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.'"
The main reason people lose unlimited data (AT& (Score:3, Informative)
People frequently drop their iPhone in a mug of beer (HOW?!), or jump in the pool, or some other stupid way of destroying it, then put their SIM card in a basic phone. Then they have a store or customer support remove their unlimited data because oh it's soooo expensive, then expect to get it put back on well after it was announced that the only way to get it back was to never voluntarily remove it. If you already have a smartphone or iPhone unlimited data feature, you are more than welcome to keep it if you upgrade or simply swap phones to another smartphone or iPhone.
If it was removed because someone at Walmart bungled an upgrade or something similar, it can be restored, just don't wait six months to call in about it.
Now, maybe Verizon doesn't know, but some of the heavy abusers of cellular data with iPhones use upwards of 40-50 GB per month. You're not going to use that much data browsing the web, but with a jailbroken iPhone, you can get a 7 to 14 megabit connection shared with a whole network of computers for all of $30 per month... and that is spelled out as abuse of the service in the ToS, which is written in very basic English.
I assume that unlimited data will be revoked again once LTE rolls out, or it will be exclusive to the first iteration of CDMA iPhone.
FYI, the only data services available for the original iPhone are all unlimited data, with varying amounts of SMS message allotments. Wink wink, nudge nudge, say no more.
Re:Yeah, right. (Score:5, Informative)
I call bullshit. We should all know the marketing definition of "unlimited" by now.
yeah, but it works from the tech perspective. You can cram 30-40x the cellular connections into the same chunk of frequency with CDMA that you can with GSM. I know that data is different than voice but the fact is that CDMA is a significantly more efficient use of spectrum than GSM-- it's one of the reasons you never have dropped calls with Verizon, but do with AT&T: the europeans, in their infinite wisdom, decided with GSM that a cell would be connected to only one tower. With code division multiplexing, other towers can easily listen in and pick up the call if you drop from one tower. GSM can't do that.
Re:Competition again? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Article is worthless (Score:5, Informative)
AT&T no longer offers the unlimited data plan. Were you to sign up as a new AT&T customer today, you would not be able to choose the unlimited plan.
Re:In "competition", consumers always lose. (Score:2, Informative)
Wal mart pays the same as other retailers. You are misinformed. They do help their employees collect government services, but it's not Walmart that put those people in that position. Obviously they'd go out of business if they offered an adequate wage, since everyone else would have such a huge price advantage over them. Most of the anti-walmart stuff you read is FUD, targated at them because they're the biggest retailer. And despite what everyone says, they got that way by having honest business practices (by working to prevent conflicts of interest with their buying staff, and by preventing unionization, which tends to drive down entry level wages for no good reason).
Re:Competition again? (Score:2, Informative)
The Verizon plan is summarized here [mygadgetnews.com].
"Verizon will be offering unlimited data for a flat $30 fee." but the small print in your contract will limit your "unlimited" data to 5GB/month, which is less than 7MB/hr. Stream audio, watch many movies, tether other devices? In other words, do what you should be able to do with an iPhone? How many days will it take you to go over 5GB? And, if you go over that "unlimitied" limit your connection will be throttled [vzw.com] for a MONTH following the day you go over. All this for only $30/mo ABOVE your regular phone bill?
France has a Fiber Optic net. For $30/m you can buy a 40MB/s Internet connection, with unlimited 3G cellphone calling to any other phone in the country, and 200 channels of TV. No cap, no throttles.
When I heard about Verizon and iPhone I was seriously considering upgrading my account. After researching it I decided I will stay with my present plan and Internet service.
Re:Competition again? (Score:4, Informative)
This has been hashed out over and over and over again on the Android-specific fora. The plans for smartphones are unlimited. Period.
BTW, what's your source for that French plan? At Orange, I see a EUR55 plan that offers 20Mbit internet, 120 channels, and unlimited Orange in-network; if you want all numbers in France, it will be EUR110/mo. Nothing like $30/mo.
Re:In "competition", consumers always lose. (Score:4, Informative)
Most of the anti-walmart stuff you read is FUD, targated at them because they're the biggest retailer. And despite what everyone says, they got that way by having honest business practices
Forget random FUD for and against them and just look at what the courts have said. They've paid out hundreds of millions of dollars in class-action suits after it was found that the forced employees to work off the clock (see, for instance, http://www.usatoday.com/money/companies/management/2005-11-02-walmart-employees_x.htm [usatoday.com] "Wal-Mart, which earned $10 billion last year, agreed to pay $50 million in 2000 to settle a class-action lawsuit alleging that 69,000 former and current Wal-Mart employees in Colorado had been forced to work off the clock").
They've paid out millions of dollars in dozen of lawsuits over unfair practices with respect to hiring of disabled employees; they've been raided at least 3 different times for having scores of illegal immigrants working in their stores, and not just on an ad-hoc basis--the 2003 raid was of stores in over 20 different states with hundreds of workers involved (see http://money.cnn.com/2003/10/23/news/companies/walmart_worker_arrests/ [cnn.com] which notes that "federal law enforcement officials said information from an undercover investigation revealed that some Wal-Mart executives and some store managers knew of the immigration violations.").
They're currently facing the biggest gender discrimination suit in US history--see http://money.cnn.com/2010/12/06/news/companies/Wal-mart-lawsuit-to-Supreme-Court/index.htm [cnn.com]
So, yeah, "honest business practices".