US carrier in shock 'wireless pipes make money' claim A US wireless carrier has admitted that it can make a very good living as a wireless carrier. This week, at a mobile-centric get-together in downtown San Francisco, T-Mobile USA chief technology officer Cole Brodman was asked how the company planned to avoid becoming nothing more than a - gasp! - network service provider in an …
For being right. The telco's have been fighting for years against this although surprisingly the network builders (Ericsson, et al.) are very happy to provide just this service for the networks (Bharti Airteil in India has completely outsourced the network) and let them get on with the business of marketing the brand and services.
It always amuses me when I see USA folk going on about mobiles. Their market is the most dysfunctional on the planet due to their asinine laws and litigation.
Mobiles/contracts/restrictions in the USA are pretty much like mobiles in Europe/Asia circa 2000.
Land of the free? Land of the lawyers more like.
Enjoy your phones that nobody in Europe would touch with a bargepole. Enjoy your telecos too who are pretty crap these days. Oh and enjoy the eternal litigation that does nothing except enrich lawyers.
Oh and Brendan T-Mobile is German, as with all pretty much all companies operating in the USA they have to try to be yank-friendly - nice try but total fail ;)
I await someone saying "but what about the iphone" which is a classic case of fail in end-user/contract terms but I guess the fools in the USA who think healthcare is communistic will whine about this. Fuck them.
Have you ever even spent more than a few days in the States? Sure we got lots of big problems but suprisingly enough not really with our wireless carriers. Yes our handsets are a bit primitive and cdma has its flaws but it is so cheap we don't complain too much. I lived in Germany for three years and I can tell you the average American pays a lot less for voice/data access than Euros do. All you can eat data plans for phones for example are the norm not the exception here. In fact there is a plan here with a smaller carrier where you get unlimited everything (voice,data,sms,etc) for less than $50 a month. I hate the monopoly M$ wannabe Deutsch Telekom so much (they ripped me off hard) I will never buy from T-Mobile no matter how good they get. Perhaps if Europe had broken up the telekom monopolies like the US did in the early 80's and neutered the political power of the corrupt telekoms you wouldn't see things like the Phorm foulup, outrageous roaming charges, and the telekoms in general handpicking politicians in the government (dont get me wrong we have this problem real bad in financial industry but as I said not so much in telecoms).
Re: Naismith
I will concede your main point though about the US have way too many lawyers with way too much power and the legal system having precious little common sense. It just doesn't really apply luckily as much as you think to the telecom industry because one of the few smart things Reagan actually did was bust up our telecom monopoly (AT&T) long ago.
Yeah, that's why I don't have a mobile.
When you sign up, they can't even tell you your actual monthly charges. You'll sign up for $29.95/mo and the actual charges will be more like $45-$55.
Now Verizon is doubling its early termination fee from $175 to $350.
T-Mobile gets around all its service contracts by claiming all the phones are water damaged. You can take the battery out of a brand-new T-Mobile phone right in the store and see the water indicator is already red.
I won't flog the dead horse that's AT&T.
Everybody pretty much refuses to work with unlocked phones. If you bring in an unlocked phone, and want service, they mysteriously "can't do anything for you" or their lowest price contract is $250/mo.
And ASDF is full of it about unlimited data plans - There isn't anything like that below $85, and by that I mean the real price, not the imaginary advertised one.
I've lived in the States for 43 years, and I can say our mobile service is a joke, and a crap one, at that.
mmhh... not that I like deutsche telekom very much, but the question arises, when you lived in Germany. And quite frankly... by now there are so many competitors to the dtag (Deutsche Telekom AG) that I find it hard to believe that it was all their fault. granted, they will screw you over if they can, but in the long run you have to allow them to (in most cases).
I am sure the telkos in the states are so good, that it is not a really big problem, when for "some reason" you cannot call some numbers from one provider through another because some idiot refuses to route etc.
apart from that, in Euroland, we may have high roaming charges (well it's not too bad anymore) but at least it is possible to reached almost anywhere (very few "white spots" on the maps in comparison to the US).
And apart from all that mess, I am quite happy to pay a few $€£ more in order to get a decent service. I can happily surf the net at a reasonable rate (2-3Mbps reaslistic) at over 200mph on the train from e.g. munich to hamburg. make a phonecall and send a fax at the same time.
I can go to most places in the world and can use my cellphone (in the US it is limited).
And no I am not trying to slag you yanks off. Being a Kraut myself, I know my peoples shortcommings very well.... I would even say the German Government is probably just as corrupt as the American Government... they just manage to hide it better....
Some things change though... these days the Germans don't have as much of an ambition to rule the world, contrary to some other governments......
(I am talking of governments, and not people)
Prost
Don't get me wrong I enjoyed my times in Germany (ah the girls) just hated the phone company with a passion. Grated this way several years ago when PAYGO was first coming out and to a foreigner with semi tolerable deutsch I was forced to use DT. As for our government it is either being ran by incompetent bought and paid for Dems or just plain evil and bought and paid for Repubs. Pick your poison.
This icon, it is for you. The US mobile market is a joke for consumers.
"All you can eat data plans for phones for example are the norm not the exception here."
Ever try tethering? Just you try and use that data plan and see what happens.
"In fact there is a plan here with a smaller carrier where you get unlimited everything (voice,data,sms,etc) for less than $50 a month. I hate the monopoly M$ wannabe Deutsch Telekom so much (they ripped me off hard) I will never buy from T-Mobile no matter how good they get. Perhaps if Europe had broken up the telekom monopolies like the US did in the early 80's and neutered the political power of the corrupt telekoms you wouldn't see things like the Phorm foulup, outrageous roaming charges, and the telekoms in general handpicking politicians in the government (dont get me wrong we have this problem real bad in financial industry but as I said not so much in telecoms)."
Are you a sockpuppet for amanfrommars? I can't believe I fell for your troll.
Regulaters are cozying up to the greedy carriers and "selling" them OUR airspace.
Rather they should allocate bandwidth the same way they allocate broadcast frequencies, free to use, but you must offer "value" to the end user.
Owning frequencies encourages the carriers to build inefficient networks and overcharge for their services.
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