War Ebook Available!
We see the final battle between the new gods and the old gods, and Kate and Daniel are trying to keep their secrets hidden, or they risk losing all their allies.
OK, so you’re a car company. You make this fantastic device that plays music and warms you up or cools you down. It puts your baby to sleep. It provides an uncomfortable yet somewhat private place to make out. And yes, you can use this device to go around town to do errands. You want one? Sign a contract saying you pay us X and then you can do whatever you want with it! Use all the features! Huzzah!*
Except people who actually DRIVE it, say, from NC to CA, will be called “hogs” and ruin it for the rest of them. This is according to the NYTimes, which implies that the people who bought the iPhone and iPad to do with it WHAT APPLE AND AT&T SAID THEY COULD DO WITH IT are “data hogs.”
I’m an iPod Touch user, meaning all I deal with is WiFi. I don’t want an iPhone, and I don’t want an iPad. For a variety of reasons (AT&T being scum is one of them). But the fact that these companies can offer a device that does X, Y, and Z, and then they are shocked, SHOCKED, when people actually use the devices as advertised, and then the NYT makes the users out to be the bad guys instead of pointing out an underhanded bait and switch on the company’s side, it enrages me.
You’re calling your users “data hogs” when you’re the dude who woke up at dawn, put on the overalls, got your slop pails and called “SOOOEEEEEEE! PIG PIG PIG PIG PIG. COME’N GETTIT.”
Look people. Open your eyes and look at your market. If you whine that people are using your service like you said they could, and you’re surprised and unhappy about that, clearly you don’t know your market and clearly you should get the fuck out of business in that market. If you didn’t know that Apple fanboys would jump at the chance to stream video and download music and games on the iDevices, you’re fools and should let me run your company, because I COULD HAVE TOLD YOU THAT.
*pants* *composes self*
Oh, and NYT? Way to suck the dick of the corporations. Quality journalism there.
* I know this is not a perfect metaphor. If it were a perfect metaphor, iPhone is to car what phone calls are to driving. But still. I stand by my point.
Share and enjoy!
12 Responses to "well shit, we didn't think anyone would actually DRIVE the car…"
Get the GFL with Discount Code MUR
The Latest from I Should Be Writing- Fun website stuff February 1, 2012
- A different writing challenge January 31, 2012
- ISBW Special #46 – Stonecoast Writer’s Residency January 30, 2012
- Notice- No interviews for a while January 30, 2012
- Eligibility in Hugos and Campbells January 24, 2012
From the NYT article, these people sound like an advertisement for the product “I can use my iPhone to share videos, talk for hours with my friends, it even replaces most of my regular computer functions! Yay!” I would have called them “Mac fanboys” or “dedicated Apple users” or “satisfied customers.”
Wow Mur that’s some powerful imagery that you have going on. The visuals that pop into my head as I read that were vivid and disturbing.
I agree, this is a complete crock – I have high speed, but it has been reduced because we’re taking all the bandwidth from the dial up users.
I encourage you to vote like I do, I don’t like em, they get no $$$ from me. Of course this is tough to do when these people have the monopoly on the stuff we need. Apple needs to get away from a single provider.
Funny thing is, I have a Droid and an unlimited data plan from Verizon. I stream videos and audio and pull and push a ton of data around. At the end of the month, Verizon sends me a bill for the flat fee and a summary of how many gig I transferred broken down by day. No slow down nonsense. No gimmicks. They offer unlimited data and then provide unlimited data. Yet another reason AT&T won’t see a penny from me ever.
The worst part is that other carriers are thinking about doing the same thing. There isn’t going to be a place for anyone to go. At this point I wish it wouldn’t cost so much for me to break a contract and go somewhere else, though I’d have to figure out how to jailbreak my iPhone and research which carriers it’d work with. I don’t know why Apple is remaining exclusive to AT&T when they can’t handle the load.
Also: “When wireless customers take “unlimited” literally, analysts say, those plans rapidly become money losers for the companies.”
What did they think “unlimited” meant? o.O
But other carriers haven’t yet. Now is the best time to “vote with your feet”. AT&T and Apple are doing A LOT of stupid things lately and if their customers start to abandon them then maybe they will stop. Or if they don’t other companies will still see that there is money to be made doing what Apple and AT&T won’t
Surely even folks who’ve not worked in PR, let alone those who have large PR departments, would realize that it isn’t good public relations to insult your customers rather than admit that you hadn’t thought it through.
I find that the fair use limits on the UK Data plans are low at 1 Gb a month.
It’s just a little tricky to get unless you’re downloading a Podiobook on it. My Phone has been recorded downloading at 41kilobits per second. (As Slow as dial up Modem!) That would mean that I’d be download 50 Mega byte ISBW#145 in OVER 2 hours!
The Math says I’ve got to be downloading for Nearly constantly for 2 days.
The iPhone in the UK, is on two Operators, with at least a 3rd hinting that they are going to appear.
I don’t see a reason to be so angry when AT&T isn’t changing any existing contract. If you made a contract for unlimited data, you’ve still got it.
AT&T is only changing what they will sell in the future. Which is what every company in the world does. They used to sell one thing for one price, and in the future they will sell a different thing for a different price. This should make me angry? Should I be pissed off at GM because their dealer won’t sell me a brand new 1960 Cadillac Eldorado for $13,000?
By all means, if you don’t want what they now sell, or don’t think it’s worth the price, don’t buy it. That’s how markets work. AT&T will likely lose a lot of customers over this change, as they should. But to act like it’s some kind of moral affront makes no sense to me.
And by the way, I haven’t heard of anyone from AT&T calling anyone pigs or “Data Hogs.” I’ve just heard that from analysts and journalists looking for a catchy line.
It was my understanding that the “new” terms are forced on people when they upgrade the phone. Is this not true?
I know that Verizon forced a particular data plan on my wife when she got a Droid. Kind of sucked. But I was already ticked at them because they wouldn’t let me keep my number when canceling one phone with them and moving to another phone already on my plan.
I have a Touch. I love it. I need a different cell phone contract, and my situation will be changing. The iPhone and teathering was looking real good.
But not now. I am a heavy user. I like to watch video on my MacBook. (Warehouse 13 this July, Yay!) since video stores are gone here in Salem, OR, I was considering NetFlix. 2 GB a month won’t cut it. The worst thing is that I won’t even be able to get unlimited data. AT&T is the suck.
AT&T went from marginal 1st place to a solid 1st place carrier (number of subscribers) due to the iPhone. People care little what network they use, the only difference is cost and performance (and sexy phones).
I just wish the iPhone was on T-Mobile. They have always been fair with their rates, and reasonable with penalities.
I still want an iPhone, but it seems I’m still Gina wait.
Hi Mur,
I agree with several of your points, most definitely AT&T being scum. I do not own an iphone or an ipod or ipad (what can I say, I’m a Linux geek). However, I do own a blackberry and a separate mobile phone plan, which I needed for a previous job. Well, when I left that job, I kept the blackberry and the plan, but I called AT&T and told them to turn the “all you can eat” data off. My new job gave me another blackberry, so I, not wanting to carry *two* blackberries, I switched out the sim cards and put the blackberry on my wife’s plan. Well, about a week later, she got a text saying “for your convenience, we have put you on a minimal data plan” to the tune of an additional $30/month. So I picked up the phone and called AT&T and told them that a) I have high speed internet and 20 machines at home, b) I am a high-performance computer sysadmin at work, and for those two reasons I didn’t need their crappy 3G network. I am pretty much within reach of a computer that doesn’t use AT&T’s shitty network, and I don’t want to pay for it. They said whenever a smart phone gets put on a plan, the cost is mandatory, whether you use data or not. We went around and around for 45 minutes, and even got to the point of my telling them that all of their phones are “teh suck”. I ended up pulling the blackberry off, and when the plans are done, I will be moving from AT&T.
And like the RIAA and MPAA, they are trying to desperately hang on to a dead business model. They have raised their early termination fee from $175 to $325, and they are no longer going to allow “all you can eat” data plans.
I would love love love a new iPhone…but as long as it’s only available from AT&T, I doubt I’ll get one.
I’ll have to stick with my iPod Touch. If they release a new version in parity with the iPhone 4′s features, I might consider an upgrade then…