Verizon To Drop Unlimited Data Plans In Two Weeks 302
itwbennett writes "The rumors have converged and now it appears that Verizon will be dropping its unlimited data plans on July 7, says blogger Peter Smith. Droid-Life lists pricing, starting at 2 GB for $30/month and going up to 10 GB for $80/month. 'The one ever-so-slightly bright side,' says Smith, 'is that 4G LTE will cost the same as 3G. Of course, you'll be able to burn through your data even faster.'"
Re:And They'll Encourage Tethering (Score:3, Informative)
RTFA:
They're not giving it away for free.
Re:And They'll Encourage Tethering (Score:4, Informative)
Data plans w/ tethering:
4GB – $50/month
7GB – $70/month
12GB – $100/month
If you go over your purchased amount of data, it will cost you $10 per 1GB.
I can't call that encouraging tethering ... yikes!
Re:Meh (Score:4, Informative)
I'm not a VZW subscriber (I have AT&T unlimited data) but just with regular use alone I'm bumping up close to 2GB monthly (just e-mail, web, and social media use).
That said, I can burn through 2GB in a day in an airport watching Netflix over 3G. Hell, I've burned through half of that on the Stairmaster doing the same.
The bandwidth caps are entirely too low especially as the carriers roll out bigger pipes to the devices. This is nothing more than a money making venture for them (much like GSM networks charging for SMS) and it needs to be stopped by the people voting w/their feet to some new startup carrier that is smart enough to buck the trends.
Re:And They'll Encourage Tethering (Score:5, Informative)
Don't forget the best part:
If you under use your plan, it doesn't carry over. Have a 12GB plan, use 3GB one month and 13GB the next? You just paid an extra $10.
Re:And They'll Encourage Tethering (Score:5, Informative)
The funny thing is, from what I see, most of the world (with the exception of Australia and maybe Canada) has been moving towards unlimited data plans everywhere. The USA are the ones regressing.
There is too much lobbying by people with big pockets and, in the end, the only one losing is the final consumer. Sigh.
Re:Ridiculous (Score:4, Informative)
Erm, download your podcasts over wi-fi and cache them on the phone for later listening pleasure. There goes 9/10ths of your data usage.
That isn't really your complaint, though. Your real complaint is that you were sold an unlimited plan and that's what you want. I understand, I really do. Went through it myself not too long back. However, if you take just a little step back you'll realize that radio spectrum isn't an unlimited resource, and with data usage growing at such phenomenal rates there's no real way to get people to be more efficient about their usage (like, for example, pulling your podcasts over landlines instead of clogging up cell towers with them) without usage limits of some sort.
The standard response at this point is to say that the bandwidth saturation problem is the carrier's problem because they are just being greedy, won't improve their network blah blah blah. OK, so put yourself in their shoes. Come up with a 5-year network hardware expansion plan that can compensate for unrestricted *exponential growth*. Let that sink in for a minute.