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You get the phone subsidised from the retail price of $600 to $100, and your carrier gets you to drop your pants. You should totally find a way to reduce carri

You get the phone subsidised from the retail price of $600 to $100, and your carrier gets you to drop your pants. You should totally find a way to reduce carrier to a dumb pipe. Everything carriers (or ISPs) try to add to the service is awful, harmful and anti-market. Make them just provide the connectivity and shut up.

blhack 14y ago
This is true across more than just consumer cell phones. I had our AT&T rep in out office the other day and he started trying to sell me... ...hosting. AT&T is better than AWS because they have teh cloudz. OH! And programming! AT&T wants to bundle some programmers with our cell phones.
mtgx 14y ago
You say that as if the carrier is "eating the price of the phone" or something, and even if you didn't mean it like that, I think that's how most people see it. When in fact it's not anything more than sending them payments for the phone every month, instead of paying for it all upfront. And I mean that on top of the price you pay for Voice and text. If anything, they even make a nice profit on those payments for the phone - probably a lot more than a bank gets on a credit. They are sneaky though. The reason they get you to think that is by keeping the plans prices the same, even if you come with your own phone. In Europe, if you use your own phone, the plan is significantly cheaper than when getting it with a phone, especially if it's a pretty high-end phone.
- guard-of-terra 14y ago
  The problem is that they're not just "eat the price of the phone by making plans fatter". They're "eat the price of the phone by making plans fatter AND your phone dumber, less useful, less secure and less predictable".
chimeracoder 14y ago
> You should totally find a way to reduce carrier to a dumb pipe That's what ISPs were until the Clinton era, when they made some sweeping regulatory changes that led to the situation we have today.
- 3825 14y ago
  I'd like to read more about this please.
  - southphillyman 14y ago
    Googling "ISP rule changes during clinton era" brings up ...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_1996 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_1996
    - 3825 14y ago
      Thank you. So deregulation happened.

blhack 14y ago

This is true across more than just consumer cell phones. I had our AT&T rep in out office the other day and he started trying to sell me... ...hosting. AT&T is better than AWS because they have teh cloudz. OH! And programming! AT&T wants to bundle some programmers with our cell phones.

mtgx 14y ago

You say that as if the carrier is "eating the price of the phone" or something, and even if you didn't mean it like that, I think that's how most people see it. When in fact it's not anything more than sending them payments for the phone every month, instead of paying for it all upfront. And I mean that on top of the price you pay for Voice and text. If anything, they even make a nice profit on those payments for the phone - probably a lot more than a bank gets on a credit. They are sneaky though. The reason they get you to think that is by keeping the plans prices the same, even if you come with your own phone. In Europe, if you use your own phone, the plan is significantly cheaper than when getting it with a phone, especially if it's a pretty high-end phone.

guard-of-terra 14y ago
The problem is that they're not just "eat the price of the phone by making plans fatter". They're "eat the price of the phone by making plans fatter AND your phone dumber, less useful, less secure and less predictable".

chimeracoder 14y ago

> You should totally find a way to reduce carrier to a dumb pipe That's what ISPs were until the Clinton era, when they made some sweeping regulatory changes that led to the situation we have today.

3825 14y ago
I'd like to read more about this please.
- southphillyman 14y ago
  Googling "ISP rule changes during clinton era" brings up ...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_1996 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_1996
  - 3825 14y ago
    Thank you. So deregulation happened.