At the moment Sprint still caps their EVDO 3G mobile data service (but not smartphone users) at about 5 GB a month, though the company doesn't cap their Mobile WiMax (4G) users. That doesn't mean they won't someday, Sprint tells Network World. Todd Rowley, vice president of 4G at Sprint tells the website they "saw subscriber behavior change" when they imposed caps on 3G service, and does not want the same thing to happen to their Mobile WiMax network. According to Rowley, they might someday place a cap on 4G service, but it would be a very high one:

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At some point in the future, if average data use goes much higher -- Rowley quoted an arbitrary figure of 20GB per month -- Sprint might cap users' monthly downloads, he said. All of Sprint's WiMax plans also include 3G service and are subject to the usual 5GB cap for use of that network. Sprint has no current plans to remove the 3G cap, Rowley said.

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As analysts like Dave Burstein have noted, while caps may be necessary on wireless networks, ever-expanding wireless capacity allows them to be quite high (as in 20-30 GB) this generation. That's in sharp contrast to AT&T's new smartphone pricing plan, which is to impose absurdly low caps (from 250 MB to 2 GB a month) in a quest to ramp up profitability through overages down the line.

As such, Sprint's "use and enjoy our product, please" rhetoric mirrors comments we've seen from Sprint partner Clearwire, and is in in stark and refreshing contrast to AT&T's continual complaining about people actually using their product. Of course, Sprint's looking up at both AT&T and Verizon as an underdog and needs any advantage they can get, while a company like AT&T has the power, size and market position to frankly not give a damn whether or not you think their caps are fair.