Verizon's New Phone Plan Proves It Has No Idea What 'Unlimited' Actually Means (gizmodo.com) 171
Verizon has unveiled its third "unlimited" smartphone plan that goes to show just how meaningless the term has become in the U.S. wireless industry. "In addition to its Go Unlimited and Beyond Unlimited plans, Verizon is now adding a premium Above Unlimited plan to the mix, which offers 75GB of 'unlimited' data per month (as opposed to the 22GB of 'unlimited' data you get on less expensive plans), along with 20GB of 'unlimited' data when using your phone as a hotspot, 500GB of Verizon cloud storage, and five monthly international Travel Passes, which are daily vouchers that let you use your phone's wireless service abroad the same as if you were in the U.S.," reports Gizmodo. Are you confused yet? From the report: And as if that wasn't bad enough, Verizon has also updated its convoluted sliding pricing scheme that adjusts based on how many phones are on a single bill. For families with four lines of service, the Above Unlimited cost $60 per person, but if you're a single user the same service costs $95, which really seems like bullshit because if everything is supposed to be unlimited, it shouldn't really make a difference how many people are on the same bill. As a small concession to flexibility, Verizon says families with multiple lines can now mix and match plans instead of having to choose a single plan for every line, which should allow families to choose the right service for an individual person's needs and help keep costs down. The new Above Unlimited plan and the company's mix-and-match feature arrives next week on June 18th.
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I guess there are not very many of us left who still have the original (grandfathered) Unlimited plan that doesn't have any data caps.
Re:I had no idea ... (Score:4, Interesting)
I had no idea that UNLIMITED could be so...well...limiting!
Back in the days of dial-up, "unlimited" meant "unlimited minutes of being connected", as there were places like Compuserve that would charge you $2/minute or something just to connect to their service. So back when small ISPs were still a thing, "unlimited" was clear to all as "unlimited minutes", which with dial-up was, amusingly, about the same amount of monthly data as today's "unlimited" plans.
Obviously the commonly-understood meaning of "unlimited" for data plans had changed, but there's no talking reason to marketroids.
Re:I had no idea ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:I had no idea ... (Score:5, Interesting)
In business, "commodity" is a dirty word. Nobody wants to be in a commodity business, because it's really, really hard to compete in a commodity business because there's only one number that matters to the consumer: price. If your customers see the commodity you're selling for a penny less, they're not your customers anymore.
Telecommunication bandwith is a commodity. Access to a MB/s is the same (except for perhaps minor differences in latency), so it should be the easiest thing in the world for consumers to buy. Consequently telecom vendors want to make pricing as confusing as possible. This is coming to ISP service too, with the end of net neutrality. Comcast and Verizon will make it impossible to tell whether Xfinity or Fios is a better deal.
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Telecommunication bandwith is a commodity.
Mostly true, but building out infrastructure is a very high barrier to entry. Also, depending where you are, quality of service can differ greatly between carriers.
This is coming to ISP service too, with the end of net neutrality. Comcast and Verizon will make it impossible to tell whether Xfinity or Fios is a better deal.
What does net neutrality have to do with that? By the way, net neutrality was introduced by Obama rather late in the game (2015). So whatever it is that you imagined the ISPs doing, they could have done it before.
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Without net neutrality you'll be buying packages of content and bandwith -- it'll be just like the old cable TV industry.
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Except that didn't happen in the decade and more before net neutrality came into play. The idea that ISPs will be able to turn the Internet into cable TV is absurd. You would quickly lose your customers.
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People didn't stream isochronous data in 2004.
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I don't know what you mean by that. Perhaps you could put it in layman's terms. If you mean something as simple as watching a video in realtime, YouTube came out in 2005.
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Dude, we had video webcam chats back in 1998. We were streaming multiple isochronous streams back then (Yahoo! Chat, anyone? Paltalk? Camfrog later on in 2003?)
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Net neutrality is a buzz word, it means different things to different people. It's like 'middle class'. Meaningless as a designation because people on the right and people on the left mean different things.
Let's talk about the real problem. Pipe owners should not be allowed to own content creators. We use to not allow movie companies to own movie theaters. (I don't know if that still true.) We shouldn't allow ISP's to own content creation companies, but we do. Likewise about wireless companies. they should
Never been throttled (Score:2)
Re:Never been throttled (Score:5, Funny)
I have verizon unlimited and constantly go over 22 GB and don't think I've ever been throttled.
Maybe they have a peering agreement with PornHub?
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You're thinking a different kind of "throttled"
Well... (Score:3)
According to folks who know a lot more about math than I, there are numbers greater than infinity. So maybe "unlimited" is simply a concept instead of an absolute . We need a Richard Feynman type to explain this to laymen. Or, at least, explain it to me.
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>The net neutrality laws from 2015 are what required network providers to provide actual numbers on how much bandwidth they provide, under what terms, as well as the price.
Nah. This has nothing to do with numbers, and has everything to with marketing, which is under the regulatory purview of the FTC. The FTC has launched lawsuits over the "unlimited" marketing claims It sued T-Mobile in 2010 for "unlimited" claims and won. Tracfone was sued and required to pay 40 mil in 2015. AT&T was sued in 2014 an
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The way I've understood this policy is that they use the term "unlimited" to mean that you have an unlimited data allowance but you are throttled when you pass a threshold. This is exactly what AT&T does. Verizon is letting you pay more for a higher threshold.
Consumers have to face it. There will always be a limited amount of bandwidth available. For example, you can't have each of the cars on a busy highway get individualized, personal audio streams simultaneously.
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"For example, you can't have each of the cars on a busy highway get individualized, personal audio streams simultaneously."
Do you even know what an MP3 player does? It's a purpose device that allows you a personalized, individualized audio stream. Many of them work with cars, some just require a simple adapter.
Now, if all of them needed to use an FM transmitter, you might have a point. But bluetooth? Fuck no, you could have every car on the road loaded with BT and as long as they followed power limits there
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Hahah, wow, you completely missed my point. I cannot understand where you got this interpretation.
I am specifically talking about the wireless data connection to mobile devices from the mobile phone towers.
What I'm talking about has absolutely nothing to do with MP3 players, FM transmitters, BlueTooth. I am talking about wireless data networks from mobile providers like AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint.
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"I cannot understand where you got this interpretation."
It's called the Americanized version of the English language. If you don't understand it, don't use it.
You stated, without ANY EXCEPTION OR FOLLOW-UP QUALIFIER, "There will always be a limited amount of bandwidth available. For example, you can't have each of the cars on a busy highway get individualized, personal audio streams simultaneously."
That leaves open a whole fucking goddamned slew of counter-points. See, I have essentially unlimited bandwidth
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Wow. Completely missed my point. I'm talking about broadcasting from mobile phone towers to devices in cars. This has nothing to do with BlueTooth or MP3 players.
Consider re-reading the post again. I won't be responding any more to this kind of trolling.
I hope you're trolling.
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"each car downloading audio from somewhere else."
Do you not know how bluetooth works? Or networking in general?
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Wow. Completely missed my point. I'm talking about broadcasting from mobile phone towers to devices in cars. This has nothing to do with BlueTooth or MP3 players.
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I don't get why people don't understand what I wrote.
At least people here are better than Reddit.
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Consumers have to face it. There will always be a limited amount of bandwidth available. For example, you can't have each of the cars on a busy highway get individualized, personal audio streams simultaneously.
Then force them to stop using the term 'unlimited'. It is false advertising. I can't say I'm selling you an 'unlimited' buffet if I'm not. I can't say I'm selling you an 'unlimited' amount of gas if I'm not. Why should wireless companies be exempt from fraud and false advertising? If it's not 'unlimited' don't say it. if you say it you should be legally required to adhere to your advertising.
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So how do those relate to alephs? And what do you feel about the continuum hypothesis?
Re:Well... (Score:5, Insightful)
> As a folk who knows a lot more about math than you,
*facepalm*
Any number divided by zero is UNDEFINED or in IEEE754 notation NaN (Not-a-Number)
Why?
Because if you graph:
* 0/negative x towards zero it goes toward -Infinity
* 0/positive x towards zero it goes toward +Infinity
The problem is that 0/0 is BOTH positive AND negative infinity. Which one is correct?
In Mathematics this is called a Singularity. [wikipedia.org] Division is supposed to be closed, meaning a single number divided by another singlenumber produces a SINGLE number -- not TWO of them! Since it is impossible to tell which Infinity is correct: a) both, b) neither, c) positive, d) negative along with the fact that we haven't invented multi-valued variables, Mathematicians leave the division by zero as undefined by definition.
Where the fuck you are are getting this C/0 = Inf + (C-1) horseshit from???
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Where the fuck you are are getting this C/0 = Inf + (C-1) horseshit from???
Core Maths.
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"no fraction left behind"
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Come on, this is simple bistromathics. They curve around and meet. Sheesh.
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LOL +1 for Douglas Adams reference.
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TY! It was so obvious I was surprised nobody had beat me to it.
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> All I can say is: ... IEE754? ... Was that meant as a joke?
I'll even document: exception handling: indications of exceptional conditions (such as division by zero, overflow, etc.), and call it NaN [wikipedia.org]
Nah, that will never catch on.
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Infinity is a concept not a number.
A better way to think about it is using sets. For example, how large is the set of even numbers? The answer is that it's infinitely large, because you can start with a set with just the number 2 in it, and expand it forever by adding 2 to the largest value in the set to get another number that belongs in the set. Likewise, the same is true for the set of odd numbers, it is also infinitely large. So how large is the set that contains all the even numbers and 7? It's cl
Cashed my unlimited VZ in years ago (Score:2)
They know exactly what it means (Score:5, Insightful)
and they are wording it to exclude the few people who want to use their smartphone as their home internet or have some continuous download on it 24x7 cause they want to feel special at using a lot of data
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no one is forcing you to buy internet twice. you don't even have to use a cell phone if you don't want to.
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and they are wording it to exclude the few people who want to use their smartphone as their home internet or have some continuous download on it 24x7 cause they want to feel special at using a lot of data
And this kind of deceptive advertising is why I'm glad I live in a country that penalises this kind of deceptive advertising. I have unlimited fibre broadband at home and unlimited means it's not metred at all. You'll find it hard to get an "unlimited" mobile phone plan here (although it's pretty good value for money, £6 a month for 1.5 GB of data... plus some minutes and texts I just don't use).
If a UK company wants to use the word "unlimited" in advertising, the service they provide must be sans
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why would i care if at&t throttles my kids' youtube if they watch too much during the month on cellular? Same for myself, some of us have better things to do than stare into a phone all day long and "stream"
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I wish people would stop buying plans that say there are unlimited but really are limited.
Show me a plan that meets the "unlimited in every way" criteria. I'll wait.
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Yes, your plan is "unlimited"... But it only works in half the areas of Verizon or AT&T, you're on Edge or 3G connectivity for big chunks, and the 4G speeds are insanely low. But you get all the data you can (when you cannect, that is). My company had Sprint, and when I moved to SoCal (Ventura) I convinced them to let me switch to Verizon because, even though it was more expensive, it actually worked. I could get data and phone service everywhere instead of big dead zones or marginal zones like Spri
Re: Its the people. (Score:2)
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Re: Its the people. (Score:2)
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https://www.tele2.nl/mobiel/si... [tele2.nl]
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In order to guarantee the quality of the network, we ask you to activate a BundleBooster in MijnTele2 or the Tele2 app when using more than 5GB per day . If you do not request an additional bundle booster, your data will be closed for one day and you will no longer be able to use the internet.
Granted, the "BundleBoosters" appear to be free, so you may have me there. We'll let the Slashdot gods decide if "unlimited, as long as you request a variance each day" is "unlimited in every way" =)
It's a bit of a stretch, but "roaming" data within the EU is limited to 8GB/month. I forget what it said for non-EU, it was significantly limited, but I'd expect to pay when roaming outside of my country.
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Some small network should try a new "Unlimited 1MB plan", charging $0.10 per megabyte.
When the bill comes and someone calls them, they'll be able to say "our plan specifically said unlimited 1MB, so we're charging you for as many MB as you used, there was no limit on the number of MB you could use. It's unlimited."
Re: Its the people. (Score:2)
I don't need unlimited. I would prefer a faster pipe than a higher data cap.
Noone can afford to give everyone 1G/sec for $100/month if you saturate it all the time so it's a game of limiting speed or having caps to stop abuse. My kids and I are on the internet constantly. We use around 300gb per month on our fiber line.
I think we get 1TB. That is plenty for us.
60% of the time, it works every time! (Score:2)
75GB of "unlimited" data? Verizon must have gone to the Anchorman School of Marketing!
Project Fi (Score:4, Interesting)
And this is exactly why I'm grateful I decided to switch to Google's Project Fi. None of this fake bullshit "unlimited", plus no international "only some days" restrictions. One shared data pool for the whole family. Once we hit our max, we can keep using data as much as we want, without getting charged more. Plus, no cost other than data sim cards that are data-only (no voice/text) are fucking AMAZING. Just keep adding devices like tablets, old cell phones, laptops, hotspots, whatever. Its all just on one shared data pool, and no fuss, no bullshit.
Re:Project Fi (Score:5, Informative)
And this is exactly why I'm grateful I decided to switch to Google's Project Fi. None of this fake bullshit "unlimited"
Right from the Fi pricing site:
After 6 GB, data is free! Enjoy the same high-speed connectivity for up to 15 GB of data use.
You can opt out of slower speeds by paying for $10/GB any individual data used above 15 GB in a billing cycle. Learn more here.
So EXACTLY the same bullshit, except a lower threshold at which they start throttling you, OR they actually start charging you by the GB. Explain how this is better?
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... Explain how this is better?
I'm not a heavy (10GB+) data user, and do not automatically recommend Fi to those who are. I find Fi better because I pay for the data I use. If I don't use it, I don't pay for it. And that, to me, is BETTER. Also, my Fi devices work well everywhere I've been in Europe. My only additional charges while outside the US are $0.20/minute for old-fashioned phone calls. And, BTW, fuck Verizon and their abuse of the language. Fuck ALL who redefine words for profit and power.
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I find Fi better because I pay for the data I use. If I don't use it, I don't pay for it. And that, to me, is BETTER.
In theory it is. In practice Fi ends up being considerably more expensive that other plans.
E.g., I have a T-Mobile 5GB + Binge on plan. It's $30 a month. A 5GB plan on Fi is $70 / month, and doesn't benefit from Binge meaning in practice I'd use 2x+ as much data that actually counts against my cap on Fi.
To be fair that's the old T-mo 5GB plan that's not offered anymore. I priced a 3x family plan at 10GB (2x the data) a month though and it's only like $5 / month more (if I bought 3 lines, which I would).
I do
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Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
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At some point, the appropriate response is for the neighborhood to get together and close down the lemonade stand.
No matter how libertarian the society - companies only exist at the allowance of the society.
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Sure, but that doesn't really work with the other three lemonade stands in town are running the same "unlimited" lemonade scam.
Different meaning (Score:4, Insightful)
"Unlimited" is the amount of money that Verizon hopes to make from their customers.
Corporate Doublespeak (Score:3)
"Prioritization point" (Score:5, Informative)
T-Mo has for quite a while now been a lot more upfront about how the term "unlimited" includes a certain amount being your "prioritization point" after which you get throttled.
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Yep, and that throttling is only if the network requires it for QoS. I share a 55+ line with my mom. $60 FLAT a month for two unlimited lines. Data MAY be throttled after 55GB per line. That seems more than fair.
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No, it doesn't - I burn through around 500gb each month, but then there are two teenagers in the house with their own PC's downloading whatever they feel like.
Our ISP will throttle the top 10% of users, and using 500gb doesn't get me into the top 10%, I have never been throttled.
I always used to be envious of the internet in the US compared to where I am, but it looks like my shit hole third world countries internet is better than the US at the moment.
like children (Score:1)
What did you expect? (Score:2)
Everyone seems to harp on the fact that Hotspot/jetpack is limited to 15gb of data per device. The issue you run into is what happened during the early days of the Feb unlimited plan when this wasn't enforced. We had a ton of people eliminating their home wifi networks and running their entire home/connected world (home security cameras, tablets, televisions, game consoles, media servers or purely cord cutting) off of a jetpack. This crippled the network. Then there were post everywhere about how someone co
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Everyone seems to harp on the fact that Hotspot/jetpack is limited to 15gb of data per device. The issue you run into is what happened during the early days of the Feb unlimited plan when this wasn't enforced. We had a ton of people eliminating their home wifi networks and running their entire home/connected world (home security cameras, tablets, televisions, game consoles, media servers or purely cord cutting) off of a jetpack. This crippled the network. Then there were post everywhere about how someone couldn't send a snapchat of their dog farting and looking shocked. Much less the issue of businesses trying to oporate off of Verizon that couldn't send out invoices or ambulances that use verizon to get medical information out to the truck due to network congestion.
Under the current network restraints, it's just not possible to run things as fully unlimited the way people want. Much less for a lesser price and still have the money to build out a network that will be able to support your unlimited dog fart snapchats in the future.
Yep, as much as I don't like Verizon, I agree with you there. I knew someone who tried that and then bitched when it all went to hell.
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All true. Good reason why a mobile operator cannot offer an unlimited plan. The problem here is that Verizon are calling their plan unlimited, when it is not. The name of it is a complete lie. Transparently and boldly so. They are promoting the service as if it were something they both will not and can not deliver.
Verizon who. (Score:3)
We got the whole extended family on board ( I think we are up to 8 people on this plan) so extra lines are something like $10 a month for unlimited plans, may just get an extra phone just to stick in the car so I can be lazy and not even take my regular phone out of my pocket.
A 150/150MBit fiber connection backstops the service at home.
Cable, monthly contracts, phone leases, and other silly shit from the major players, thanks but no thanks.
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Verizon has given up on FiOS. There is a reason that there are no new builds except infills and government-mandated projects like Washington DC and New York City. There is a reason Frontier owns a huge former Verizon FiOS plants in 15+ states now and why Frontier's stock value has been flat since then.
They originally planned to earn profits after a decade or two but the time horizon is so far out past two decades they fire-sold to Frontier and sued to be allowed to halt builds in DC and NYC.
Author does not understand volume pricing (Score:2)
And as if that wasn't bad enough, Verizon has also updated its convoluted sliding pricing scheme that adjusts based on how many phones are on a single bill.
This is called volume pricing. In this case it is used to entice households to use the same carrier rather than shop around based on different needs. It may be bad, but it makes plenty of sense.
nothing new (Score:2)
Let's not forget; this is the same company that failed to grasp the difference between $.02 and $.0002
https://consumerist.com/2006/1... [consumerist.com]
(if anyone has the original audio, please post it)
One of the worst for service in US. (Score:1)
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Everyone I know who used Verizon has regretted it. Much slower to use with many more deadspots.
I had Straight Talk (prepaid vendor on the Verizon Network) and switched to Sprint because I was getting poor data in a lot of areas, and Sprint was offering the "free for a year" deal. I'm only three months into my Sprint "free" contract, but am trying to figure out if I should switch to Verizon because data availability is even worse.
I don't know what to do.
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Everyone I know who used Verizon has regretted it. Much slower to use with many more deadspots.
I had Straight Talk (prepaid vendor on the Verizon Network) and switched to Sprint because I was getting poor data in a lot of areas, and Sprint was offering the "free for a year" deal. I'm only three months into my Sprint "free" contract, but am trying to figure out if I should switch to Verizon because data availability is even worse.
I don't know what to do.
Well I just has a co-worker quit Sprit after 3 days, it was so bad. It cost him $100 but he gave all 4 phones back and went back to ATT.
Lame! I get 100GB for 9$ (Score:1)
I live in Israel, and I have the 100GB plan of 012mobile. And it's just 30 ILS (around 9$).
Yay for me!
Verizon are annoying.. like if you want to sell a device that connects to Verizon, you must get a Verizon certificate for that...
Later this year ... (Score:2)
In addition to its Go Unlimited and Beyond Unlimited plans, Verizon is now adding a premium Above Unlimited plan to the mix, ...
Unlimited Bullshit (Score:1)
It's a plan to change the meaning of "unlimited" (Score:2)
Deceptive advertising (Score:1)
Are you confused yet? (Score:2)
You won't be, after this week's episode of Soap!
Verizon's... No Idea What Unlimited Means (Score:2)
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less."
No, I'm afraid YOU'RE the one confused. You just expect it to be the common English language definition of the word. In this case Marketing has gotten involved, and it's not English anymore, even though the glyphs would appear to be so. Just think of it as Advanced Emoji.
After all, they FEEL "unlimited" actually has a value of like 28GB, and who are YOU to completely invalidate their feelings? Corporations have people too -- you HORRIBLE person you!
---
A decade ago, I used to work for Verizon Wirel
Ridiculous complexity not necessary (Score:1)
Swedish smooth sailing (Score:1)
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No idea what anyone puts up with Verizon / ATT. I'll just continue enjoying my no bullshit Walmart plan.
ATT sucks. My wife swore she would do without a phone before ever using them again and it has been 8 years and she is still saying that.
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Nobody is forcing the companies to call it unlimited when it isn't. That's their choice.
People should expect to get what they paid for, it's the companies' fault if they can't provide what they sold.
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In the US bribes are legally protected as free speech, so the end result isn't exactly a surprise.