fiberguyMy views are my own.Premium
join:2005-05-20
kudos:3 | Right... but, what people are posting on Facebook, for the most part, on mobile apps, especially on the iPhone which has the best Facebook App, is really nothing more than a text message. Yes, the text goes over 3G, or in at&t's case, Edge, lol, ... it's usually a small amount of data. At least on the 200 people I have on my facebook list, what I see mainly are those people posting mobile updates are "At the airport, waiting for a flight".. and yes, my life in enriched for that information. 
Any strain they have on their networks is their own fault, to be honest. They started mobile broadband as a business service and then started to push into the personal use. In fact, I just checked the major carriers and their cards, for example, are still mainly listed under their business sections... so yea, it's the phones for personal people.
The way *I* see it, they wanted more revenue for mobile broadband so they turned to the end user, but I see this as "let's get more revenue from broadband so lets get more $ from the end user, even if we're not ready for them, and put heavy restrictions on them and charge premiums for it"... I have the iPhone, now two of them since I moved my personal phone over from Sprint last week along side my business phone that already was on att. Both of those phones, and I consider myself a heavy user, are primarily wifi use.. I pay $60 a month for the two phone's data plan and hardly use 100 meg a month combined for 3G data. I know that the tweens out there are using a lot of data.. but becuase of that, instead of them crying they have strain, there are two things I see...
1) take that revenue and increase capacity.
2) if you're going to talk about strain and want the public to care, start releasing actual numbers to the public.
Until number 2 happens, I see this as a press campaign to throw some fud on the customer.
This is one case where I don't feel sorry for the carriers.. the heavy customers are, in my opinion, subsidized by the light users every month.
I'm not sure exactly who is coming up with the term "cracking" when describing network impact, but, they sold the service to the end user and it just sounds like SOMEONE is crying becuase their plans of revenue isn't panning out.. ie: like airplanes who over sell their flights knowing that about 10% of passengers won't show up, the carriers are over selling their network in HOPES that 50% of their customers won't use anywhere near their data.. which, in my opinion is true, especially when they are all now starting to FORCE data plans on to people.
Again, this is one case where I don't feel sorry for them.. they need to take that revenue and upgrade their networks, and fast. OR, go to billing by the byte, which is where I think they SHOULD go.. when you have a so-called "limited resource" it SHOULD be metered until they can handle traffic..
But still, facebook status updates?? cracking the networks? .. I'd really like to see those numbers. I can ALSO see this as "the most popular app" attack by some junior exec or analyst saying the sky is falling. We've all seen this before where they look at numbers, take the most popular app, site, traffic pattern, and say "that's the reason we're hurting"... and while FB may be a high use app, or the most popular app/site on mobile networks, is it REALLY making the network crawls? We're seen many times where networks have a habit of looking at the top few percent of users or use and them blame them for problems and those users/use may be the top users, but are they really taking up a LARGE percent of the over all picture? Sometimes they DO like to just attack the most popular user, app, or site.. Why? Maybe becuase they're trying to invent a new revenue stream or billing model... but, my point is that I want them to be honest, and transparent about the issue they face.. if they can't post hard numbers, in this day and age, I'm not interested.
I pay $100 a month for my service for one of my lines, and I hardly get anywhere near what I consider "value" out of my data (and value is their term, not mine) So if they're going to try to convince me that their network is cracking, well, I hope they're not looking at me and MY rates becuase they wont' get any more from me.. I'm one of the customers they WANT to keep.. not piss off.
I just think that some carriers need to rethink they way they talk to the general public becuase I personally see this is an impending attack/restriction on how I am using my service.
I just want them to publish hard numbers if they're going to try to make me feel sorry for them, especially when I write at&t a $400 check every month.
You know me and my thoughts.. I know what it takes to run a business and how to walk a line between operating an honest business and proper compensation from the customer, BUT, lately, I think that many of these large businesses (aka corps) are going about it wrong.. with a little creative thinking, HONEST changes, they can treat all of their customers fair. Right now, mobile broadband IS a limited resource which is why I believe they DO need to go to billing by the byte.. they need to charge heavy users more, and light users less.. this is how the phone company did it for years with long distance billing and how the cell companies use minutes to control network use. Sometimes, and in some cases, 'unlimited' billing doesn't work. In the case of mobile broadband, unlimited rates is just a way to get more customers on board to their service all while they're telling people that unlimited isn't really unlimited a they cry they can't handle it.. if they can't handle it and networks are cracking, what should that tell them? ... it tells me its limited and they need to charge for actual use UNTIL they can build out their networks to handle it..
My guess is mobile providers will screw up in the end for a long time to come. And, on another note, I still think they're looking for a lot of revenue, but not to build networks, but to come up with silly ads slamming the competition to gain MORE customers.. I know its against the 1st amendment for the govt to control speech, but one way to get these networks under control and get them to build them out on their own is to limit what they can advertise by stop slamming each other and instead talk about themselves.. and use the same controls that they used on the tobacco industry in marketing practices.
Just my opinions..
But, for now, I have to post a status on facebook, on my phone, that says I just posted a message on Broadband Reports. |
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