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Comment by jonknee | Hacker News Reader

> Why would they have a problem with something that gives them extra revenue?

Because the data plan isn't metered. Tethering will cost them capacity they aren't billing to anyone. Sort of how like you can get in trouble for using a residential cable modem in a business--consumers get a price break and power users pay more.

> Connecting your phone to your computer as a modem is a standard feature for all other phones.

Not totally true, the iPhone is just now getting this in the upcoming 3.0 release for example. Many times tethering requires a more expensive data plan with the carrier and that may turn out to be the case with both Android and iPhone.

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> Because the data plan isn't metered.

Fair enough. In my country it is (I did not think that there was a country that did not charge for its data).I use a SIM with pre-paid on it which is nice (no contracts, nothing).

> Sort of how like you can get in trouble for using a residential cable modem in a business--consumers get a price break and power users pay more.

This is actually just a devious scheme to rip companies off.

> Not totally true, the iPhone is just now getting this in the upcoming 3.0 release for example.

Maybe. I only personally know of one person with an iPhone (again, it is more popular in the states). Most newish (e.g. last 4 years) phones (from Nokia or Samsung) have 3G built-in (when compared to iPhone's EDGE).

Also, connecting to the Internet using these phones' modems is straight forward and the majority of them accept micro-USB (through which it also charges).

> Fair enough. In my country it is (I did not think that there was a country that did not charge for its data).I use a SIM with pre-paid on it which is nice (no contracts, nothing).

In the US it's common to require unlimited data packages for smartphones. The G1 and iPhone are examples of that. It's also common with BlackBerry. It's uncommon to pay by the megabyte here, you either don't have internet access or have unlimited (well, "unlimited") access.

It may be uncommon but there are limited data plan options where you pay by megabytes. (T-Mobile has a couple)

But those options are not available on all phones. The G1 for example requires T-Mobile's unlimited data plan which costs $24.99/month. (FWIW the iPhone is the same way, but AT&t's plan is more expensive.)

Consumers don't get a price break. They get shafted just as hard as the rest.

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