Good commentary.
Read it.
Link: MyPhoneRocks dot com � Industry BS – Thoughts about the future of mobile.
Today, along with your mobile service provider, you decide on a few things related to your service. You agree with them on the number of minutes you get, whether or not you get to access the internet, and how much it costs. If you like the service, coverage, and price then you take the deal or go somewhere else.
However, once you sign up, your service provider makes the rest of the decisions for you. They decide what ring tones you get to choose from, what games you get to play, what browser you get to use, what music you get to listen to, whether you get to upload photos to Flickr or Kodak, and on and on it goes.
“However, once you sign up, your service provider makes the rest of the decisions for you. They decide what ring tones you get to choose from, what games you get to play, what browser you get to use, what music you get to listen to, whether you get to upload photos to Flickr or Kodak, and on and on it goes.”
I disagree; at least with S60 phones you put any ring tone of your choice on there, I can chop out any part of any mp3 with Audacity if I want and put it on the phone as a ringtone. I can install whatever games I want, free or paid for. I can install different browsers. I can upload photos to whichever site I want. I can rip mp3s from CDs and put them on the phone. I can browse the Internet, not just a walled garden. I only pay my operator for minutes, messages, and data.
So the decision you make at the beginning shouldn’t just be about the operator, it should also be about the phone. That first decision should include whether you’re happy to pay the operator $3 for a song. In fact, you can choose a phone regardless of operator.
I see it all as the same argument: you get to choose a plan (and a phone) before you sign up. If you don’t like it, go elsewhere. The end.