The US Cell Phone Carriers Are The New Soviet Ministries

[Ed Hansberry]

<a href="http://ptech.wsj.com/archive/ptech-20050602.html">http://ptech.wsj.com/archive/ptech-20050602.html</a><br /><br />Walt Mossberg had a pretty good article in the Wall Street Journal this morning taking the US cell carriers to task for stifling innovation.<br /><br /><i>"I call these cellphone companies the new Soviet ministries, because they are reminiscent of the Communist bureaucracies in Russia that stood athwart the free market for decades. Like the real Soviet ministries, these technology middlemen too often believe they can decide better than the market what goods consumers need."</i><br /><br />Hey, if I had known I could have summarized "they know what you need better than you do" as "new Soviet ministry" some of my Palm articles would have been much shorter. :wink: Cellular providers in the US are <i>desperately</i> trying not to become a dumb pipe for voice and data. They want to sell more than the service. Profits are enormous on ring tones and applications, and retaining customers via locked devices that only work on their network help keep people in place. They can't win. They are only delaying the inevitable. There is no difference in a phone line, cable/dsl modem and cellular services. The cellular providers just haven't picked up on it yet. They will.

[Mark Kenepp]

I just read this article myself before seeing this post. It is a little disturbing.

I have a few staff members who insist on using Verizon Wireless and I can't blame them. Verizon has the best coverage (in some instances, the only overage) for where these individuals use their phones.

The problem is, they are really crippled when it comes to connectivity, i.e. collecting email on the go. There are certainly solutions provided by Verizon that work, but there are problems that I run into with Verizon products that I don't have with other providers.

I personally only buy unlocked phones but I worry that there might be some functionality that I will be unable to utilize because I do not use a provider branded handset. So far, that has not been the case.

When will it change?

I personally will never choose a provider that would insist on my using a handset provided by the Mobile Service.

[Ash211]

I compare it to your local gas station telling you what kind of car you can buy. It's absurd. America is one of the most industrious nations in the world and every year we Americans become more and more dependant on our cell phones yet the cell phone companies seem intent on keeping us in the dark ages.

[emuelle1]

That's a good point. I just did a bunch of research while trying to decide what to do when my AT&amp;T Wireless contract runs out (we left Cingular for them and got bought right back into Cingular within three months).

I find T-mobile has the best prices on paper, but I don't hear good reviews of them and their phones. Cingular by far has the best selection of the best phones, and they seem to have better prices. Verizon costs more but is supposed to have better coverage. I can't quite figure out what the point to Sprint or Nextel is, especially when you need two lines. All the people I know on Nextel complain constantly about the horrible coverage, but year after year refuse to leave. Reminds me of us Windows users...

[Jon Westfall]

Well, I gotta hand it to them. They told me that I'd want ringtones and picture emails instead of reasonable data plans and push email, and gosh darn it, they were absolutly....

Well, I'll let Jules Winfield from Pulp Fiction put it best (Modified for this context...):

It ain't no ballpark either. Look maybe your method of cell phone usage differs from mine, but usin' a cell phone for stupid fun junk and usin' it for productivity ain't the same ballpark, ain't the same league, ain't even the same sport. Ringtones don't mean *****

[pre]

As a wireless engineer, and as part of a handset test team, I see many problems caused by handsets that the network side gets blamed for. The piece of the network you hold in your hand is really only a very small part of a very complex technology. Any network is only as good as it's weakest link.

[emuelle1]

I know I could care less about ring tones and downloading games. I don't even care if I can send pictures, as long as I can BT them to my Pocket PC or download them to my computer.

YOu're right though. They're telling you what they want you to want, not what you might find useful or practical. I do hate the fact that I can't just buy my own phone and select my carrier.