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What programs do smartphones use that requires so much data? Youtube videos? Movies? Games?
Youtube videos and streaming movies (Netflix) can consume a lot of bandwidth (data) in a short amount of time. Heavy extended use of internet radio such as Pandora can also escalate data usage a fair bit. Examples would be having the internet radio going while you're working out at the gym 5 days a week or jogging thru the park or taking the bus or train downtown every weekday from your apartment in the suburbs.
Seriously - 2 GB, 5 GB is NOTHING if you stream content often. These low caps are ridiculous.
I also expect sales of apps that have a large disk footprint to be hurt by these caps, if they aren't already. I have several games on my iPhone and iPad that are several hundred megabytes each. People will either make sure to only d/l those apps (and their version updates - which means downloading the full app again at least on iOS) over Wifi, or skip them altogether.
Verizon is being greedy here. They are banking on customers using more and more data in the future and Verizon (expect AT&T to follow suit soon) is re-positioning its pricing structure to monetarily capitalize on that as much as possible. Voice and text may eventually go the VoIP route (i.e. data) too.
I'm pretty sure that these carriers have the capacity to handle a copious amount of data from each user and device.
It also makes no sense to me why adding a tablet costs $10 while adding a smartphone costs $40.
As for me...*hugs grandfathered unlimited ATT data plan*.
Obviously a big drag. I have an upgrade in the next 2 weeks so I am still undecided about what I will do. The phone I want isn't out yet but in order to keep unlimited for another 2 years(and my 20% employee discount) I will have to upgrade soon.
I only really use 100-500 mb a year but looking at the other plans even the smallest plan is $30 a month with no employee discount so I would still be paying more for less data.
In the future, I definitely don't use enough data to justify paying $700 for a cellphone(almost 3 times as much as my laptop-which is fairly well equipped). So it's either suck it up with the tiered data or look at other carriers.
I have to say it may not make much sense to stay on as an individual user for Verizon in the future.
There are several pre-paid carriers that offer unlimited talk, text and data for less than $50 a month. Why anyone in their right mind would stick with Verizon is beyond me.
I have had PagePlus for about 6 months and it operates off the Verizon network. I have been very happy with my service. I suggest you check out PagePlus (for Verizon), Simple Mobile (for T-Mobile) and H2O for AT & T. You will be amazed how inexpensive cellular service (with data) can be.
There are several pre-paid carriers that offer unlimited talk, text and data for less than $50 a month. Why anyone in their right mind would stick with Verizon is beyond me.
Most of them don't actually offer true unlimited data on smart phones. For instance with the Metro PCS $50 plan you only get 2.5 GB of Data on 4G then the rest of the data is on their very slow 3g.
Too bad they throttle us after 2ish gb. Happened to me 3 times so far.
So when you are under "throttle" does Pandora no longer work?
I mean, if that's true then yea that sucks. But if it just means web pages load a bit slower then so what??
So when you are under "throttle" does Pandora no longer work?
I mean, if that's true then yea that sucks. But if it just means web pages load a bit slower then so what??
I get throttled to around dial-up speeds till the next billing cycle
I believe like the article says other companies will follow suit. Been coming for sometime with the hogs usage problem.
Yes they are. This is also going to be a problem for the MVNOs like Virgin and MetroPCS who offer all you can eat, no contract plans that lease space from Sprint and VZW.
This also bites into their bottom line. By next year, its unlikely they will be $50/mo without some kind of change to that model.
If it wasnt VZ, it was going to be another big 4 operator. What exists right now is not sustainable for at least the next two years based on LTE launches and the data hog devices that will use it.
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