Senators To Examine Exclusive Handset Deals 234
narramissic writes "Based on a request that a group of rural operators sent asking the FCC to examine the practice of handset exclusivity, four members of the Commerce Subcommittee on Communications, Technology and the Internet sent a letter to the FCC expressing their concern. Small operators, like U.S. Cellular argue (PDF) that 'exclusive handset contracts divide wireless customers into haves and have nots.' But nationwide operators, including Verizon, maintain (PDF) that 'in the absence of exclusivity agreements, wireless carriers would have less incentive to develop and promote innovative handsets.' The Commerce Committee expects to hold a hearing on the issue tomorrow."
What a crock (Score:5, Informative)
On a technical level American carriers care only that the phones pass GCF. If they want to bring innovation into this, they are going to have to argue that somehow the business model itself is innovative, but I don't think that is what they are saying.
What is important in exclusivity is that users don't have a choice of carriers if they want to buy a specific phone. If you want the iPhone, you're stuck with AT&T, for example. But that doesn't bring any innovation to the phones themselves.
Unlocking the phones isn't any better, though, technologically speaking. With a choice of carriers, you end up with a lot of choice, but the phones on the market are still the same old dreck. The reason for this is because the innovation must happen at the phone maker level. To support this, operating system vendors need to also be innovative. And to make sure that innovative operating systems can run, advanced chips are necessary.
But none of that involves the carriers. Carriers are merely the pipes: A necessary component, but a wholly replaceable part. From a technical innovation standpoint, these guys are the road system. Cars are what we consider innovative, roads are only considered when they suck. And frankly, American cellular carriers suck.
About feaking time... (Score:5, Informative)
Heavy integration with online services, firmware branding and exclusive deals are nothing but bad news for us. I havn't bought a SIM-locked phone since 2001 and I hope to never have to buy one again. The openness of GSM is a great thing but people take it for granted here.
A lot of people buy locked phones because they are cheaper, but they shouldn't be cheaper. This was acceptable 10 years ago when not everybody had a phone but now there are too many phones. Producing more phones only generates more e-waste. There should be more countries like Belgium around where this shit with subsidising phones doesn't fly. At least then my collection of unlocked Nokias will be worth more than 20 cents
Exclusive handset deals are nothing more than a way of making people put up with a more expensive / lower quality network they wouldn't normally put up with.
Re:T-Mobile Sucks But I'm stuck on a contract (Score:5, Informative)
Re:"Develop and promote"? (Score:5, Informative)
This is like saying Microsoft has no say in hardware development. Its simply not true. Netbook development is pretty severely curtailed by Microsoft's netbook licensing arrangement. You arent going to build a device that has features your biggest customer frowns upon/outright bans.
Re:Binding Contracts. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:T-Mobile Sucks But I'm stuck on a contract (Score:3, Informative)
Get ready for Jitterbug handsets (Score:3, Informative)
There is competition amongst the operators to develop the best handsets.. Without the iphone, would we have seen the Storm, Omnia or others?
Each device has it's good and bad points. The fact is that Cellular companies are only in charge of part of their network at best, and the and the handset shouldn't really be the determining factor of choosing an Provider At&T readily admits their network wasn't optimal for the number of users with the Iphone and they are now trying to remedy that so each user has a better experience. Only time will give a better indication
Exclusive handsets aren't necessarily a bad thing. It is just one factor that should be measured..
There really isn't enough spectrum to have true competition. The cost of the RF spectrum and cell site acquisition are the major factors for an operator.
Re:Carriers != Manufacturers (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Binding Contracts. (Score:5, Informative)
US Cellular appears to be a CDMA network from my spot-checks, so they couldn't use a stock IPhone on their network if they wanted.
That's part of the battle right now - even US GSM phones from T-Mobile vs ATT aren't 3G-compatible, nor compatible with CDMA networks (Verizon, Sprint, US Cellular).
Doug
Re:Binding Contracts. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Binding Contracts. (Score:1, Informative)
You are correct, USCC is running on CDMA rather than GSM. It doesn't mean that a version of the iPhone with a different radio couldn't be developed.
I happen to live in an area serviced by the big 4 carriers as well as USCC and thought long and hard about choosing a smart phone from USCC or an iPhone from AT&T. I ended up with an HTC Touch Pro simply because I was unwilling to suffer with AT&T's poor coverage in NE Wisconsin. AT&T has no reason to deliver 3G due to fact that it isn't cost effective to deploy it in the area I live in, simply due to lack of population. To be fair, USCC still only supports CDMA 1x in my part of Wisconsin, but they at least have some plan to deploy EVDO, which is significantly faster than CDMA 1x.
I have to agree with the RCA for the most part. I think that carriers should not have exclusivity with regard to mobile devices; at least not of multi-year proportions. Carriers should not differentiate themselves by what handsets they offer, but rather the quality and performance of the service they provide. If we were to rate carriers by the this standard, perhaps they would improve coverage areas as well as customer service related issues. I'm certain that a fair amount of readers would have some good stories to tell about poor coverage and poor customer service from their wireless carriers.
Re:"Develop and promote"? (Score:2, Informative)
The prepaid vendors are even worse. Even the one that promises "No Evil". Evil must be being able to get your damn contacts off the friggin phone or IF the phone can take pictures, they can't be downloaded directly to a computer. The phone's manufacture offers software to do all of the above? That's evil too, so the phone is lobotomized so these evil tools won't work with the phone. Being able to move a SIM card from one phone to another that you bought from them is evil too.
Re:Carriers != Manufacturers (Score:5, Informative)
The carriers exert a LOT of influence over the manufacturers. Carrier says "give us that phone but remove the WiFi chip and disable the GPS please". Manufacturer has to say "yes" else carrier says "OK, then, we wont sell your phones"
Only manufacturers at this point that MIGHT be able to say NO to carriers would be RIM (because the Blackberry is so important to business customers and unlike Windows Mobile there is no alternative supplier) and Apple (who has a phone so hot that AT&T cant afford not to keep carrying it)
Re:"Innovative", as in having features disabled? (Score:3, Informative)
My HUGE issue with both Verizon and AT&T is that if you purchase a PDA phone such as a Blackberry, they require you to also subscribe to a special data plan at $20-$30 per month. I don't disagree that data access should cost more than voice, but both carriers already offer a so-called "unlimited" data plan for non-PDA phones at a lower cost. However, they both feel you can charge more just because it's a PDA, despite the fact that a Blackberry is no more capable of utilizing bandwidth than any other network enabled phone.
They're not very honest about why either. I'm in the market to switch carriers and I contacted both companies about why the regular unlimited data plans don't cover PDA's and mums the word. They just spew bullshit form letters about how the Blackberry plans offer unlimited data, but neglect to give any reason why they're special.
Re:Carriers != Manufacturers (Score:3, Informative)
That's pretty much true. For awhile, Verizon could lock down BB GPS because they only used AGPS, so they needed Verizon's supplemental location servers. Now that most BBs have full GPS, I don't have to pay Verizon $5/month just to use somebody else's mapping software. And having full bluetooth is awesome.
Re:Ugh! (Score:5, Informative)
I doubt most people working in cell phone stores have any idea why their phones are crippled.
They're there to sell FEATURES, not limitations. They don't say that this phone can't be tethered to your computer, they sell you an unlimited data plan (phone only) and a tethering cable. Then they cackle with glee when they see that $.75/kilobit charge on your bill to the tune of $750.00. Should have read the contract, eh?
At any rate, you COULD use bluetooth to upload pictures or download ringtones from your computer to your phone, but its been disabled in the firmware. Also, you COULD use that built-in GPS with Google Maps to see where you're at, but that's disabled too unless you subscribe to whatever GPS mapping software they're getting kickbacks from this year.
The whole market is a perfect example of what would happen if 'trusted computing' ever took off. There would be no more of this "I didn't like the drivers so I installed hacked ones" or "Hey my nVidia card is a higher model that's been flashed to be a lower model, let me reflash that so it can be awesome again"
Re:Carriers != Manufacturers (Score:2, Informative)
The carriers exert a LOT of influence over the manufacturers. Carrier says "give us that phone but remove the WiFi chip and disable the GPS please". Manufacturer has to say "yes" else carrier says "OK, then, we wont sell your phones"
As someone who works for a handset manufacturer, I can tell you that is far more true than most people thing. The "operators" tells us what to put in a phone. The general public is really losing out on innovation.
I don't know that it's government's job to step into this, but the only real solution is to split sales of handsets and service; or in reality, split the tying of handsets and service together. It's useful to consumers to get the service and handsets at the same time, but when they are tied together in a contract is when everyone loses.