The first phone I ever owned was a Motorola Razr. The Razr’s buttons are some of the finest ever to grace a mobile device. The keypad is laser-etched out of a sheet of shimmering aluminum, and when pressed, ignites in a lambent blue glow that looked like the sci-fi future.
But there was one button that I was terrified to press. In all my years of owning a Razr, I can’t say I tapped it more than once or twice, and never on purpose: the internet button.
A lot of much younger people will never understand the dread that these internet buttons filled us with in the early 2000s. Whether true or not, I didn’t know anyone who was not terrified of accidentally pressing one of these buttons on their phones and racking up a massive bill, or rushing through your prepaid card.
Times certainly have changed.
This is one of those stories of how Steve Jobs shaped your life even if you’ve never owned an Apple product. Because he somehow managed to do the impossible: convince carriers worldwide to offer reasonably affordable access to the real internet. Before that, any affordable web access offered by the likes of Vodafone was only for their own portals (Vodafone Live and similar), and the HTCs, Nokias and Sony Ericssons couldn’t be arsed to do something about the issue because they just didn’t consider it their problem. Much like the likes of Creative didn’t care about how users were supposed to get their music files in the age of copy-protected audio CDs.
Sure, the Apple wasn’t the company to offer offer a decent phone browser (though I would argue it was the first phone to offer a *good* phone browser, especially when combined with finger touch). But even my Nokia N70 had a decent-for-the-time Opera browser, and so did Windows Mobile phones. But Apple was the first company to (somehow) convince carriers that offering affordable access to the real internet was something worth doing. In Greece, I had to register my LG Optimus 2X as an iPhone to qualify for the big subsidy under my carrier’s big plan (with a whopping 350MB of data). That tells you what you need to know. My carrier at the time was a local carrier called COSMOTE btw. But they wanted to offer the iPhone, so they had to offer affordable access to the real internet.
kurkosdr,
I agree, there were other desired platforms – I wanted a nokia smartphone, but the true differentiator was the data plan. That makes or breaks everything.
Actually I don’t think the carriers would have offered the deal. The ATT deal (in the US) was an iphone exclusive and ATT has said in retrospect that it was a mistake and they lost money on it, so iphone users were extremely lucky to get such a competitive data plan for the time.
My guess is that some carrot and stick tactics were involved. Basically Apple waving iPhone exclusivity as a carrot (Verizon didn’t like the fact they were left out of the first iPhone, it’s the reason they marketed Android so heavily) while threatening to either buy a small carrier like Sprint or set up their own MVNO and lock every other carrier out as a stick.
When it comes to worldwide carriers, everyone wanted to offer “the Apple phone”, so they practically lined up.
What I am glad is that carriers finally became dumb pipes, basically offering two data transfer tiers (no-QoS data aka “mobile data” and QoS data aka “voice” which can be used as data with a CSD connection if QoS is a top priority) while being completely agnostic of what users do with those data pipes. No portals or having to buy apps through the carrier (anyone who had the displeasure of using a Vodafone Live-branded or similar phone, with app installation locked to the carrier’s portal, knows what I am taking about). There is still SMS, but that’s the only residual from the pre-iPhone age.
BTW the reason AT&T lost money on the iPhone deal was the huge phone subsidies they had to offer. Most American’s thought the iPhone cost only 150 bucks (yeah, right). Those subsidies is the reason Verizon kept pushing Android even after they were allowed into the Android club. Companies like HTC, Sony Ericsson, LG etc were willing to heavily discount phones for carriers, compared to Apple which maintained near-retail margin when selling to AT&T.
were allowed into the Android club = were allowed into the iPhone club
when selling to AT&T = when selling to carriers
(sorry)
kurkosdr,
I am for carriers treating bandwidth agnostically and allowing users use their bandwidth however they see fit with no preferential treatment for specific services or use cases. However with the reversal of net neutrality carriers are back to their old tactics: backroom deals giving some services preferential treatment to skip the quotas and QOS/throttling. Even on the deceptively named “unlimited plans” US carriers are notorious for quotas, surcharges, and throttling for tethering and hotspots. A byte is a byte is a byte…yet consumers are getting billed differently depending on how and where we use those bytes. I so hate that our representatives reversed net neutrality 🙁
I hated everything about carrier bundling. IMHO plan and device should be 100% separate. Fortunately this is something that has improved a lot and we’re no longer forced to buy their devices. Thankfully government gave consumers the explicit right to unlock their phones from carrier control!
It can’t be compared to how bad things were before. For example, on unbranded Sony Ericsson phones you could press on a jar file (sent via Bluetooth using a PC or whatever) and the jar file would install as expected. But Vodafone Live-branded variants or even Cosmote-branded (a local carrier) variants had the jar installation feature locked. Aka, absolutely nothing would happen when pressing on the jar file. Phones like the ones made by Sharp which were meant to be always carrier-branded and had no carrier-unbranded variants didn’t even support jar installation at the OS level. This meant that the carriers were subsidizing a phone that they controlled when it came to apps. And people today complain about branded boot screens and apps you can disable with a couple of taps… pah!
So, at least we got rid of those portals and any preferential treatment to some services is for stuff users actually want. But yes, it’s a tactic that endangers competition, I can’t argue with that.
I hate the practice of phone “subsidies” too. Haven’t bought a subsidized phone since that LG Optimus 2X I mentioned above, and even that time I came to regret it because the contract became more expensive than prepaid when it came to mobile data (even when accounting for the subsidy). But good luck telling most people they can’t get a subsidized phone. There are people out there who think an iPhone costs 150 bucks (they are usually the same people who complain about carriers not letting them terminate contracts early). And even people who do know how much a certain phone costs still want to be shielded from the upfront price of the phone, and considering that phone manufacturers do sell at steep discounts to carriers, I can’t fault them. And most governments don’t have the balls to say no to carriers and users at the same time. I personally switched to pre-paid with an auto-renewing bundle and got out of the whole brouhaha. That’s what I did in Greece after my contract was up and what I did when I moved to the UK.
You set the images to disabled.
I had a Sony Ericsson phone with a “WAP” browser. I had actually used it in several urgent occasions. Yes it cost a lot, and had to watch every step (like defusing a delicate bomb). But it was still useful.
The biggest problem was tethering. Windows would not care whether your connection was 2G EDGE, or your ISP, and could start downloading updates on your very expensive line. I tried to make sure the sessions were limited to 50KB of data (yes not 50MB, but only 1/1024th of that).
What happened to the Windows 2000 article? Has this site been hacked?
It’s a joke. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long-time_nuclear_waste_warning_messages
The EU did a lot to drive data prices down and allow tethering. There may also be something in there forcing unbundling of phones from phone plans. Networks also have to supply unlock codes although via retailers many are sold unlocked. The UK is a bit of a basket case at the moment after the ghastliness of Brexit but you can get around 100GB for less than £30 or even £20. I have one of these deals for mobile broadband with unlimited calls and texts. It’s good enough for me so I gave up cable which has become hugely overpriced because of American’s pushing leveraged buy-outs and stupid “light touch” regulation. If they think I’m paying for their version of the East India Company they can jog on.
I don’t know why people keep parroting the US or bringing up Steve Jobs. It’s just perpetuating the myths peddled by the other side of the Atlantic and sucking up all the oxygen.
HollyB,
I don’t know much about mobile service in the EU, is it the case that customers are allowed to use all their data by tethering if they choose?
That would be a game changer for me. I very rarely use mobile data because when I’m at home I don’t need it. However when I travel almost all of the data I need is tethered and it’s so annoying that we can’t just use the plan’s normal data for it. They end up charging more for tethered data on top of the normal data plan. They do it because they can get away with it, but it’s not fair at all. I think an extra $10 per 6GB tethering or something like that. Meanwhile mobile data can go unused.
I am always astonished at how affordable internet service is overseas. The “unlimited” dataplans here in the US are too limited for our home uses, especially with the offsite backups and family streaming. The local cable company is a monopoly so those prices aren’t great. The network is somewhat oversubscribed too, just now I measured 58mbps down and 24mbps up for around $70. I know people who have better bandwidth simply because they live in markets with competing ISPs. Monopolies are the worst.
I talk about the US because it’s where I live, you talk about the UK because that’s where you live. I think it’s only natural for people to speak in terms of what they know.
No it’s not. The UK is by and large ten times more internationalist than the US. The media lens is much more constricted now than it used to be but that’s because 70% of the media is owned by nationalistic right wing non-dom billionaires. The Atlantic (a US publication) even did an article about the firehouse of the US spewing itself in everyone’s faces. Get out of your bubble.
HollyB,
Yes it is and you do it as well by placing so much emphasis on the UK. Not that I judge you for it, like I said it’s completely natural, but it is hypocritical to judge others over something that you too. You know, it’s not like I’m being close minded here, I was genuinely showing an interest in your part of the world and you’re the one shutting it down. Not for nothing but if the tables were reversed and you were asking me questions, I’d be happy to answer them and talk rather than going on the attack unprovoked. I guess you must have a reason for being this way, but to be perfectly honest if you’d just be nicer to others I think you’d find people would be nicer to you as well.
Pretty much. In the UK, this was largely a result of the EU’s 2015 Open Internet Access Regulation which brought in an expansive form of net neutrality (called the ‘open internet’ principle, in EU parlance). Ofcom (the UK’s equivalent of your FCC) has consistently taken the view that this gives consumers a core right to use their data allowance to tether. It can and does take action against mobile operators whose plans restrict tethering. See, for example: https://www.ofcom.org.uk/about-ofcom/latest/bulletins/competition-bulletins/all-closed-cases/cw_01218
oskeladden,
Thanks, that is extremely informative! I see it goes way further than what I was asking about…
Wow I am jealous of that. Being able to take one’s phone SIM and plug it into a “MIFI” is awesome!
I wonder if there’s a way to get such a phone with those plans as a US customer, haha. I suppose if you managed to import one they’d probably get you on roaming charges for being in foreign territory. They mention roaming too but only in the EU’s jurisdiction.
How is it that EU manages to keep corporate corruption at bay? Or is this just an illusion “the grass is greener on the other side”? I only see bits and pieces of European politics, but it seems they’re a lot more willing and able to represent ordinary consumers whereas in the US consumer interests are secondary to big corporations.
That was useful but I think Americans should learn to take an interest outside their bubble and do their own research. We get America rammed down are necks on the internet every day and I know I’ve done my own research so sometimes know more about America than Americans. There comes a point when rewarding American exceptionalism and laziness gets boring.
I’m also royally annoyed at taking the time to explain the why’s and wherefore’s of a public policy area from constitutional issues on down only for American’s not to pay attention and then lazily ask the next whataboutery question when it has already been explained to their lazy asses months before.
HollyB,
Oskeladden’s post was useful period. I did take an interest, which was the whole reason for asking the question.
It’s not unreasonable for outsiders to ask questions of things we don’t know. For you to frame it as an annoyance is a *you* problem. If you are so bothered then just don’t answer at all than answer with a complaints about reasonable questions. Encouraging questions is good to help everyone learn. If you knew the answer, then it would take you less time and energy to be nice and give an insightful answer. This whole meta-discussion you’ve created to complain about questions is the waste of time where nobody learns anything.
Learn to do your own research and look outside your bubble. Make an effort. That’s the lesson and more Americans than not (and more than a few men in general depending on the topic) cannot be bothered. I think that’s a lesson Americans (and men depending on the topic) need to learn hence my comments. I’m not your secretary nor your personal chef and dish washer.
And what are you going to do with what you have learned? Sweet FA from what I can tell even after explaining point by point how to lobby and the pitfalls which you just “uh huh” skipped past.
Like you skipped past a link I provided on tech/science and ethics without a murmer.
I’m being ten times nicer to you than some of the kneejerk context free comments I’ve got from university lecturers and politicians over the years…
HollyB,
If you don’t want to answer questions, then don’t. It’s as simple as that. However I will not be shamed into not asking questions when I have them. Even if you don’t have the answer, someone else might as was the case for my question about tethering in the EU.
I don’t keep track of everything you say and I have absolutely no idea what you’re referring to. You’re going to have to be more specific or you’ll have to accept that I cannot know what you are thinking.
Ok, but to be clear criticizing people for asking relevant questions or being a certain sex or nationality is rude and detrimental to the signal to noise ratio for the discussion. If someone criticized your sex & nationality, then you would be rightfully offended, well it goes both ways.