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Nope, two separate metrics. 289,000 phone subscribers 255,000 tablet subscribers So, they lost over half a million subs.
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Apr 20, 2017 16:39
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| # ¿ May 11, 2024 22:00 |
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Not to be down on your job or anything, but the days of the carrier store are numbered. We are finally getting to the point where wireless is commodity. Unlimited plans are killing all but the lowest of plan tiers. Subsidized contracts have gone away. Excellent low cost unlocked all carrier phones are becoming more and more common so fewer people have to buy phones on payment plans. Both Apple and Samsung offer cross carrier compatible unbranded and unlocked flagships. It's only a matter of time before both of them make the decision that they don't need to chase shelf space on a carrier store and it's only so long before carriers stop kicking back advertising funds to these manufacturers. Best Buy and even the manufacturer will pick up the slack in financing these flagships and the carriers will quietly exit the hardware business. When you no longer have to provide support for complicated plans and people buy their phone at the Apple Store, Best Buy, or Amazon on whatever schedule they choose, the stores are suddenly a very expensive operation with little return on investment.
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Apr 21, 2017 05:07
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There are payment plan options outside of carrier. For example, the iPhone upgrade program is one monthly cost to ensure you always have the latest phone. For under $70 /month, someone could easily always have the latest iPhone and a few gig of prepaid data and not ever set foot into a carrier store. Prepaid already accounts for around 1/3rd of wireless users anyways, those people aren't going on carrier payment plans. Yes, a lot of people are on them now, but it's only a matter of time before the hardware manufactures really start pushing plans like the iPhone upgrade program to keep customers locked into their brand. Honestly, if Google offered a similar program for their Pixels I would probably jump on it. I would come out slightly less ahead than selling the old phone off every year after buying a new one, but it's less of a pain. bull3964 fucked around with this message at 05:52 on Apr 21, 2017 |
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Apr 21, 2017 05:49
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Yeah, they offer a normal payment plan. I'd like to have an option like the Apple program though which would allow for an upgrade after a year and include some form of hardware accident protection.
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Apr 21, 2017 06:15
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Well, my wireless at home is already double my FiOS's 75mbps speeds. I'm sure it's wouldn't be if everyone was using it instead of home internet connection which is where 5g would come in, but it's plenty fast enough now. 5g is going to be an interesting thing to see carriers sell. It's important from a technical prospective, but there aren't really any major end user benefits when you're just looking at data connectivity for smart phones. At this point, I would never pay any sort of premium or give up unlimited to go to 5g, there's nothing to gain on my end.
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Apr 21, 2017 13:43
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I would expect more pushes to unlimited as time goes on. It simplifies everything from the billing side.
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Apr 26, 2017 04:19
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Oh, hey, noticed my bill for this month was $5 more. Check, and my $5 auto-pay discount was removed. Get on chat and find out that credit card auto-pay isn't eligible for discount, only debit or checking. No where on the auto-pay page is this mentioned. There was no prompts when I switched to the new unlimited plan that this was the case. Yes, it's buried in the fine print off the agreement, but it still seems pretty shady regardless. This is entirely academic since my company reimburses me for my full bill, but it still really rubs me the wrong way. I think this is the final push I need to go on a little carrier tourism. Been a VZW customer for the past 15 years, but I'm really done with their bullshit. It's not like anything special is keeping me here, I can always port back and get the same plan if I don't like the alternatives. The joys of having a completely carrier free phone.
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May 31, 2017 15:47
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The margin for being cost competitive on these plans is razor thin and losing $5 discount due to my payment method is nearly a 6% price increase. Sorry Verizon, no one gets my checking account details for auto-pay, especially not a portal that has been hacked in the past and can easily order thousands of dollars in merchandise.
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May 31, 2017 23:16
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I went over 22gb for several days and there was zero changes in speed.
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Jun 9, 2017 22:35
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Honestly, even 50mbps on Verizon is pretty terrible. I easily get over 3x that.
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Jun 10, 2017 00:54
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Well, all relative. I regularly get 147-170 mbps around southwest PA.
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Jun 10, 2017 01:28
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Looks like Verizon launched an LTE only dumb phone today. The end is nigh for CDMA.
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Jun 16, 2017 03:59
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Just pop it in. Works right away.
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Aug 8, 2017 02:48
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The $75 plan's tethering is limited to 600kbps, always. Why loving bother? This has got to be one of Verizon's most anti-customer moves ever and I'm half tempted to switch carriers out or principal even though I can (mostly) keep what I have now. bull3964 fucked around with this message at 15:22 on Aug 22, 2017 |
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Aug 22, 2017 13:40
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Yeah, I flat out ignore the rewards program and you would never get me subscribing to it.
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Aug 22, 2017 15:21
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16 year Verizon customer here and I dropped them on my way home from work and went T-Mobile with the One+ plan. It wasn't about money (I get 100% reimbursed by work), it wasn't really even about the video streaming since I don't do it too often. It was about finally being fed up. The bald face anti-consumer slap in the face that I'm just so completely tired of. It's all the lesser of the evils, but time and time again Verizon has proved themselves that they aren't even interested in what perception they put out. This was just a final straw moment. I have an unlocked Pixel that I own outright. Verizon has given me no reason at all to stay loyal. Time to play carrier tourist. One thing is for sure, Verizon postpaid is as the very very very bottom of the list now. So far so good with the switch. I was in and out of the store with functioning service on my number in 15 minutes
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Aug 23, 2017 01:18
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Even Qualcomm was throwing shade at Verizon today. https://twitter.com/sherifhanna/status/899998155135107073 Likely because you don't need a fancy SD960 with a gigabit LTE connection when you're limited to 720p video.
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Aug 23, 2017 03:57
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I don't really have an issue with auto-pay, but I don't like being forced to use a checking account to get the discount.
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Aug 23, 2017 04:37
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Verizon needs to ditch pretty much every account system they have as I think that's a huge contributor to what makes store wait times so bad. Swapping to T-Mobile tonight was... refreshing? There were only two people working in the store and when I got there both were occupied with customers. Still, I was in and out in under 15 minutes and everything was setup, even autopay. It was just drat simple. "I want to get the One+ plan with my current number." Handed over account number, pin, credit card, and ID. Signed a few things, entered my SSN, swapped SIM, done. I've spent more time doing an in-store pickup of an accessory at a Verizon store. I don't even mean wait times, I mean actually engaged with someone across the counter.
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Aug 23, 2017 06:06
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Endless Mike posted:Verizon just emailed me to let me know I'm upgraded to Beyond Unlimited for free. Yeah, that's essentially what was happening. You keep the same price, get the extra 5 gb of tethering data, 'gain' the video bandwidth throttling. Everyone 'gains' the video throttling. From the oldest of unlimited plans to the newest of new.
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Aug 23, 2017 20:36
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Oh man, I just got the "upgrade" email from VZW even though my number is ported, such bullshit they don't even mention the throttling in small print. Half of it is crowing about their privacy invasion scheme masquerading as an incentive program. quote:
Emphasis mine. You say this literally the same day you tell everyone 720p is good enough, nearly word for word.
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Aug 23, 2017 22:44
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AdmiralViscen posted:Wait are they proactively changing people to the new plans without consent? That would be unprecedented if so Yes, they are. In reality, they are throttling video on all plans, even legacy unlimited, so it basically boils down to a name change.
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Aug 24, 2017 00:02
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T-Mobile's account site is throwing random high traffic errors tonight. I think Verizon dun hosed up big time.
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Aug 24, 2017 04:35
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DangerZoneDelux posted:Lol no one cares man. Seriously. I don't think I ever notice that the quality of my streaming video unless it doesn't work I think that yes, people actually do care. This has been getting massive amounts of negative press and I'm seeing people mention it that have literally never mentioned anything technical before. Next quarter's subscriber numbers are going to be really interesting.
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Aug 24, 2017 05:06
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Endless Mike posted:*Doesn't like video throttling* I think you completely missed the point. Back in Feb, if Verizon would have said "We're bringing back unlimited but video is throttled to 720p" most people would have grumbled, but it wouldn't have been a huge blowup. Instead, Verizon marketed on the fact that their plans were simple and there were no restrictions on use beyond de-prioritization above 22gb and reaped pretty good subscriber growth because of it. Most of those subscribers likely went on a device payment plan. Then, with 24 hours notice, they change the terms of service to something more restrictive. It's bait and switch. They pulled in a bunch of subs, got them hooked on payment plans, and then yanked the rug out from under them. It's blatantly scummy behavior even for Verizon. Besides ALL of that, I have not seen any numbers to support that "HD Video" as you can get on T-Mobile and ATT is throttled. Even if it is though, they didn't promise that it wasn't touched at all and then turn around 5 minutes later and say "just kidding."
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Aug 24, 2017 14:58
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Three-Phase posted:I don't think I am even getting 720. I have an iPhone and the YouTube video is so blocky it looks like it's now 480 or less! The issue is in the implemention. They are imposing a hard throughput cap on video streams no matter the source so the source is going to react as if you have a lovely connection. Since it doesn't appear to be intelligent in any way and align that cap with what a source delivers, I can only imagine there are knock on effects. Framerate can have an effect too. 60fps can requires a higher bandwidth connection than 24/25/30. Different sources have different encodes. You might need a minimum of 2.5mbps for 720p YouTube, Netflix may only need 2.2. Bitrate and resolutions can overlap too in transition areas. High bitrate 480p can look better than low bitrate 720p due to atifacts. Same with the transition boundry between 1080p and 720p. The only real metric we know is that tethering video streams are limited to 10mbps which should be enough for most services. Most. Vudu HDX 1080p streams are between 9.5 and 20 Mbps. So, 10mbps is going to be riding that boundry. It will pop up to HDX quality on low bitrate scenes and then have to transition down to HD for high bitrate streams. I don't even think Vudu has 720p encodes so the bandwidth limitation on mobile might force you to the 480p stream regardless of the tier you are on. We don't know what bitrate Verizon is capping mobile at. All that can be hoped for is that they chose wisely, but it may screw things up quite a bit depending on source. 720p is an odd choice though. That tells me they are likely throttling video to about 2.5 or 3mbps on mobile. No content provider is targeting HD to customers with that sort of bandwidth, it just doesn't make sense to. bull3964 fucked around with this message at 19:19 on Aug 24, 2017 |
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Aug 24, 2017 19:14
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I've heard of people having success using it on other carriers without much screwing around.
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Sep 14, 2017 17:49
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I don't know what Verizon's obsession is with spamming out new SIMs with every device and going through an activation process. If your old SIM fits your new phone, just pop out the shipped SIM prior to turning the phone on for the first time and put your current SIM in. There doesn't need to be an activation process.
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Sep 22, 2017 18:22
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I don't want to come off as an evangelist and I don't want to step on toes of people that depend on Verizon for a paycheck, but I have to say I've been beyond satisfied switching to T-Mobile (which means Fi would be fine.) I was worried about coverage as well since t-mobile traditionally didn't have great coverage in Western PA. Turns out though, the ads are true and it's leaps and bounds better than it was just 2 years ago. I've actually only run across places where I have better coverage than before rather than the reverse. My average speeds have been a bit lower (in the 60ish Mbps range rather than over 100) but it sounds like that had gone to poo poo for a lot of people recently so who knows if I still would have been getting that.
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Oct 10, 2017 21:01
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| # ¿ May 11, 2024 22:00 |
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The video is throttled to 720p and it still counts against the soft cap.
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Oct 15, 2017 01:41
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