I used to work for Verizon, way back to before NYNEX and Bell Atlantic merged. Went through that merger and the GTE one. Thankfully, I missed out on the MCA merger. Hellish tings, those tel mergers…

None of the carriers, be they former Baby Bells or whatever they have become in the past few years, ever want to be just a fat, dumb pipe. They want to sell you the access AND the services. They don’t know how to do the services right, of course, but that doesn’t stop them from trying. Again, and again, and again, and again, and again…

The wireless carriers, most of whom in the US were once landline carriers of one sort or another, are no different. They don’t want to be just a fat, dumb pipe.

They see no future in it.

They will do anything and everything they can to ensure that you go to them for the services, even though it is likely they don’t have the better or the less expensive service.

Woadan
(Professional Telecom Curmudgeon)

Amen…

5) Carry and sell unbranded/unlocked devices!
5a) Have month-to-month data/voice plans without a time contract

I agree! Carriers treat current customers like manure compared to prospective ones, and it creates an environment of antagonism between customers and themselves. They should allow better upgrade paths and better customer support (especially in the smartphone arena).

“In the monopolistic approach of offering your own services for pay on the network…”

I think that’s the problem in essence – the current business model used by carriers that rests on network differentiation and long-term locked-in contracts results in a monopolistic/oligopolistic market structure. Customer retention isn’t a key strategy for carriers as there are disincentives for customers to switch networks, which leads to poorer customer service and less attention to product/service enhancements.

I also personally believe the practice of offering deep subsidies on phones coupled with lock-in contracts, no matter how attractive the consumer in the short term, slows the pace of product innovation as hardware turnover is considerably less. It also reduces the diversity of hardware available, as manufacturers have to deal through the carriers rather than independent retail networks, and this involves not inconsiderable expense. Why else does US almost always appears to be last to get any of the latest phones?

Bottom line: less competition, higher costs, lower social benefits.

Along with your excellent suggestions Kevin (and your’s too James), I’d like to add another. Give us reasonable contract terms so we can upgrade our phones if we want. It’s bad enough having to buy a new phone every (or every other) time a new Operating System is released. If that’s going to be the case then at least offer us a reasonable way to purchase one of those new phones.

A case in point, last September (8 months ago) I upgraded my old MPx220 to a Cingular 3125 (The “Star Trek” phone). Now I find out HTC feels they didn’t sell enough of them so no plans to release WM6 to the carriers. Combine that with the fact that I was in my local Cingular store last week and discovered the 3125 is no longer carried in the store, it’s only available online. So I have to wonder how long it will even be available there.

So last September I did the upgrade because my MPx220 had seen its better days and the WM5 upgrade wasn’t being released for it. So I upgrade to the 3125 which was what, 2-3 months old at the time, for WM5 and a new phone. So now 8 months later I’m in the exact same spot I was then and I still have 12 months to go on my contract!!!! Aaaaaarrgh!

I think I’ll just get rid of my cell phone altogether. It will cut down on my bills and my life will be a lot less disrupted. The only problem being it’s how my clients reach me .

Oh well, back to counting the months until upgrade time again, so I can start the process all over.

You have some very valid points and I couldn’t agree more, however, here’s a quick comparison of data rates to those of the Canadian carriers – Bell, Telus and Rogers (BlackBerry rates for all three, non-BlackBerry rates are slightly different, but in the same ballpark):

Rogers (EDGE) / Data Included / Additional Data
$25 (on 3 year term) / 0.5 MB / $31 per MB
$40 (on 3 year term) / 1 MB / $10 per MB
$60 (on 3 year term) / 25 MB / $7 per MB
$100 (on 3 year term) / 200 MB / $5 per MB

Bell (CDMA) / Data Included / Additional Data
$25 / 4 MB / $12 per MB
$40 / 8 MB / $8 per MB
$60 / 25 MB / $6 per MB
$100 / 250 MB / $3 per MB

Telus (CDMA)
Same as Bell above

All rates are monthly.
Using even 1 GB of data in one month on one of our carriers can easily run into thousands of dollars by the current pricing – far cry from $50-$60 dollars, even with currency conversion :-)

Kevin, as usual, a well-thought out post.

You’ve suggested the carriers become exactly what they fear the most–being a fat, dumb data pipe.

As you may recall I have spoken before of having worked for Verizon in the past. While I didn’t work the wireless side, the same people run things at the top. They spent thousands if not millions on the verizon.net portal and its accompanying services because they felt they needed to be like MSN or Yahoo. (They aren’t, and never will be because they don’t get it.) The Wireless side is the same. They make more money by being more than just a fat dumb pipe, and they know it. (Even though I think they dishonestly steer customers to their own solution, many of whom do not know better, or will simply take the path of least resistance.)

When PDA phone browsers are proxied to maximize the carriers content (Cingular did this with the 8125 I owned), you know something is rotten in Denmark. Er, New York City.

Woadan

Yes, those people at the chronicle sure know how to throw a URL.

Yes, but the permalink to mine is much shorter. ;)

http://www.chron.com/commons/persona.html?newspaperUserId=jkendrick&plckPersonaPage=BlogViewPost&plckUserId=jkendrick&plckPostId=Blog%3ajkendrickPost%3a05abc014-814f-4f14-8810-a6c2241953e5&plckController=PersonaBlog&plckScript=personaScript&plckElementId=personaDest