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Comment by Loic | Hacker News Reader

We nearly have that in Germany at the mobile data level. Just this WE, I was walking in the street and a big offer from Vodafone targeting youths was special contracts with "Pass", one was unlimited WhatsApp data[0]. They are not limiting to WhatsApp (Telegram is in it), but I suppose in the future they can easily make a deal with WhatsApp and offer only unlimited for WhatsApp and then the new comers are automatically out of the game.

[0]: https://www.vodafone.de/privat/service/vodafone-pass.html

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This kind of thing has been done for a couple of years now, if I understand the Vodafone offer correctly. Binge On in the U.S. (or StreamOn in Germany) by T-Mobile is the same thing, and the Deutsche Telekom used to offer a plan where you get free Spotify streaming, no matter the state of your data plan.

But then again: Does this kind of marketing touch the _core_ problem of net neutrality? You could argue that--as long as the user's high-speed data is intact--all of these services operate at the same speed.

Of course, this is an incentive to users to choose Spotify or WhatsApp over some competitor, but you could argue that _because_ they're giving you the same speed for everything as long as you still have data, it's not as bad as other approaches (not that I think it's a good thing).

Then again, it probably is a really slippery slope.

New European regulations explicitly forbid this: I had a Deezer bundle in my mobile contract which allowed unlimited data when streaming deezer music. Then 2 years ago I received a letter from my mobile provider stating that because of the new law my Deezer bundle was no longer valid (same monthly fee, of course).

WE?

Weekend?

I think weekend? Esoteric contraction but I guess if OP is a German native then it saves more typing when compared with Wochenende.

As another German native this is it, yes. I am not sure I saw it before in English, but it is a fairly common abbreviation, at least in chats (although I think my iPhone automatically replaces WE with Wochenende even though I never set it up to do so).

I am sorry, yes, WE means weekend. I am French living in Germany and this is part of the "continental" way of writing. Even in Denmark where I stayed a couple of years it was used all the time.

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