plan that's sturdy and reliable and fast, it will be an enormous windfall for them. Verizon is not only huge, but generally accepted as providing better service, especially in the northeast. Verizon wants money and to be bigger than AT&T - offering unlimited data gets more people to switch to or pick up Verizon service with an iPhone. If they aren't priced very competitive with AT&T, they'll minimize that enormous surge, which they don't want. Make less per person, get more people - totally worth it.
The true winners are, of course, Apple. Either way, millions of people will be buying iPhones for the first and probably not the last time. Toss in the iPad 2 and Lion to round out the corners and 2011 is looking up for Apple. Competition amongst telecoms is better for consumers, but it's better for producers as well.
Re:Competition again? (Score:5, Insightful)
Really, really bad timing on your part (Score:5, Insightful)
Every other time it's been clear it's a rumor. This time it's obvious it's no rumor, there are leaks from techs testing and the news is all over the place. It's like saying that there's not going to be an eclipse just because there wasn't one all last year. New data is at hand...
But the really funny thing about your post is, you make it in the same year Duke Nukem Forever is actually set to release for real...
Re:Not Sure I'm Buying It (Score:4, Insightful)
It's a fun rumor, but I'm not sure I believe it.
Verizon certainly does not want a bunch of data-sucking iPhones on their network unless they can make money off of them.
No mention of cost yet, but they have already been carrying the heavy load of Android phones for some time. They use just as much data (if not more) than an iPhone.
Quote Verizon CEO:
"Whether they are iPhones or Droids, they are smartphones," Verizon Chief Executive Ivan G. Seidenberg said in a mid-November interview. "Regardless of the mix, we are prepared to carry more data."
I would wager it will be around 30 bucks, just like AT&T's unlimited plan was before they stopped selling it (although many are grandfathered into the unlimited).
Re:Not Sure I'm Buying It (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, it's expensive -- good thing my employer pays for it.
What I'm skeptical of is not that they'll offer an unlimited data plan, but of what kind of throttling they do.
I've noticed that I'm SEVERELY throttled when I do a big download.
Simple web surfing? No problem. Email? Not bad. Last month I downloaded a 17 Mb file and it took 2 hours... in the middle of the night when network usage HAD to be low. Maybe I just had a really bad connection.
Re:Yeah, right. (Score:5, Insightful)
Verizon will offer unlimited data, until they don't want to anymore.
Article is worthless (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:In "competition", consumers always lose. (Score:5, Insightful)
The ultimate goal of "competition" is to achieve monopoly status, by eliminating competitors. That is what "competition" means.
Once you eliminate your competitors, you can do whatever you want to the market.
Why would you want consumers to suffer through competition?
Assuming we're not talking about assasination, the way to "eliminate competitors" in a free market is to have a better product. If your product is so good that no one else can compete, then who cares? If you start trying to abuse your monopoly position, new competition will come.
Of course, there's always the modern definition of "competition", which means only compete with a couple other companies, and use your influence in the government to make competition either illegal (cell phone carriers with government issued monopolies, computer hardware companies with patents) or impossible (Walmart and Conagra with subsidies). I don't see how more government control would help that.
How long until we learn the secret limits? (Score:4, Insightful)
How long do you think it will it be before people who have purchased the "unlimited" plan and taken it seriously will receive notices from Verizon saying that their account has been cancelled or disabled due to "excessive" use? And the representatives explaining that they just mean "no stated limit," and that they never dreamed that people would actually download _that_ much, and it is with the saddest and greatest reluctance they have been unwillingly forced to take measures against a few, a very very few evildoers in order to insure the optimum user experience for the vast majority of good Verizon customers, and anyway they never really said it was unlimited because if you scroll 61% of the way down the 150-page online terms and conditions they reserve the right to curtail the usage by any individual in the interests of the greater good of the Verizon network as a whole?
Re:In "competition", consumers always lose. (Score:4, Insightful)
Assuming we're not talking about assasination, the way to "eliminate competitors" in a free market is to have a better product.
I don't see how more government control would help that.
That is what government regulation is for. It is to ensure that the best product wins under its own merits and that all costs are taken into account.
Dear AT&T (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm ready for a new iphone, but you wont sell me one at a discount because you want to make me wait another year.
Guess what, If you want to keep me, in 1 year when I am off contract, You had better offer me a 32Gig iphone 4 for free or discount the service by $40.00 a month or I'm switching to Verizon.
If you guys are going to be 3rd rate service, then I pay far less.
Re:In "competition", consumers always lose. (Score:2, Insightful)
Government regulations do not have that effect. Not even close. Quite the opposite, really.
Re:In "competition", consumers always lose. (Score:2, Insightful)
Except that is what it means economically. You cant expect the leaders of a company to sit their and work towards no ultimate goal. Humans in any endeavor do not like to feel they are running in a hamster wheel and there is no way to win. They will find a way to win and then abuse that position to its fullest because greed is good to them.
That is why the free market does not work. Or at least does not work in a way that is beneficial to the many and if it does not benefit the people, there is no reason for it to exist in that way.
Re:Not Sure I'm Buying It (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm betting they will be adding a small amount of crapware, but part of the reason they didn't get the iPhone 3 years ago was because Jobs wouldn't let them cripple it or control it.
Jobs hasn't gotten any more accommodating over the years so I'm guessing VZW is taking the phone pretty much as dictated.
That doesn't mean it will be as fast or as friendly as the GSM models, because CDMA does calls OR data, and unless you are on wifi concurrently, you will have to wait till your call is done to check your facebook status or send that email.
Nor do I expect a lot of iphone users to immediately jump ship. Oh, they talk big in their hatred of AT&T, but when it comes to paying off that existing AT&T phone while starting a contract with VZW for the new phone the economics of the situation will quell their bravado.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Not "insightful" at all (Score:2, Insightful)
Since your statement "the way to eliminate competitors in a free market is to have a better product" is false.
You are under the false impression that the free market results in better products.