Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

http://mynewsjunkie.com/2009/06/15/c...g-price-hikes/

Who wants to bet they'll talk about this for a while, then all the bought off senators and congressmen will just let it die. :rolleyes:

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

You'd think that people would have been up in arms way back in 2007 when this article ran and they announced that text messages were marked up 7314%.

They've gone up since.

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

There's two rules when it comes to cellular service, or human nature for that matter.

1. People are naturally gullible. You feed them enough BS, they'll believe anything.
2. The ones who actually care about this make up the extreme minority. The rest don't feel like they can do anything about it, so they don't bother.

I run into these all the time in the FOSS world. It makes it a bear to convince people they're getting taken to the cleaners. At the same time I wonder if it also doesn't have something to do with people not wanting to admit they got suckered, and thus they shut up and don't say anything so as to pretend like they're the smart ones and not the suckers.

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

or they have a "good" life already and do not see a need to rock the boat...

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

They could cut their bill by 60-80% and they don't want to rock the boat!? Dude, if I had a chance to save 60% and still get the same amount of service, I'd be shaking that sucker like a cat 5 hurricane!

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

i never said the reasoning would be perfectly rational...

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

Do not use SMS messages. Use IM (GTalk, ICQ, MSN, etc.). Whatever puny advantages SMS has over IM do not justify the price.

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

I don't know where you live, but here:
- Everyone has a mobile that can SMS, but not many have a smartphone that can IM.
- There is only one protocol, you can reach all other phone owners.
- You don't need to have a separate IM account, just use your phone number.
- No setup, it just works.

These features make it "priceless" for many. Even when the costs are outrageous when calculated in cents/byte :-)

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

Well, you can voice-call ones who cannot IM. Or send them an email which they will read once they get to a computer.

Given the cost, I would rather voice-call than use this "one protocol".

Pretty much everybody, except retirees and toddlers, has at least one IM account now. IM accounts are free.

Setting up an IM client takes about 5 minutes, including the download time. I have no problems spending these 5 minutes once, if it saves me money for months afterward.

Sorry, but I do not see this as "priceless". All I see is service providers fleecing consumers who are too lazy/stupid to keep track of their own money.

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

I can't justify SMS costing me 60 bucks a year extra simply because my friends don't listen to me when I say "don't text me" and makes a higher bill for me if I didn't have the ability to send/receive.

For me, SMS is... wasteful. Personally, I would rather IM. But since my phone doesn't support IM's in the background (iPhone 3G) so I'd have to be either tethered to my desktop/laptop or wifi network or in the app not using my phone.

And IM's while away on their network still counts as data.

It's not like that for all phones; however I need something that does work and not cost me an arm and a leg.

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

Yes. Except not everybody (not talking about retirees and toddlers) are on-line on IMs on their phones + that requires additional software, setup (if it's possible at all), not to mention the requirements for Skype and alike. IM are still far from being as ubiquitous as SMS's, low cost or not.

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

Ah, most people I communicate with are at work during the work week, and they all have IM at their fingertips. On weekends, I can just as well call and talk rather than type cryptic messages on a crummy keyboard.

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

That's the showstopper right there. I might want to use IM more than anything, but as long as the "people I communicate with" is not limited to my geek buddies with smartphones or spread through half a dozen different IM protocols, I won't be able to do that - actually, that's one of the reasons I need a NIT for.

Also, not sure if it's an European thing, but SMS reception is free (in fact, I don't know about SMS-less plans). As for sending, the #@%#$ providers here reintroduced per minute billing, so for short reminders/confirmations it's actually cheaper/less bothersome to use SMS than do a voice call (60$ ? Even on the worst plan here that's several thousand messages !).

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

Yes, but can't you ... like... you know... call and talk to them? After all, if they are not geeks, what is the chance they rely on SMS for communications rather than on old fashioned voice calls?

Funny, I do not even know how much MTS charges for SMS messages :). I do know how much they charge per megabyte of IP traffic though.

Anyways, a look at their web site shows r4.25/MB of traffic and r1.95 for each outgoing SMS message (incoming messages are free). In other words, each SMS is equivalent to 512kB of traffic. Imagine how many messages you will have to send over IM to reach 512kB :)

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

I used to have free incoming text, but it changed to $0.10/message in or out last summer. The free incoming suited me well, as I don't send text messages, but I do receive the occasional alert message from work.

While I don't follow U.S. cellular plans closely, I suspect my free incoming was unusual. When I started having to pay for incoming text messages, I commented about it at work, and my co-workers were shocked I hadn't been paying previously.

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

Wow, guess I got it easier here then.

In Brazil it is illegal to charge for incoming messages you didn't ask for officially (like those games and stuff). Brazilian consumer law states that one event cannot generate two different charges (i. e. you cannot charge twice for the same message), and honestly, paying to receive messages is just absurd. It's like paying to send a package through fedex and fedex charging the person who gets it as well.

They don't do it there do they?

Just out of curiosity, sjgadsby, where do you live?

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

Again, I suspect this falls under 'European thing' but nearly everybody I know texts to an extent. This includes my (retiree!) parents and first grader neighbour kids (toddler++) who I suspect text better than they write. It's not a replacement for talk (except in environments you can't talk). Think about it as more of a replacement for short emails rather than IM.

I believe you have misread something. The 4-5 RSD is the cost for 100KB (in US terms, a little over ~$1.3 for 1MB !). To add insult to injury, MTS's gprs/3g connections are notoriusly unreliable/slow, basically good for (small) emails but not much else. WIth most plans you get ~hundreds messages for free (or discount) before you start paying for SMSs at the rate you specified.

It's a vicious circle though - we have a very little % of smartphones (price sensitive market), so GPRS is not widely used (and 3G even less) so the providers have little incentive to upgrade data services which lowers demand for smartphones further, circle complete.

EDIT: Disclaimer: I'm not a MTS customer (but other local GSM providers do not differ significantly neither in price nor quality).

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

Ever seen Witness?

Seriously, I live in rural Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, USA. There's a local joke that a traffic jam here is six cars waiting to pass an Amish buggy.

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

Jeez, yeah I've seen it lol =))

Wow, that's just bad man.

It seems like mobile internet prices in the US are just as bad as in Brazil, even though regular adsl prices are much cheaper there =(

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

It does sound like some kind of insanity to me, really. It is easier to call, after all.

I have no idea what RSD is, but 4.25 Russian roubles are equivalent to US$ 0.14 and this is the price per megabyte, not per 100kB. Also, MTS' GPRS is quite reliable, albeit sluggish. I use SSH via GPRS and it worked well enough all the way to Byelorussian border.

Way different here, with many smartphones and even more "feature phones". By the way, any decent JavaME phone will run Jimm (MIDP IM client) with no difficulty. It does not have to be a smartphone.

I do not think it is the same MTS :)

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

Tell that to our British friends who already did a billion messages a week in 2007 (that's 2.4 messages per day for everybody, from toddler to granny !)

Russia ? Ah, the confusion :) When your were responding to my post referencing 'here' with MTS I thought you were talking about Mobilna Telefonija Srbije (=MTS ;) ), a telco 'here' in my reference frame :) Of course I have no bearing on the Russian MTS or services - I just know that for a <10$ montly plan (on our, Serbian MTS :D ) you get hundreds of free messages, so there is no real incentive for IMs (=not worth the effort).

Also, there is a huge number of SMS services people use here so there is even a bit of inertia at work (e.g. you use SMS for parking, small payments, applications, televoting and whatnot).

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

Crazy, crazy brits. Have probably got nation-wide carpal tunnel syndrome by now. :)

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

The thing about sms is that its sync free, you send, and the other party reply when they have time.

Ok, i have seen people drop whatever they are holding when their phone beeps about a incoming message. But unless you got a handsfree stuck in your ear 24/7, talking ties up both your and the one your talking to. Something thats not really needed when a short bit of text is all that's required (and it also allows one to save the info about when and where to meet).

But then i live in one of those nations where incoming messages are free, and tethering is part of the basic package ;)

Re: Cell Phone Execs Will Face Questions On Text Messaging Price Hikes
 

Well, TSO has a point. Part of the SMS nonsense might be that it's become an addiction. It's one of the primary reasons I won't get a blackberry. If I had one of those, I'd never get anything done. :(