Comment by shawnee_ | Hacker News Reader

Comment by shawnee_ | Hacker News Reader

Dumbphones are underrated. Last year, when deciding whether or not to jump on the smartphone bandwagon, I did extensive research and ultimately came to the conclusion that it was just not worth it. Yet. If or when telecomms ever stop trying to handcuff customers with contracts, it might be.

Because, ultimately, it's never been about the phone; it's all about the contract that Verizon / TMobile / AT&T wants to handcuff us to.

Net neutrality "lite" means that the telecoms have extreme incentives to keep us chained to contracts for as long as possible, no matter what advances in technology might make voice and data usage cheaper / bandwidth more efficient, or whatever.

Anyway, I ended up keeping my contractless dumb phone for voice only, and got an Android tablet for anything that would have otherwise persuaded me to want a smart phone. Unfortunately, I ended up needing to buy a data plan for it, which means I'm handcuffed to a contract anyway. But at least the tablet is optimized for "reading" which is what I'd want to do most of, had I a smart phone.

I guess that's where Verizon wins, spending my hard-earned money on lobbying for laws that decrease my power of choice, as a consumer.

This is a fairly unique issue to America and its ridiculous contracts.

This article is mostly talking about the developing markets, where pre-paid is the defacto standard. No contracts.

Most people with data enabled phones in Rwanda pay less than $30 a month for their service. (pre-paid we pay 5c a megabyte)

For the past year I've been using an LG Optimus V on Virgin Mobile. The phone cost $150 and was bought contract free. The service for me is $25 a month. That includes 300 minutes of talk time and unlimited data (which has really been unlimited for me. They did recently institute a 2.5 gigabyte limit beyond which you get throttled down to 256Kbps, but for the price I'm paying that seems more than fair). The unlimited data is effectively unlimited talk time since I have my phone set up to use my Google Voice number via SIP to handle inbound and outbound calls and I'm not that big on talking on the phone all the time in any case.

The Optimus V is hardly the top of the line when it comes to Android phones but it gives me everything I want out of an Android smartphone -- the full Google Nav turn by turn GPS functionality (killer feature #1 for a smartphone for me, and the reason I wouldn't trade Android for an iPhone even if the prices were identical -- and I used to be an iPhone user, I used the iPhone 3G for 2 years), tethering of my laptop and/or ASUS Transformer tablet/netbook (killer feature #2) and Google Voice (killer feature #3).

Everything else the phone does is gravy after that.

YMMV and your prices may vary since the $25 rate is grandfathered in (even though, as I mentioned, I wasn't under any contract -- which is pretty cool), I think the rate for new users is $35. But I've been very happy with Virgin Mobile and the Optimus V.

I think that's a false dichotomy. I've never had a contract for any of my smart phones; pre-pay, all the way. For all my data usage out and about, 8 GBP (O2 web) is more than sufficient. But my phone is usually on wifi, around the house or on location at work. It almost completely displaces tablet usage; it's a rare task that makes it worthwhile holding a heavy iPad compared with my Galaxy Nexus.

>it's a rare task that makes it worthwhile holding a heavy iPad compared with my Galaxy Nexus.

I think this may end up being the future for most. That is many will couple a cheap smartphone or dumbphone with a tablet that offers PAYG (pay as you go) web access. It is simply too expensive to have monthly two data fees to pay for or a possible $9.99/month to add an extra device for shared data usage.

I think it's the opposite; have a phone with cheap PAYG data, and a wifi-only tablet. It's simply too inconvenient to lug around a tablet, so you seldom need mobile data access on it.

Fair enough, but I almost always carried a large screen with me whether it was in the form of a laptop or tablet. If the situation required tethering I would be losing significant battery life on my main communications device.

Prepaid phones in the U.S. (at least through T-Mobile, Verizon, and Virgin Mobile, which resells Sprint) do not roam. If you are not within range of a tower owned by your carrier, you do not get service (except 911).

Look at coverage maps for the major carriers... even Verizon's map for prepaid is swiss cheese.

Probably fine if you stay in the city but if you travel (or live in the suburbs of a city like Milwaukee) this is a dealbreaker.

You know, T-Mobile charges you less per month if you don't have a contract. Over the course of 2 years, its big enough to pay for a smartphone bought contract free.

In the UK the opposite is true; if you have a contract you get better per-month costs, and over the course of 2 years it's often enough to pay for a smartphone bought contract-free.

I have just done this myself with a 24-month contract saving 6 GBP a month (making it 4 GBP a month, including 500Mb/month of data) which paid for a Milestone 2...

I think they meant "cheaper without a subsidized phone bundled" not "cheaper without a contract" it's just that the two are almost synonymous in the US.

The question to ask is: Are they inflating the pay-as-you-go plans to make the contract plans more attractive?

I know that's the case in the US.

Can you not just buy a phone & get a SIM-only contract in the US?

You can't. That's USA specific and that's where US is in stone age.

Yes, you can. But, it usually doesn't make sense, for one or more of several reasons:

1) Different technologies need different phones. For example, an iPhone won't get HSPA+ on T-Mobile because T-Mobile uses AWS. Similarly, you can't use a GSM phone on a CDMA network, and vice versa

2) Except for T-Mobile, you pay the same both off and on contract. This is probably the biggest reason that it doesn't make sense. Even T-Mobile only gives you a discounted price after you've been on the contract. If you are lucky enough to be in such a state, and like T-Mobile's phones (or don't mind living with EDGE data), then it's great! Else, it doesn't make much financial sense.

The last time I looked AT&T prepaid was several hundred dollars cheaper over 2 years for comparable service. The margin is smaller for expensive devices like the iPhone, though. The real problem is that you have to buy the phone up front.

People hate paying $600 for an iPhone when they can just put it on credit and never do the math.

I'm not sure anything in your post actually answers his question.

To answer his question: Yes, there are many "SIM-only" (commonly called "prepaid" in the US) options. AT&T has the GoPhone thing, and T-Mobile has a couple of different prepaid options.

You can get smartphone data with both AT&T and T-Mobile's prepaid. A contract-free iPhone (3GS/4/4S) on AT&T GoPhone is a pretty good deal right now. Using an iPhone on GoPhone doesn't require that it be unlocked, as it uses standard AT&T (micro-)SIMS.

The various CDMA carriers and the MVNOs operating off of it has similar deals, though they're not as cost-effective and there's a choice of no or expensive data options.

Well, I did say "yes, you can" so technically I did answer his question.

However, the implication is that by buying a SIM (which can also be postpaid. It is not strictly prepaid only) and a phone, you get the choice of phone and service. This may be true in Europe. It is certainly true in India, where people routinely swap SIM's.

It is not true in the U.S. There is largely no benefit to buying service and a SIM separately. Yes, prepaid is cheaper, and I forgot about that. But if you look at an apples to apples comparison of plans, there is absolutely no reason to buy postpaid off-contract when you pay the same amount regardless.

What laws? You mean the contract?

I mean lack of laws. Net neutrality lite protects consumers only in the realm of hard-wired ISP service, not mobile broadband.

The regulations ban content blocking and require transparency from ISPs. They also require network management and packet discrimination to be "reasonable," but they exempt wireless broadband from all but the transparency and blocking rules.

source: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/12/its-here-fcc...

> I mean lack of laws. Net neutrality

But your problem is not with net neutrality, it's much earlier, before you even connect -- you didn't want the contract ("handcuffs"). Or am I reading that incorrectly?

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