So AT&T is buying T-Mobile USA for $39 billion in a deal that makes perfect sense if you are an RF engineer or a fat-cat telco tycoon, but my question is what happens to all the jailbroken and unlocked iPhones?
T-Mobile and AT&T are the USA’s only GSM wireless network operators, so if you had an iPhone and wanted to dump AT&T to allow things like free tethering, the obvious (and frankly only) way for Americans to do so was by jumping from cranky old AT&T to the much friendlier T-Mobile. And so tens of thousands — maybe hundreds of thousands — of AT&T customer did just that, and were gratefully accepted by T-Mobile.
But now with the T-Mobile brand, back office, and customer service likely to go away, will AT&T turn all those iPhones into bricks? It depends in part on Apple, on the Apple-AT&T contract, but mainly I think it depends on terms set by regulators in return for approving the deal.
AT&T has said it will grandfather T-Mobile customers, honoring their often lower monthly fees and continued use of T-Mobile phones, but AT&T has had nothing specific to say yet about T-Mobile iPhones.
Apple hates jailbroken and unlocked iPhones, of course, and would like to see them all die, but since Verizon began selling iPhones in the USA, Apple has lost some clout with AT&T.
So my guess is that AT&T will allow jailbroken and unlocked iPhones to run on their network if the Federal Communications Commission or Federal Trade Commission or Department of Justice demand it as a condition for approving the merger, which they will if we demand it. And if that happens, the even more important question becomes whether Apple will lose some control of its ecosystem? Will jailbreaking and unlocking — enabling iPhones to add software features and do things beyond the ken of Cupertino — become the norm?
I hope so.
Update — According to a report this morning in Forbes: “AT&T said Monday that it in the year after the closing, it plans to rearrange how T-Mobile’s cell towers work. The spectrum they use for third-generation services, or 3G, will be repurposed for 4G, which is faster. That would leave current T-Mobile phones without 3G. They would need to be replaced with phones that use AT&T’s 3G frequencies. AT&T said it had factored the cost of replacement phones into the total cost of the acquisition.”
This would seem to suggest that AT&T will give you a free replacement for your jailbroken, unlocked iPhone on the T-Mobile network.
But wait, there’s more! If AT&T is repurposing T-Mobile 3G service to 4G, doesn’t that strongly suggest that 3G is going away completely on AT&T? It looks that way to me. So will AT&T be giving EVERYONE a free 4G phone upgrade or just the jailbroken unlocked iPhones?
Ironic, eh?
Jailbroken iPhones currently work on ATT’s network now. My 3G, which I use when I need the very occasional tethering, is jailbroken and works when I put in my iPhone 4’s SIM.
Unless you are referring to UNLOCKED phones. For example, an iPhone unlocked to support TMobile’s SIM. Then, yes, I would think that it would be nice if that phone can use ATT’s existing 3G network rather than TMobile’s Edge network.
Apple hates jailbroken phones -they introduce security vulnerabilities that taint the iPhone’s image and enable piracy which costs them and developers revenue and makes the platform less attractive to develop for- but nor unlocked phones necessarily. The problem was that in order to unlock you need first to jailbreak.
It will be sad to see T-Mobile go because they were competition and had aggressive prices. I doubt this has anything to do with the iPhone.
There goes the (small amount of) competition for US GSM operators (aside from the very small guys). Will there ever be a time when people can buy a phone from wherever they wish and buy a plan from any company to work with it? Perhaps the FCC will wake up and realise that with 4G systems, its time to break incompatibilities and allow true competition.
But the USofA is based upon monopoly power, abetted by government. If the last 30 years haven’t proven that, I don’t know what more can be said.
Either you’re not from the U.S., or you are an extremely ignorant citizen/resident.
The U.S. business climate is all about competition. Yes, accumulation of wealth and growing bigger is part of it, but it is essentially about ingenuity and invention and doing something nobody else thought of before, or doing it better than anybody else thought to do.
Monopoly = stagnation. I can’t think of a single ‘Monopoly’ in the U.S. There may be regional monopolies in the form of utility concessions, but even in those cases there is competition in many places. Oligopolies exist, such as the U.S. wireless industry, where economies of scale are necessary to improve service and lower prices. You can see oligopolies in many industries in many countries. Monopolies generally only exist in countries where the companies are in the back pocket of the government or vice-versa. Right now, the U.S. government is at war with U.S. business. Definitely no monopolies.
I can think of a monopoly. Try Comcast Cable. I have no other option other than DSL.
ironic that someone posting under the name Mr. Windows can’t think of a single monopoly in the U.S.
if the U.S. government is “at war with U.S. business”, i sure wish they would wage war on me like they wage war on all the Wall Street bankers!
The U.S. economy is NOT “all about competition”. You are spouting theory taught in business school, so you must be an MBA. Open your eyes and see that the U.S. economy is actually all about stifling competition in the name of increased profits. What on earth do you think M&A are all about? It costs billions of dollars to acquire another company so why would anyone do it? PROFIT! And where does that profit come from? DECREASED competition. AT&T is gobbling up T*Mobile to eliminate their only GSM competition and you can be darned sure subscriber rates will increase. Just as airfares increase every time airlines merge. Are you completely blind to this fact? Or willfully ignorant?
Yes, I meant unlocked, but rather than whining or wringing our hands, the thing to do is to bitch and moan to regulators until they force AT&T to essentially buy-off Apple and allow unlocked phones on the network. It’s worth a billion or two to AT&T and Apple will probably accept that to get the merger through. Write the FCC, FTC, and DoJ!
I don’t understand the “buy off Apple” part. AT&T could be forced by the FCC to allow unlocked phones but leave it up to Apple to kill or allow unlocked iPhones in one of their updates. Apple would be the one violating the rule, which should apply to all carriers, so they would be choosing to get out of the cell phone business in the US.
The USA has a bill of rights which did not prevent it from having slavery for almost 100 years or lack of equality of woman for almost 200 years. Apple’s efforts to prevent its citizenry from viruses, fraud or loss will meet the ultimate right of the USA — I think Lincoln spoke of being fooled well so be it.
But don’t in some future blog, Robert X, complain of Madoffs, Goldman Sachs’ or whooping cough that kills your children, steals your money or bankrupt nations.
Its your right to be fooled and stupid against all warnings And ellect similar people
And make stupid laws! Bring back the Wild West — oh its moved to Libya!
“Apple hates jailbroken and unlocked iPhones”
Really? I guess I’ve never read where they actually have had that stance.
Over here in Australia, Apple happily sell us iphones directly from the Apple store with no locking. I am on my 3rd carrier now with complete freedom to move where the value is.
Whilst we are not perfect, we do have good consumer protection laws that wind back some of that hard core capitalism (masquerading as “you will buy our product how we want to sell it, not how you want to use it”).
I also think that Apple refusing to offer carrier customisations confirms they are a slave to their app store rather than the carriers….
But does Australia have but one network protocol? For all carriers? Something rational governments do.
Yes we have 2G GSM and 3G UMTS across our 4 carriers. With a quad band phone such as a iPhone 4 or BB 9700 I can pick all 4 carriers up.
It would be nice if they would pick up some of the good things from TMO, instead of keeping all the bad things about AT&T.
Why is it that in the US the only choice is between bad and mostly bad?
What regulators need to do is mandate that all GSM phones be sold unlocked. This has nothing to do with jailbreaking. And while T-Mobile has *slightly* better domestic rates, that isn’t the issue. The issue is the absolutely outrageous roaming fees one gets charged when travelling, and that’s where unlocked phones come into play — by being able to insert a local SIM in your iPhone you can save hundreds if not thousands of dollars from the usury roaming rate for AT&T voice and data, not the pennies you can save with T-Mobile domestically.
Everyone from Canada to Italy mandates unlocked iPhones. Why can’t we do the same?
Jailbreaking
…Jailbreaking is a security hazard as was pointed out above, and mandated factory unlocking would kill the one real need for otherwise security conscious users to jailbreak.
(Sorry for the split post — the hazards of the iPad touchscreen…)
Apple doesn’t hate unlocked phones. That is how he majority are sold in the world. USA is really where the carrier locked phone dominates.
Jail broken is a different matter, and unrelated to carrier locking.
All I want is to fly to Germany and get a local SIM card to use while there. I don’t want to buy an AT&T package or get billed $3 a call; all I want is a local SIM card. I just want to use the damn phone like a PHONE. Is that too much to ask? I’m not going to jailbreak the damn thing every time Apple changes the OS just to fit in a SIM card when traveling; too much trouble. Just let me do what I used to do with every other phone I ever owned.
Jailbreaking is already legal. It was specifically allowed as an exception to the DMCA when the enforcement rules were reviewed last summer.
Carrier locking is a different matter, you’d think they could just as well sell the phone unlocked but that only benefits the customer. There’s not much upside for AT&T apart from happier customers.
Jailbreaking phones has nothing to do with the carrier, there have already been court rulings allowing people to load whatever they want onto their phones. However, the carriers in the U.S. have traditionally locked the handsets to their networks, primarily as a justification to subsidize the phones. Instead of $599 or $699 for an iPhone, you can get one for $299 or $399. Elsewhere you pay for your phone as part of your contract. We really should move to that kind of ecosystem. As a long time AT&T customer, I don’t plan on switching, so I don’t mind a 2- or even 3-year contract, in exchange for lower-priced phones.
I do want the option to use a local SIM card if I travel to Europe or wherever, and as a long time customer, I usually have no problem getting an unlock code. The FCC should mandate all phones be unlocked, period.
Jailbreaking is a separate issue. Apple and any manufacturer has the right to void your warranty if you modify the firmware of your handset. As a consumer, I want to be able to write my own code or download whatever software I care to. With my Fuze and the 8135 before that, I was able to download any number of Windows Mobile programs from wherever and load them on my phone. This concept of App Stores and Marketplaces is restricting consumer choice, albeit with the possible benefit of higher quality fart apps and the ability of the App Store to recall broken or malignant apps. Consumers should be able to choose which App Store they use, or directly download apps to their phones. But that is something we need to take up with the phone and OS manufacturers, not necessarily AT&T, Verizon or Sprint.
“However, the carriers in the U.S. have traditionally locked the handsets to their networks, primarily as a justification to subsidize the phones. Instead of $599 or $699 for an iPhone, you can get one for $299 or $399. ”
Again this shows PROFOUND ignorance of economics.
When you buy a subsidized phone, you do NOT buy just a phone. You buy a BUNDLE of a phone AND a two year contract. That two-year contract includes the subsidy for the phone in it. Locking has NOTHING to do with this.
Even back in the day when T-Mobile was independent, how does it hurt AT&T to have you use your cell-phone on T-Mo’s network? You still have to pay the ATT contract every month, and if you’e paying that contract, but not actually contributing to ATT overload, that’s a pretty good deal for ATT.
How long until the integration is finalized?
You can take your unlocked AT&T iPhone to T-Mobile, put in a T-Mobile SIM card, and you can make T-Mobile calls with it.
The problem is that your data network would be the very slow Edge network and not the fast HSPA+ network that T-Mobile is installing. That’s because T-Mobile’s network and AT&T’s network operate on two different frequencies.
The blame for the merger can be placed directly at Steve Jobs’ feet. The iPhone and iPad sold in the U.S. are set to the 850, 900, 1900, 2100 MHz frequencies. Unfortunately, T-Mobile uses the 1700 Mhz spectrum which means an iPad or iPhone simply cannot have that fast 3G speed on a T-Mobile network.
In the pre-iPhone/iPad days, T-Mobile could compete against the AT&T/Verizon dualopoly by offering better customer service and lower prices. Once the iPhone came out, the cellular carriers were no longer in the business of selling simple phones. The money was in the smart phones like the iPhone and Android phones.
T-Mobile was slowly leaking customers for the last three years. They stemmed the tide of defections for a while, but once Verizon got the iPhone and they didn’t, the game was over.
Maybe if Apple provided a T-Mobile friendly version of the iPhone and iPad, T-Mobile could have remained a viable company. WIth the two big cellular juggernauts selling the iPhone and iPad, and with the smallest network, T-Mobile simply could not compete.
Rumors of T-Mobile and Apple in negotiations have been running rampant for the last two years. I imagine they went like this:
T-Mobile: Can we please have the iPhone?
Apple: Huh? Did someone say something?
While T-Mobile had every reason to want the iPhone, Apple had little reason to give it to T-Mobile. On just AT&T and Verizon, Apple is selling iPhones as fast as they can be manufactured. Adding T-Mobile wouldn’t increase sales. Plus, they would have to use a new 5 frequency chip which would increase the cost of the iPhone.
I hade been wondering how much longer I had to wait on T-Mobile for them to get an iPhone. I was thinking about getting Android, but my son has an Android phone which he has learned to hate. It was never officially updated beyond 1.6, and he downloaded a Android 2.1 release which tends to crash all the time. Still no word of a Android 2.2 or 2.3 release for his phone. A phone that’s less than a year old, and will never be updated. A phone where 70% of the stuff my son downloads are simply utilities to make his phone “run better”. Not what I want.
I guess now the question has been settled. Whether or not I like it, I’m now an AT&T customer which means I can get that iPhone I had been waiting for all of these years.
The is one of the few redeeming qualities of Apple. They support their hardware for a few years.
Telecoms are not really in the support/keeping customers mode. Once AT&T has 1/2 the market in the US, I am sure they will change. 🙂
“The blame for the merger can be placed directly at Steve Jobs’ feet.”
This is a fascinating claim. So what you are saying is that:
(a) Apple turned away business that could have made it money at ZERO extra effort? That’s a mighty strange way for a company to behave.
(b) You are privy to the negotiations between T-Mo and Apple, unlike the rest of us? You know absolutely for sure that it was Apple making unreasonable demands, not T-Mo? You know how the first round of negotiations for iPhone 1 went down all those years ago? Then the doubtless next round of negotiations for iPad?
You really should write an article sharing these details with the rest of us.
There is hope that Apple’s chipsets starting with the iPhone 4 support the 1700 spectrum, and all they have to do is hit a software switch. If so, we will all all of a sudden have better coverage. I sure hope it is true…
And I can only imagine the iPhone 5 on AT&T/T-Mobile will support HSPA+ on all the frequencies, and the iPhone 5 on VZ will just be another CDMA phone. Another reason to stick with the GSM variety…
Maybe when iPhone 6 hits, you will see LTE, but it seems in Apple’s best interest (in so far as performance (in data speed) per Wh) is clearly in the GSM and HSPA+ camp. You have really no change in battery life from the current speeds, speeds of 6-8 Mbps in real world (my friend here in Seattle has a new T-Mobile “4G” phone and sees those speeds). LTE chipsets are still to power hungry, and the infrastructure is just not built out enough yet for Apple to invest. HSPA+ can be achieved with existing infrastructure.
It is all about Towers and the AWS-1 Spectrum for AT&T
Looks like they will be positioning the firms combined AWS-1 1700MHz spectrum Nationwide for “phone to tower” services in their new LTE network.
Not sure what they will do with the 2100MHz AWS-1 spectrum-maybe backhaul ??
If AT&T plans to use both their 700MHz and AWS-1 spectrum (1700MHz) for the new LTE service they will need at minimum a tri-mode chip set in the new radios (Smartphones) or at least a Software Defined Chip. Regardless they will require all T-Mobiel subs to change out their existing devices.
Phase one: Focus all new AWS-1 Spectrum on enhancing AT&T existing HSPA Plus network to compete with VZW new LTE network. Need to combine AT&T existing 850MHz-1900MHz and 1700MHz-2100MHZ spectrum some how in HSPA+.
Phase 2 transition these HSPA+ services to the new AT&T LTE network.
Metro PCS is presently using the AWS-1 spectrum for their new LTE network and have announced a LTE/AWS phone.
Will be interesting to see what AT&T will do.
Jim A.
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Someone define for me please the difference between jailbroken and unlocked…
Carrier locking restricts a phone to the network of the carrier it was purchased through. This is ostensibly done to prevent you from getting a subsidized phone from one carrier and switching to another carrier. Some carriers allow phones to be easily unlocked (frequently for a price) and some don’t.
Jailbreaking is the process of removing user limitations placed on the phone OS. Phones are frequently designed to prevent the user from full access to the inner workings of the OS. For example, carriers may preinstall software the user can’t remove or prevent add-on features such as tethering. When a phone is jailbroken these restrictions are removed, granting full access to the (generally) Unix based computer within the phone.
Who else on the planet uses 1700mhz and why did Tmobile choose that? In Australia we have 3 major networks and the iphone4 covers all their frequencies (the 3G didn’t quite cover all the HSPDA channels though). We pulled down the CDMA networks 6 years ago to go with the international GSM system but there is no publicity about LTE yet. I used to think seceded screwed with data prices here (we were until last year actually) but competition seems to have come to the carrier with the best network but now it seems to be overloaded like the other two who promised everything but delivered squat.
Good luck with this new twist dudes.
I do not think the purchase of T-Mobile will benefit the USA public. I can think of ways it will HURT the public, reduce service, and stifle competition. I don’t think this would be a good thing for our neighbors in Europe either.
Our son went on a trip outside of the USA last year and needed an international phone so that he could keep in touch with us. We knew from a previous experience the international phone service offered by our cell phone company was expensive and didn’t work well. After doing some research we found one of T-Mobile’s pay as you go plans was our best option. It worked great.
Isn’t T-Mobile one of the few and largest foreign owned cell phone providers operating in the USA? They bring a different, and refreshing perspective to the market. AT&T on the other hand is big, stubborn, inflexible, …
In Canada, there were provincial telco’s that used CDMA and one independant national telco (Rogers) that used GSM. The provincial telco’s cooperated tobether to allow roaming. Additional national telco’s were created but they struggled and one (Fido) was bought by Rogers and operates as a seperate brand using GSM. The other mamor telco used the iDen technology Nextel used in the US but it was bought by Telus in Alberta which mered with BCTel to make for a bigger telco to combat Bell Canada which operated primarily in Ontario and Quebec, but I believe Bell bought the telcos in the maritimes (New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland). Telus bought a small regional telco in Quebec ad used it to expand futher in Canada while Bell built in the west and both Telus and Bell used existing agreements to use each others CDMA networks in their primary territories for coverage while building out their own towers where economically feasible.
Telus and Bell have as of a couple years ago also created a GSM network and thus offer iPhones to compete with Rogers/Fido.
There are some brands (Virgin and Solo) that are owned by Bell and a few others but in 2010, Canada got some additional telco’s but they operate in the 1700Mhz band that TMobile operates in as all the spectrum that Regular GSM and CDMA operates in has already been allocated. Wind Mobile was one of the first out of the gate to operate in multiple provinces and currently serves only in major cities (Toronto and Ottawa in Ontario, Edmonton and Calgary in Alberta and Vancouver in BC). Mobilicity is expanding to match Wind while Public Mobile seems intent on maximizing in Ontario before it expands outside that province. Shaw is the major cable operator in the west and it is planning to launch cellular service. There is a cable and media company that operates mainly in Quebec that is already offering cellular service.
Sasktel operates in Saskatchewan using CDMA but is bringing out a GSM network as is Manitoba Tel, both of these networks being independent of Bell, Telus and Rogers/Fido.
I am using Wind Mobile for the following reasons:
Rates and fees have come down considerably since we’ve gotten some competition from R/F, B & T, so supporting Wind helps.
I don’t travel a lot so being mainly in a Wind area is fine and if I do go outside of my city, Wind has roaming (at extra cost) with Rogers if needed.
I am on an unlimited usage plan with data, texting and North America long distance included.
I am using a servicable but crappy Nokia phone as it was the best of the four phones I could select from a year ago. I’ll keep using it until Apple supports 1700Mhz or I can no longer stand this phone. I have an iPod Touch for my mobile computing needs so no worries for the most part.
I can definitely see why Nokia is losing market share. This phone is okay, but the experience is very different to the iPod Touch for surfing the net and using Apps.
Hope that helps explain Canada’s cell phone system and how this might affect choice in equipment.
I used to have an AT&T CDMA phone. It worked great. No dropped calls, no issues. It didn’t work in Europe, but then again, the AT&T GSM phones really didn’t work in Europe either. Even friends who had them found they were riddled with issues.
Then my Nokia started dropping calls. I called and complained and was told my phone was old. Phones go bad I was told and I needed to upgrade. The CDMA phones were no longer available, so I would have to re-sign up with AT&T.
I talked to other friends who had the CDMA phones. They had the same issue. Suddenly phone calls would drop and AT&T told us our phones were old. Finally I got people at AT&T to admit the real issue is that AT&T was turning off the old CDMA towers. I had to switch to GSM because I had no choice. I had to pay a $35 dollar fee to switch my service from AT&T to AT&T which I still find galling. There’s a class action lawsuit against AT&T for this very reason.
If this deal goes through, every T-Mobile customer should really get used to the fact that AT&T will start to treat them like dirt. Especially if AT&T plans to switch the T-Mobile network over to 4G. I live in an area which used to have great coverage, but for one reason or another I have five cell phone towers in my area which have severely degraded service, an issue that has been going on for three years. I can’t switch to Verizon because they seem to be having the same issue now. I call and complain whenever I have the free time, but the calls take over one hour and still I have degraded service. The only solution offered is a micro cell in my house, which I have to pay the bandwidth charges, but it doesn’t help with the fact my entire neighborhood has terrible service.
I really hope this deal does not go through. I’m no fan of T-Mobile, I just hate the idea of AT&T growing larger. They can’t handle their business issues now so I cannot imagine a scenario where AT&T service for customers improves with the purchase of T-Mobile.
AT&T Wireless did not have CDMA; they used TDMA. Cingular, the joint venture between Southwestern Bell and BellSouth, introduced GSM to the U.S.
As CDMA (and TDMA) phones did not utilize SIM cards for network provisioning, the phone’s radio firmware needed to be flashed in order to support the frequencies used by the different carriers.
As LTE is the evolution of GSM (Long Term Evolution), AT&T had already announced that it would be upgrading it’s network to LTE (eventually). T-Mobile (owned by Deutsche Telecom) hadn’t specifically announced a migration to LTE. but as they were also GSM, and their parent DT ahd announced their adoption of LTE, it was natural that they would do so. Verizon Wireless (joint venture between Verizon and Vodaphone) announced they would migrate from CDMA to LTE to better support joint and worldwide customers. Sprint/Nextel was the lone holdout, initially trying to go the WiMax route with their partner Clearwire, but seeing huge time delays and cost escalations started couching their terms and hedging their bets, testing LTE, so it has been apparent they are on the verge of an announcement switching to LTE as well.
Now with the AT&T/T-Mobile merger, one wonders just what the hell they will do with the 1700Mghz AWS bands. They are useless for LTE if you want interoperability with the rest of the world, where they are using 700/800Mghz bands primarily. About the only thing they might be useful for is mobile TV, which so far hasn’t caught on. Adding T-Mo’s 1900/2100Mghz spectrum to the AT&T portfolio fills some coverage gaps. The 1700Mghz is a head-scratcher.
Well, Cringe, some ideas;
– Since a merged T&T/T-Mobile would be the *only* GSM provider in the US, the concept of locking phones to a network is moot. We should begin petitioning the FTC, FCC, and every other F*C to require this as a condition of merger. After all, there is no other network to go to, so why lock? Network locking is now pointless, and SIM locks ditto.
– If locking is moot, then we have only phone features to fear, so do we have a way to compel AT&Tmobile to not disable manufacturers’ features? Remember the RAZR, and Verizon’s disabling Bluetooth file transfers? Among other things, this meant you had to buy ringtones, even if you made your own, as there was no way to send the file to the phone. While iPhones are subject to Apple’s limitations, Android phones allow some creativity by the carrier. I fear the days of rooting my Android phone are past…
– It is inevitable that we will see price increases. Is that enough reason to petition the FTC to deny this, since the carriers are essentially claiming that the coming bandwidth crunch will lead to price increases, and this merger eases the bandwidth crunch???
Overall, this is BAU. We get taken again, and it was inevitable. Now, wilL Sprint survive alone? If they could afford to buy spectrum and increase coverage, I would have an alternative, but that isn’t going to happen.
Another great article, Cringe.
Perhaps DoJ, FCC, and FTC should require that AT&T successfully get Sprint and Verizon to join the GSM/4G networks like the rest of the world so there is still competition. As is, CDMA still requires you to go to the carrier to switch phones – so no buying your own phone and then switching them without the carrier knowing it – and GSM is the world standard. Everyone else uses SIM cards, it’s about time all carriers in the US were required to as well.
Otherwise, they should not allow this deal to go through.
You fail to take into account that India, South Korea and other places use CDMA. China PRC uses TD-CDMA.
GSM is the defacto world standard in a rehash of the BetaMax vs.VHS war. CDMA (and TDMA) was the technology of the future for PCS, which never really reached its potential outside of some early trials around Washington DC. While we here in the U.S. (and most of our brethren in Canada and Mexico and South America) pigeonholed ourselves building competing technologies and keeping consumer costs high, Europe led the way, agreeing on a single technology standard operating on a fairly standardized spectrum range and customers benefited from competition based on price, handset availability and especially choice.
15 years later, it seems we have finally seen the light.
I don’t understand why tethering, which is a device feature, is in hands of a service provider instead of the device owner. Isn’t the user paying for the data service? Shouldn’t the user be able to use that data source the way they wish as long as they are not stealing it?
This is a holdover from olden days when the carriers were trying to protect the quality of their voice networks by keeping people from saturating the network with data modem calls. The older CDMA and TDMA networks simply weren’t built for sustained use like that.
Nowadays it’s merely a revenue enhancer, a la checked bag fees by the airlines.
I favor tethering also but there will have to be caps or high fees for data when people start streeming all their TV and movies over the internet. Wireless via cell towers really is limited more than wired. For example, while you are streeming your entertainment you can drive all over the neighborhood or walk anywhere in your house, picking up the signal from the same tower. Others will have to wait until you’re done to use the same bandwidth.
It’s interesting that AT&T is getting T-Mobile for a relative bargain price; Deutsche Telecom paid $35B for VoiceStream Wireless, and bought several more little companies and spectrum for billions more over the years. However, AT&T is paying the $1000 per subscriber that is considered the norm in the industry for customer acquisition.
If they are going to be doing away with all 3G on T-Mobiles “system”, think about it. It’s b/c all current T-Mobile phones support it. Right? Of course. So where am I going with this? In a year or more then we’ll have to “buy” or be given new phones from them which will all be 4G. So, if everyone of us on the current 3G plans for T-Mobile have phones that are no longer supported, then we’ll have to upgrade to the NEW AT&T phone plans! Which means we will no longer have the option to keep our current low priced phone plans. So, it’s a slow “force” move people. Think about it!
4G has backward compatibility for 3G.
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“Apple hates jailbroken and unlocked iPhones, of course”
This is a stupid statement because it conflates two VERY DIFFERENT issues.
(a) Jailbreaking means putting various software on the phone through mechanisms not approved by Apple. For various reasons, yes, Apple does not like this.
(b) Unlocking means allowing the phone to be used on any GSM network, rather than only on ATT’s network. This is something ATT demands, not something Apple wants.
Why would Apple want it? It RUINS the iPhone experience for Americans traveling overseas. People using non-iPhones (eg Nexus-1 or Nexus-S) can swap SIMs in the country they are visiting and happily get voice (and usually data), so that they can use Maps, can have their phone’s GPS geotag their photos, can read and send email, etc etc. The non-iPhone users get to laugh at the Apple customers and tell them “shame your crappy phone can’t do anything useful here”.
So, yeah, if the FCC dismantled carrier locked phones as part of this acquisition, I can imagine Apple cheering them on, and happily submitting an amicus brief for why it thinks this is a great idea.
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From this perspective, it’s actually quite apparent why their economy has gone through 4 recessions in the last 20 years, and will continue to slide after the reconstruction blip. The aging population is the cause, not for the reason of an “aging-workforce” but “stubborn idealism” that is threatened like a guillotine on the younger workforce.
Simonly kopen…
[…]I, Cringely » Blog Archive » Will AT&T buying T-Mobile make jailbroken and unlocked iPhones finally legal? – Cringely on technology[…]…
Learn how to jailbreak your iPhone 5…
[…]I, Cringely » Blog Archive » Will AT&T buying T-Mobile make jailbroken and unlocked iPhones finally legal? – Cringely on technology[…]…
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[…]I, Cringely » Blog Archive » Will AT&T buying T-Mobile make jailbroken and unlocked iPhones finally legal? – Cringely on technology[…]…
I’ve verizon and I require a new cell phone. I really wish for to obtain an unlocked palm treo. How precisely does an unlocked telephone work and how do I add it to my existing service?
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[…]I, Cringely » Blog Archive » Will AT&T buying T-Mobile make jailbroken and unlocked iPhones finally legal? – Cringely on technology[…]…
Thanks for great info, will be refering to your blog…
[…]I, Cringely » Blog Archive » Will AT&T buying T-Mobile make jailbroken and unlocked iPhones finally legal? – Cringely on technology[…]…
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[…]I, Cringely » Blog Archive » Will AT&T buying T-Mobile make jailbroken and unlocked iPhones finally legal? – Cringely on technology[…]…
Nice review Dave. Are you going to mention my website? Many Thanks and keep up the good work.
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[…]I, Cringely » Blog Archive Will AT&T buying T-Mobile make jailbroken and unlocked iPhones finally legal? – Cringely on technology[…]…
Can someone tell me what “degraded” and “severely degraded” in cell
towers means?