honestly, this is the BEST TC post I have read in a long while. Extremely well written / crafted and contains serious, sensible points.
I’m so pissed off that I kind of want to call AT&T and demand that they call each of the people I missed calls from and personally apologize. Instead, I’m writing them this very public condemnation.
I would do the former. I really would. Here in the UK phone companies have such a monopoly amongst themselves.
As a consumer I feel regularly screwed. At the moment I am stuck with a shit 18 month old phone because it is out of warranty and upgrading to a newer model (despite being a 10 yr long customer of my current company!) is too expensive outside of the limited free upgrade time.
I sympathize heavily. No one hacks together a phone startup because it is such a closed business. Look how much awesome stuff developed when starting up on the web becomes easy - I hope mobile networks go the same way.
At the moment I am stuck with a shit 18 month old phone because it is out of warranty and upgrading to a newer model (despite being a 10 yr long customer of my current company!) is too expensive outside of the limited free upgrade time.
This may surprise you, but that's actually how much a phone costs. Turns out we haven't quite gotten them to grow on trees yet.
I can't think of any industry (other than video gaming) where someone gives you something for free so you'll use their service; count the one free phone every 2 years as a blessing. If you want the latest-and-greatest, you have to buy it, just like with everything else.
To be 100% fair I have more than paid for my phone since signing the contract :) I rang them up wanting a new phone and asking if they could do me a deal if I agreed to a higher monthly fee and a full 24 month contract (the phone aimed at being an Iphone).
When I first rang them last month there was 6 months left on the contract and they were quite happy to do this - except they wanted the full 6 months paid off first! That's more than the phones original value. I offered to pay the value of the phone (seeing as they get my custom for 24 months locked in - and I am a 10yr customer). not interested.
I agree - trying to get something for nothing is silly :) but I think I deserve some reward for my loyalty? Especially as I will actually be paying for the phone AND increasing my contract amount (and locking in for 24 months - which really means forever as it's an Iphone :))
What do you mean by "Here in the UK phone companies have such a monopoly amongst themselves."?
There's a choice between voda, orange, t, o2 and others and it doesn't seem so bad. Of course O2 seems to have the same problems like at&t - not good enough infrastructure and not enough coverage to handle iphones properly (and now they will get Pre as well, unfortunately). And there are crappy carriers like Three which should DIAF long ago. But otherwise, many offers are sensible.
You're forced to go the 18 months contract route mostly when you're buying the cheapest stuff, which is fair enough. Otherwise, I don't think the situation is bad at all.
I have to disagree about the quality of the composition of the article. While the topic is interesting and even a bit redeeming for TC, the writing falls short of good journalism.
I'm not sure mobile networks will ever go the way of the web startup. I think they had been there before, in their early days.
If anything, we ought to hope the web startup doesn't go the way of mobile service providers...
I’m so pissed off that I kind of want to call AT&T and demand that they call each of the people I missed calls from and personally apologize. Instead, I’m writing them this very public condemnation.
I would do the former. I really would. Here in the UK phone companies have such a monopoly amongst themselves.
As a consumer I feel regularly screwed. At the moment I am stuck with a shit 18 month old phone because it is out of warranty and upgrading to a newer model (despite being a 10 yr long customer of my current company!) is too expensive outside of the limited free upgrade time.
I sympathize heavily. No one hacks together a phone startup because it is such a closed business. Look how much awesome stuff developed when starting up on the web becomes easy - I hope mobile networks go the same way.