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Eschatology posted:For any of you data-gluttons out there waking up in the middle of the night with soaked sheets at the prospect of someday losing your unlimited data package, there is a "save" plan available if you are upgrading or opting in to Edge which will earn you a big sexy 6GB data package for a nominal $30 a month. It is a discretionary offering, so be nice to your representative and you may be gifted. The unlimited package is $30 a month. Why would this tempt me?
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Oct 10, 2013 14:53
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If you want to use an upgrade for a new phone or fear that Verizon will someday force the remaining people off of unlimited leaving you with 2GB.
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Oct 10, 2013 14:56
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jfreder posted:I gave the code from this thread to my girlfriend who called up Verizon to get 6GB. She talked with the rep for awhile and he eventually figured out that he wasn't able to add the feature directly because her family plan already has a corporate discount applied and he wasn't able to add it without removing the discount. He told her he would put in a special request for her but said that there was little chance it would work. Two days later she got notified that she was switched to 6GB on her line while keeping the corporate discount as well. This is similar to what happened to me. The tech had to put in a request to get my 6GB. It took a week or something but it finally went through and I've still got my employee discount. Just keep pushing and they'll give it to you. I don't think there's any sort of sucking up you have to do to your local salesperson to get it as long as you had unlimited data in the first place.
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Oct 10, 2013 15:14
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benisntfunny posted:Even with the code I was told I couldn't apply with my corporate discount intact. Some corp discounts actually will let you keep unlimited, that is likely what happened to you. I bet the system didn't allow the 6GB plan because the unlimited wasn't keyed to go away. We had a system failure on one for a customer last week, and going through the proper channels to 2GB changed, they had problems as well and just gave the guy unlimited back.
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Oct 10, 2013 16:21
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jfreder posted:If you want to use an upgrade for a new phone or fear that Verizon will someday force the remaining people off of unlimited leaving you with 2GB. I did a transfer upgrade last month and got a subsidized phone while keeping the unlimited data plan. It took all of 30 minutes in the Verizon store to accomplish. It'll be 18 months to 2 years before it's time for a new phone. By then, I can't imagine that the data plan rates won't be better. They throw around double or triple data promotions like candy. Verizon doesn't have the legal basis to just throw someone off their unlimited data plan. If they did it anyway, I'd just hop on the most appealing promotion and wait for the class-action settlement.
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Oct 10, 2013 17:29
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bam thwok posted:Verizon doesn't have the legal basis to just throw someone off their unlimited data plan. Yes they do, it would just let you out of your ETF when they did.
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Oct 10, 2013 17:33
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bam thwok posted:I did a transfer upgrade last month and got a subsidized phone while keeping the unlimited data plan. It took all of 30 minutes in the Verizon store to accomplish. It'll be 18 months to 2 years before it's time for a new phone. By then, I can't imagine that the data plan rates won't be better. They throw around double or triple data promotions like candy. Verizon doesn't have the legal basis to just throw someone off their unlimited data plan. If they did it anyway, I'd just hop on the most appealing promotion and wait for the class-action settlement. Then I guess this wouldn't be tempting to you.
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Oct 10, 2013 18:02
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Mighty Horse posted:Some corp discounts actually will let you keep unlimited, that is likely what happened to you.
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Oct 10, 2013 19:16
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So can you get unlimited for cheap with the 25% discount or not?
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Oct 11, 2013 08:19
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bam thwok posted:The unlimited package is $30 a month. Why would this tempt me? Because paying $650 dollars for a phone is lovely. Especially if you fall under the 6GB threshold and are just clinging to the unlimited based on principle. The fact of the matter is that, eventually, unlimited data will go away entirely. Bandwidth is based off of infrastructure and is, therefore, not infinite. If you think that because you have unlimited now that you will have unlimited forever, this is a wholly unrealistic philosophy. If you purchase phones at full retail cost and are not under a contract, you have to realize that there are no terms for which either party (you or your carrier) are forced to comply. We can all pretend to be armchair esquires as much as we want, but the communications giants will always have superior counsel. You will not find and exploit a loophole any longer than they allow you to. Obviously, if you are burning through 20 gigs of data on a monthly basis, opting into a 6GB package doesn't make sense. However, you may also want to explore other alternatives. Wireless as a primary ISP is sub-par anyway; even if you remove cost from the equation.
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Oct 11, 2013 18:42
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Eschatology posted:Because paying $650 dollars for a phone is lovely. Especially if you fall under the 6GB threshold and are just clinging to the unlimited based on principle. I've held onto unlimited through 3-4 phone upgrades, all subsidized. I don't ever intend to pay $650 for a phone, and that would be a red line for keeping unlimited. At that point I'd just start buying phones used a year off their release or so. I don't think I've ever used quite that much data, but I've hit over 4 GB with not extraordinary usage before. I'd be very likely to go over 6 GB on a share plan, though. quote:The fact of the matter is that, eventually, unlimited data will go away entirely. Bandwidth is based off of infrastructure and is, therefore, not infinite. If you think that because you have unlimited now that you will have unlimited forever, this is a wholly unrealistic philosophy. If you purchase phones at full retail cost and are not under a contract, you have to realize that there are no terms for which either party (you or your carrier) are forced to comply. We can all pretend to be armchair esquires as much as we want, but the communications giants will always have superior counsel. You will not find and exploit a loophole any longer than they allow you to. It's not a forgone conclusion that unlimited is going away. Market pressures, tech breakthroughs, whatever, evolve pretty rapidly. Other carriers have bet on unlimited, and it's not just wishful thinking to suspect that Verizon may have a plan bring it back in some form, and thus would have no interest now in sideswiping a chunk of users who would probably jump to the new version of the plan. Also, have some stones in yourself as a consumer. If they pull the rug out, you can get a lot done with an irate phone call to customer service or two.
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Oct 11, 2013 19:12
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Eschatology posted:
The perception that you have to use your phone as your primary ISP in order to use a ton of data needs to go away. I've really done nothing other than listen to music for my 20 minute commute (so 40 min a day) and I've burned through 1.6gb of data in little over half my billing cycle. That's not abuse of my unlimited, that's not trying to stick it to Verizon, that's me simply using my smartphone in a nearly minimal capacity. As more and more people start using their phones beyond facebook updates (and iTunes radio is a good way for that to start happening), people are going to find that 2gb is way too restrictive and the alternatives are too expensive. And, once again, caps do nothing to curb congestion. Stop perpetuating that myth. It's a bit criminal that Verizon will give people 6 months free Google All Access when selling them a new Droid Mini/Ultra/MAXX with a measly 2gb data plan. If a person listens for more than a hour a day off wifi, they are going to blow through their cap like nothing.
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Oct 11, 2013 19:21
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bull3964 posted:
Caps might not, but I bet overage fees do. Get hit with a few $20+ overages and I bet your average user will be more mindful of their consumption and be on the look out for free WiFi more often.
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Oct 11, 2013 19:37
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Lowen SoDium posted:...be on the look out for free WiFi more often. With as widespread as free/minimal hassle wifi is becoming anymore aside from people using their phones as a primary means of internet service I can't imagine actually needing unlimited. I have an unlimited data plan on my phone (I work for a major silicon valley tech company, apparently if you're part of a large enough account Verizon still offers unlimited) and looking at my usage for the current billing cycle (28th of last month - 27th of this month) I've used about 450 MB of mobile data (includes tethering it to my wife's tablet whenever we're out), while my wifi usage in the same period is over 1.5 GB.
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Oct 11, 2013 19:47
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Geoj posted:With as widespread as free/minimal hassle wifi is becoming anymore aside from people using their phones as a primary means of internet service I can't imagine actually needing unlimited. I have an unlimited data plan on my phone (I work for a major silicon valley tech company, apparently if you're part of a large enough account Verizon still offers unlimited) and looking at my usage for the current billing cycle (28th of last month - 27th of this month) I've used about 450 MB of mobile data (includes tethering it to my wife's tablet whenever we're out), while my wifi usage in the same period is over 1.5 GB. Okay Bill Gates but we don't all use the phones the same. As people mentioned there are very real examples of steaming just music in a car and blowing away data caps.
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Oct 11, 2013 20:13
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Geoj posted:With as widespread as free/minimal hassle wifi is becoming anymore aside from people using their phones as a primary means of internet service I can't imagine actually needing unlimited. You can go ahead and trust random corporation with both a) Setting up a wifi access point securely. b) Not collecting "statistics" on what you access. I know I'm sure as hell not going to use an unsecured WAP that may or may not have isolation turned on with my device that basically has my whole life flowing through it. I know I already make that compromise with google and Verizon, but I would rather some random script kiddie not have the opportunity to scrape information off my device because they have no idea how to secure things properly. Edit: And it looks like the cycle of competition and capitalism is "working" again. http://www.androidcentral.com/att-kicks-traditional-data-plans-curb-it-s-mobile-share-or-nothing Verizon went ahead and killed traditional plans a few months ago and now AT&T is joining the party. I love that they recognize that people are using voice less and less, so they'll just force everyone to pay for unlimited. "In 95 percent of the new customer scenarios, Mobile Share offers the same or better price with additional value." Later adding "those remaining 5% can suck it and suck it hard." At least AT&T has a prepaid option that's worth a drat. bull3964 fucked around with this message at 20:29 on Oct 11, 2013 |
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Oct 11, 2013 20:21
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benisntfunny posted:Okay Bill Gates but we don't all use the phones the same. As people mentioned there are very real examples of steaming just music in a car and blowing away data caps. Its too bad smartphones don't have built-in and expandable storage to the tune of several gigabytes. Or are you one of these people who must have 24/7 access to your entire 4+ TB music collection? bull3964 posted:I know I'm sure as hell not going to use an unsecured WAP that may or may not have isolation turned on with my device that basically has my whole life flowing through it. If you have that much sensitive information on your phone you probably shouldn't be leaving the house with it in the first place. What happens if you drop it/leave it somewhere (or someone picks it out of your pocket)? e: Let me guess, you're so  that you also run 100% of your internet traffic at home through a VPN/TOR server and have eschewed having your own wifi network because there could be a NSA van parked down the street sniffing your packets?VVV Geoj fucked around with this message at 20:44 on Oct 11, 2013 |
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Oct 11, 2013 20:29
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Geoj posted:If you have that much sensitive information on your phone you probably shouldn't be leaving the house with it in the first place. What happens if you drop it/leave it somewhere (or someone picks it out of your pocket)? It takes just one app transmitting a password in the clear to cause a major problem with account hijacking. Do YOU know if every app you are using is using https for everything? The difference between that and me losing my phone is I actually know when the latter happens and can take appropriate steps. However, if some script kiddie managed to gain access to, say, my Evernote account by sniffing credentials passed in the clear or managing to highjack a cookie on an unsecured API call, I may not know for months if ever. Public wifi is always a last resort if the data connection is too bad. Otherwise, I'm on mobile data. I would actually love to see Google add a VPN service that would allow you to establish a secure tunnel out of untrusted local networks to enhance security or some OS level option to disable non-https connections when on open wifi networks. Geoj posted:Its too bad smartphones don't have built-in and expandable storage to the tune of several gigabytes. Or are you one of these people who must have 24/7 access to your entire 4+ TB music collection? That's a false argument. I would simply like to be able to use services as they are presented to me. No more, no less. If that happens to be listening to a radio station on All Access so I can expose myself to new music while on my commute, then I should be able to do so. Verizon made a $2.25 billion profit last quarter. No one, I mean no one, should be arguing at this point that the prices they have set for their services are dictated by anything other than the shareholders rather than the free market. There is zero market pressure at this point because we essentially have a duopoly with a sort of weird reverse Bertrand model going on. Each firm makes a move to gently caress the customer and the other follows suit in a month or two. bull3964 fucked around with this message at 20:48 on Oct 11, 2013 |
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Oct 11, 2013 20:38
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Plus with device locks and device manager remote wipe device theft isn't a such a security issue as it is a financial issue.
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Oct 11, 2013 20:42
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bull3964 posted:Verizon made a $2.25 billion profit last quarter. No one, I mean no one, should be arguing at this point that the prices they have set for their services are dictated by anything other than the shareholders rather than the free market. There is zero market pressure at this point because we essentially have a duopoly with a sort of weird reverse Bertrand model going on. Each firm makes a move to gently caress the customer and the other follows suit in a month or two. The point I was making is that there are ways around data caps. As someone who 1) has an unlimited plan that's unlikely to go away as long as I keep my current job and 2) doesn't pay my bill regardless of what data plan I'm on I'm probably the last person who who should be worrying about data caps, yet with a very minimal amount of effort I've managed to put 75% of my data usage through wifi. Which is obviously shilling for profit motives that benefit shareholders, etc. etc. If you think the government/"script kiddies" are all out to steal everything off of your phone and monitor your web activity every time you leave your farady cage lined apartment/home I don't really have an answer.
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Oct 11, 2013 21:04
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Geoj posted:The point I was making is that there are ways around data caps. As someone who 1) has an unlimited plan that's unlikely to go away as long as I keep my current job and 2) doesn't pay my bill regardless of what data plan I'm on I'm probably the last person who who should be worrying about data caps, yet with a very minimal amount of effort I've managed to put 75% of my data usage through wifi. Which is obviously shilling for profit motives that benefit shareholders, etc. etc. Yeah, in fact you DO sound like a corporate shill letting us know how beneficial our data caps are and blahblah gently caress you.
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Oct 11, 2013 21:12
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iostream.h posted:Yeah, in fact you DO sound like a corporate shill letting us know how beneficial our data caps are Can you show me where I said that data caps are beneficial? I observed that I don't think unlimited plans are necessary, and there are ways to sidestep data caps. That doesn't mean "I think service providers should charge draconian fees for tiny data plans."
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Oct 11, 2013 21:22
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Geoj posted:Can you show me where I said that data caps are beneficial? I observed that I don't think unlimited plans are necessary, and there are ways to sidestep data caps. That doesn't mean "I think service providers should charge draconian fees for tiny data plans." Still waiting for that Wifi signal to reach my car on my hour commute each way to work. Pls help. Seems like you have the answer for me.
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Oct 11, 2013 21:47
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Geoj posted:
I'm not sure I have much to say to you if this is your attitude on this. This isn't tinfoil conspiracy level poo poo. This is the way theft is done now instead of pick-pocketing. These threats can and mostly likely will eventually exist everywhere that they can be exploited. I just prefer not to play Russian roulette when I'm paying a company an exorbitant amount of money every month to provide that access securely. MOST of the major breeches in private data that have happened in the last 5 years are due to someone exploiting the physical infrastructure to skim data. Just this past month a group of people were caught plugging in keyloggers on computers in Nordstroms to skim credit cards. You can buy tiny appliances now that look like nothing more than an air freshener who's sole purpose is to skim data off wireless networks. Something like that could be plugged in under a table at Starbucks and not be noticed for months while sending everything it finds to a remote source. This is the state of information security in 2013. I may be able to connect to 1,000 wifi access points and not run into anything like that, but it only takes once to make life difficult. In an ideal world, all communication on your phone would take place over SSL and it wouldn't matter, but app makers and service providers haven't earned that trust yet.
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Oct 11, 2013 21:53
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Geoj posted:Its too bad smartphones don't have built-in and expandable storage to the tune of several gigabytes. Or are you one of these people who must have 24/7 access to your entire 4+ TB music collection? I have a capricious desire to listen to all sorts of music without micromanaging what's on my device. I pay a monthly fee for a popular streaming music service specifically for that purpose. It's also why I bought a phone without an SD card, since I wanted a cloud-based entertainment device and not an ipod with a wireless signal.
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Oct 11, 2013 22:03
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So what's your answer? Should Verizon just offer flat-rate unlimited for everyone without any kind of caps? Sprint tried that; it didn't work out so well. I had a data plan with them until this past February and it was absolute poo poo. Oh but I'm sure it'll be different with Verizon - the evil corporation that paid out dividends to its shareholders unlike literally every other public-traded company in the world  I think a more balanced approach would be bringing the bottom data tier up to 4/6 GB (while maintaining the current price.) Just because Verizon is profitable doesn't mean their network has unlimited bandwidth. I'd much rather have a reasonable data cap and usable mobile data service than unlimited that takes 20-30 seconds to respond to a request. Geoj fucked around with this message at 23:19 on Oct 11, 2013 |
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Oct 11, 2013 22:20
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Geoj posted:So what's your answer? Should Verizon just offer flat-rate unlimited for everyone without any kind of caps? Sprint tried that; it didn’t work out so well. Oh but I'm sure it'll be different with Verizon, the evil corporation that paid out dividends to its shareholders unlike literally every other public-traded company in the world. Sprint's financial woes don't have anything to do with offering unlimited data. Sprint has always had lovely backhaul that couldn't handle ANY sort of data demands beyond 2005 era blackberries. It needed a massive infrastructure refresh and in places where that has happened, things are going amazingly well. Honestly, around Pittsburgh, Sprint LTE is easily the equal of Verizon in speed most places. The coverage isn't as extensive yet, but it's improving. Once again, repeat after me, caps do absolutely NOTHING for both spectrum congestion nor backhaul congestion. It's not a solution for anything other than making more money. If they want to provide a good experience to everyone, they would be looking to traffic shape congested nodes, not saying "it's a free for all until you run out your cap!" You asked "what's [my] answer." To you, I ask "what's the problem?" The move to tiered data wasn't any attempt to forestall network collapse nor is Verizon lacking in funds to upgrade networks where necessary. I don't give a poo poo if Verizon is paying out dividends every quarter. The economy does not exist for the sole purpose of lining stockholders pockets. I cannot tell you what Verizon "should" be getting for profits right now, all I can say is that the proper market forces are not in place. Ever since smartphones took off, Verizon and AT&T have been taking turns introducing more restrictions and price increases on customers which are then, in turn, adopted by the other company in short order. This is not the way the free market should be working. They are not competing with each other for customers, they are silently colluding with each other, each taking turns for another wave of price gouging since they know their customers will have no where else to turn. LTE is 300% more spectrally efficient than EVDO. Transit costs are dropping by over 50% year over year. If they want to manage traffic issues, then they should traffic shape on congested nodes. Once your data hits the backhaul, we're essentially talking pennies per GB so it's not like people using a ton of data are costing tens of dollars a month more than lite users.
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Oct 11, 2013 23:28
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bull3964 posted:Sprint's financial woes don't have anything to do with offering unlimited data And what I'm getting at is I don't think Verizon would upgrade networks where necessary, or increase tower density as demand rose. Kind of like what Sprint did about ten years ago. I'm having a hard time understanding this hypothetical "if only they would do across-the-board unlimited at a flat rate, then everything would be perfect" when you were just complaining about what a terrible company they are for issuing a dividend while maintaining data caps. Which is it?
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Oct 12, 2013 01:13
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In not sure why you are creating this false dichotomy. When I said I didn't give a poo poo about dividends, I quite mean that. It's Verizon's purpose to make as much money for shareholders as possible. They can be as high or as low as the market dictates. But that only works if you have a functioning competitive market to keep them in check, which we don't have at all. Not in the slightest. Verizon would "upgrade their networks as demand increased" because they would be forced to to do so to remain competitive. That's the way a competitive market works. If they had to raise prices to do so, then they would, but again, that would be constrained within the restrictions of what the market would bare. Stop fixating on flat rate unlimited and just realize that Verizon (and ATT) are not delivering their services at prices we would have if they actually competed. I actually prefer per MB pricing. Give me per MB pricing based off of 4gb for $30 and I would jump on it. But it's apparently OK to charge us overages if the cap is exceeded but not refund money if you don't hit your cap. Every input into the technology behind mobile networks is dropping in cost like crazy yet prices keep going up. As a new smartphone customer in 2008, minimum buy in was about $69.98/month before taxes and fees. Today it's $80 minimum and that only gets you a paltry 500mb in mobile data. There is something incredibly wrong about that. bull3964 fucked around with this message at 02:09 on Oct 12, 2013 |
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Oct 12, 2013 01:39
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So that EDGE thing, the 6GB for $30, is that only for existing users or can I get that as a new user? Because data plans on verizon are expensive mannnnn.
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Oct 12, 2013 03:29
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GreenBuckanneer posted:So that EDGE thing, the 6GB for $30, is that only for existing users or can I get that as a new user? Only if you were an existing user that just upgraded to a tiered plan and lost unlimited AFAIK.
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Oct 12, 2013 04:00
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Well that's lame. I might be able to go up to 2gb but anything past that is way too expensive, and I burn through 2gb under normal usage if I'm not careful.
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Oct 12, 2013 06:56
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bull3964 posted:
bull3964 posted:Verizon would "upgrade their networks as demand increased" because they would be forced to to do so to remain competitive. That's the way a competitive market works. If they had to raise prices to do so, then they would, but again, that would be constrained within the restrictions of what the market would bare. LTE maybe 3 times more spectrally efficient than EVDO, but that doesn't change 2 facts: Data usage is going up Spectrum is limited You keep saying that carrier can just afford to upgrade their network, but there is only so much you can do about radio congestion. You can put up more towers, but that doesn't help if your users are too densely populated and you have already deployed your available spectrum. T-Mobile already does data throttling once you reach your limit, rather than charge you more. But really, I think I would rather pay an overage and still get usable service instead of being choked down to 2.5G speeds. I know throttling is not the same as traffic shaping, but the short of the long is that if I am paying for a high speed wireless service, I expect it to be a high speed wireless service. I don't even want it to be slower because too many people are standing too close to me or because I downloaded too many large files. I often need this connection for my job, so it is important to me. You might be right that traffic shaping congested nodes is a good way to handle it, but it's not a long term solution. Data usage will continue to rise. If users don't have an incentive to curb their usage, congestion will become unmanageable. Sprint is still a great example of this. Many markets they have deployed LTE in only get speeds similar to EVDO. I have seen it in New York and Atlanta and in even large airport I have passed through. It is why I left Sprint to come to VZW, even though it is a lot more expensive and not Unlimited. I agree that data plans are expensive. Probably more expensive than they should be. I wish that the telecoms were still required to reinvest X% of their profits in to their own infrastructure like their were before deregulation.
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Oct 12, 2013 16:35
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Yeah, I've been to sporting events where data was so chocked that I couldn't get through an iMessage, never mind trying to anything that sends more than a few bytes. This was with a strong data connection on LTE. Granted, that is an exceptional case, but I can see it being an issue in any large city.
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Oct 12, 2013 17:03
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Lowen SoDium posted:
People can only get so densely populated in an area and there ARE ways to deal with it. All the carriers are deploying smaller and smaller sites. Verizon is going to do that specifically with the AWS spectrum they have. http://www.extremetech.com/electronics/156545-verizon-wireless-strategy-for-aws-spectrum-small-cells In areas like NYC, you could eventually have a building with half a dozen of those smaller cell sites in them or a larger one every block, providing access to a much smaller area. The carriers also have mobile cell sites that they can roll into sporting events to handle the excess capacity now. Spectrum is limited, but careful deployment of site density and tuning of their range means we aren't in danger of running up against a hard capacity limit any time soon. Or rather, there is a hard capacity limit in the amount of data a slice of spectrum can carry, but we can keep progressively shrinking the sites and making more of them to handle it for now. Lowen SoDium posted:
Again, this is largely a backhaul problem and not a spectrum congestion problem. You are still operating under the misconception that caps make any meaningful impact on congestion. If everyone on a node is under their cap, has a sufficiently large enough cap, or simply doesn't care about overages, then performance is going to suffer if the site is not sized properly. Do you really think someone waiting at the airport is going to go 'I'm not going to stream this movie right now because I might go over my cap in 28 days' rather than just say 'gently caress it, I'll deal with the overage charge if it comes later because I'm on vacation and I want to watch this movie while I wait for my flight.' Caps are also terrible because there's no weighting in relation to how congested a node may be. You could have one guy that's using 1.99GB every month in the center of Manhattan while another guy who usually only uses 1.5gb a month in rural Wisconsin who just happens to hit 3.5gb one month because he was traveling. Who used more data over the course of a year and who ended up paying more? Who did more "harm" to Verizon's network? bull3964 fucked around with this message at 17:18 on Oct 12, 2013 |
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Oct 12, 2013 17:11
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bull3964 posted:People can only get so densely populated in an area and there ARE ways to deal with it. All the carriers are deploying smaller and smaller sites. bull3964 posted:Again, this is largely a backhaul problem and not a spectrum congestion problem. bull3964 posted:You are still operating under the misconception that caps make any meaningful impact on congestion. If everyone on a node is under their cap, has a sufficiently large enough cap, or simply doesn't care about overages, then performance is going to suffer if the site is not sized properly. Do you really think someone waiting at the airport is going to go 'I'm not going to stream this movie right now because I might go over my cap in 28 days' rather than just say 'gently caress it, I'll deal with the overage charge if it comes later because I'm on vacation and I want to watch this movie while I wait for my flight.' Caps = Lower Data Usage I understand that lower data usage is not the same thing as fixing congestion, but you can not argue that they are not related. And yes, I do really think that someone sitting in an airport might thing twice about streaming a movie if there is a chance they might go over their monthly cap and have to pay extra. They might actually plan a head a little and download the movie on to their device before they leave their house, or they might use the airport WiFi rather than just stream off of LTE. I know this is true because I do it all the time. I load up my phone or tablet with movies In the end, it doesn't matter. All signs point to unlimited going away on Verizon. And I don't expect it to come back until there is another significant advancement in wireless technology or possible after they retire their CDMA network and repurpose that spectrum for LTE.
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Oct 12, 2013 18:28
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Every time Verizon threatens my unlimited data plans, I don't think about ways to cut back on my data usage. My data usage isn't even that high. All I think about is how the phones get faster and the amount you can do with them gets smaller. All I think about is how I pay a premium for a premium service, but it looks like that premium service is falling more and more in line with the non-premium services that you can get for a fraction of the cost. I've been a Verizon customer for a long time, but I think the games they're playing will burn them badly in the long run. Use that 2 billion in profit to improve infrastructure, that's what I pay you so loving much for. If Verizon can't do that, then gently caress Verizon. I live in a city, anyone can offer similar coverage.
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Oct 12, 2013 18:48
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Lowen SoDium posted:How small do you expect them to make their cell sites? As small as they need to be to provide adequate service levels? Verizon currently has 700mhz, they'll soon be deploying smaller sites with AWS spectrum. In under 10 years, they'll have 850mhz spectrum and 1900mhz PCS spectrum to agument even that after they sunset CDMA. They have plenty of spectrum to work with right now and many strategies to manage congestion. quote:I would really like to see some proof to back this up. I know that the new Network Vision upgraded sites are supposed to have Gig backhauls, but several I have been on are still very slow. I don't know how anyone other than Sprint can prove or disprove this. Just because they have gig backhauls to the tower doesn't mean the network backing them is up to snuff though. Look, it doesn't take information from a Sprint engineer to extrapolate this. Sprint is using the same LTE tech as verizon. However, they have just over half the subscriber base. Even fewer of those have LTE phones compared to Verizon since Sprint started offering LTE devices almost a year and a half later than Verizon. On top of ALL that, Sprint uses 1900mhz for their LTE frequency which means the sites have lesser range than Verizon's 700mhz sites, leading to less density per site. So, a sprint user would have to be using over double, probably almost triple, the amount of data an average Verizon customer in order to just match average tower load. It's not unlimited users killing Sprints network. It's years of questionable financial decisions and infrastructure neglect paying their toll right now. quote:I get what you are saying. Caps are not fair. I do agree that having a data cap isn't going to fix the example of the Manhattan vs Wisconsin directly. But by making customers pay attention to how they use their data and monitor their overall consumption which does indirectly help that example. Joe user in Manhattan is less likely to use data all the time, and so would the other users in his same area. Actually, you can easily argue that caps are not really affecting data usage on a whole since Verizon tells us that over 95% of users never use more than 2gb. Yet, price for a 2gb smarpthone plan for a new customer jumped $30 a month with the compulsory share everything plans. There's just no easy way to ensure that the distribution of people who are currently concerned about their cap are even enough among congested sites to make any sort of statistical difference. If you general argument is that people just need to start using less mobile data on a whole, well that's just something we're going to disagree on as a fundamental basis. Telecoms are already costing the economy billions a year in lost revenue due to our shoddy broadband network. Mobile is key piece to fix that gap, but it's never going to happen priced in the stratosphere. quote:And yes, I do really think that someone sitting in an airport might thing twice about streaming a movie if there is a chance they might go over their monthly cap and have to pay extra. They might actually plan a head a little and download the movie on to their device before they leave their house, or they might use the airport WiFi rather than just stream off of LTE. I know this is true because I do it all the time. I load up my phone or tablet with movies There aren't many legal/easy sources of movies you can use offline. Google Play allows it and Vudu allows it. However, Hulu+ and Netflix both do not have an offline option. Of the services that do allow you to cache movies for offline use, even fewer will allow the use of an SD card as the storage. There haven't been any significant jumps in local storage over the past few years, if anything we are moving in the opposite direction. quote:In the end, it doesn't matter. All signs point to unlimited going away on Verizon. And I don't expect it to come back until there is another significant advancement in wireless technology or possible after they retire their CDMA network and repurpose that spectrum for LTE. No, it won't come back until Verizon actually has some competition in the wireless space. Once Verizon's churn rates start going up, they will start reacting REAL fast. You expect to pay a premium for premium service, but everyone else is getting better by the day while Verizon is actually getting WORSE by the day (I used to be able to pull down 45mbps at my house over LTE and now I'm lucky to get 20Mbps.) Same thing is happening on the broadband side of things. This silly slap fight that Verizon and Netflix are having (and I'm not choosing sides, they are both partially in the wrong) has caused my 35/35 home connection to be nearly worthless to me during peak hours. I have loving fiber coming into my basement yet sometimes I'm only getting a 280p stream from netflix and youtube videos will buffer for hours without ever playing. Hulu+ streams sometime refuse to start. The irony of this is many times I can jump on my phone, turn off wifi, and stream the same content just fine in HD from LTE. I agree with litany of gulps, capabilities of devices are going up yet we can use them for less and less every day (while getting to pay more for the privilege.)
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Oct 12, 2013 20:34
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Lowen SoDium posted:But really, I think I would rather pay an overage and still get usable service instead of being choked down to 2.5G speeds. I would rather be throttled than "refused" access. I don't really care about the speed so much as long as it's fast enough to stream audio.
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Oct 13, 2013 01:59
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Hell, even getting throttled to 3G speeds would work - it would only really punish people who do heavy downloading all month long without really effecting your average user. I'm sure the "BUT HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO STREAM MY 920 KBPS FLAC MUSIC COLLECTION DURING MY 6 HOUR ONE WAY DAILY COMMUTE/KEEP MY  GOING?" crowd will say this too would be unacceptable though.
Geoj fucked around with this message at 03:15 on Oct 13, 2013 |
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Oct 13, 2013 03:07
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