An interesting article in PCMag about the price of wireless in general. I gather that he's mainly referring to the U.S., but the situation is probably similar elsewhere.
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http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2344696,00.asp
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"3G wireless doesn't provide much of an alternative. I've seen the terrified looks in the eyes of wireless company executives. They're genuinely worried that they can't carry much more traffic. 3G networks are much more fragile than you think. AT&T's network couldn't even handle a bunch of SXSW convention attendees with iPhones. Now imagine if they were all trying to live-stream video using Qik. I've had wireless executives tell me that they set data plan prices high specifically to keep people off their networks—because if they had too many more heavy data users, the networks wouldn't be able to function."