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Comment by LVB | Hacker News Reader

Not looking forward to basically a 100% increase in my bill when Verizon pulls the plug on the grandfather unlimited plans.

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I felt that was a disingenuous part of the chart. The author said that FaceTime only worked over cellular for AT&T when you moved to a shared data plan, but always worked on Verizon. That's technically true, but only really because Verizon won't offer customers subsidized pricing without moving to a shared data plan.

From Verizon's perspective, if you pay their post-pay rates and bring your own iPhone, you're paying them an additional $18+/mo since they don't have to cover the subsidy. As such, if you have a grandfathered plan, they care less since you're basically paying for a higher rate plan by not using a subsidy.

That $18.75/month buys you much more than unlimited data, if it's a truly unlocked phone.

It's a CDMA phone which by definition can't be unlocked.

That's not true. CDMA is just one band. The iPhone 5 supports multiple bands, including GSM bands and LTE bands. It also includes a SIM card slot. The iPhone 5 can be unlocked and a new SIM inserted.

Not the iPhone. You can use the SIM internationally but not in the US. Put an AT&T or T-Mobile SIM in your "unlocked" Verizon iPhone and it will not work.

UPDATE: I should also add that if you buy an factory unlocked iPhone from Apple, there is no way to activate it on any CDMA network. CDMA is inherently a locked network.

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