Verizon customers on the unlimited plan

[LMITOUT]

I'm sure that uses a half gb a month right there. Then emails, news, and weather updates constantly streaming into Widgets.

Not even close.

[CAMAN]

Not even close.

Yeah...your right...closer to a GB...

May 29 - June 5 about 250 MB used

Foreground - 1.01MB

Background - 249MB

With the live wallpaper being considered a background process lets calculate it out.

249MB per week times 4 weeks per month equals almost 1gb.

[Scott K]

That seems kinda waistful to me.

[LMITOUT]

If that is accurate I wouldn't call that being a heavy user, but more like using one app that is terribly designed.

If someone is knowingly using apps like that and then gets throttled by their provider I don't feel sorry for them at all. That's just dumb.

[upnorth]

Bandwidth costs. As users go up and the amount of data that users consume they need to add more to their internet pipe or add more pipes. They are either going to have to throttle usage or charge the heavy users more. Hard to charge the heavy users more if they have unlimited data.

[toughguy]

If someone is knowingly using apps like that and then gets throttled by their provider I don't feel sorry for them at all. That's just dumb.

Exactly - And VZW's mission is accomplished when people start to monitor their usage, freeing up not only bandwidth, but quickly vanishing available spectrum as well.

[Scott K]

When I tether for a week, and just use my computer as a normal work computer, that would include my web surfing, I am lucky to burn a gig a week.

[CJH]

Yeah...your right...closer to a GB...

May 29 - June 5 about 250 MB used

Foreground - 1.01MB

Background - 249MB

With the live wallpaper being considered a background process lets calculate it out.

249MB per week times 4 weeks per month equals almost 1gb.

What the heck do you have running that is sucking up that much?

[CAMAN]

If that is accurate I wouldn't call that being a heavy user, but more like using one app that is terribly designed.

If someone is knowingly using apps like that and then gets throttled by their provider I don't feel sorry for them at all. That's just dumb.

Whats the difference between if I use an app that I like and keeps me informed, or sitting on a weather site all day reloading data? I'm still using bandwidth. I'm paying for it so I will use it. I didn't get a $300 phone and pay for unlimited data so I can only use 1-2 gb a month! If you ask me, that's just dumb! If you're gonna pay that much for something you better have a use for it, not just sitting in your pocket all day. And this is one of my uses.

And if you must know it's a live wallpaper that updates itself every 15 minutes, of the weather radar centered over my location and follows my cell tower location(yeah the tin-foil hat bunch probably won't like it ). It works great and is actually very well designed and runs flawlessly. The reason it uses so much bandwidth is because it automagically updates a fairly decent resolution radar image every 15 minutes. Call me dumb whatever, weather is something that I am interested in and I like to stay up to speed on what is going on, and this is the only weather app that I have found that does this sort of thing, so I am keeping it.

Here's my homescreen...

[Kyhl]

I've been looking at this from a user and inverster point of view. From a user, I want my unlimited or cheaper data. Like everything else in electronics, why doesn't data get cheaper over time? This question really bothers me.

From the invester point of view, I am watching subscriber sentiment online like here, which could lead to subscriber turnover. Not good. Looking here seems more realistic as opposed to phone geek forums.

I'm thinking T would be the winner if that happened, and T has a better dividend. I know as a customer, T is the first place I will be looking if VZ's data becomes too expensive.

What I'd really like to see is for VZ to buy a bunch of equipment from OCLR and upgrade their infrastructure to allow for more and cheaper data plans. That would be a win-win-win.

[LMITOUT]

Whats the difference between if I use an app that I like and keeps me informed, or sitting on a weather site all day reloading data? I'm still using bandwidth. I'm paying for it so I will use it. I didn't get a $300 phone and pay for unlimited data so I can only use 1-2 gb a month! If you ask me, that's just dumb! If you're gonna pay that much for something you better have a use for it, not just sitting in your pocket all day. And this is one of my uses.

I guess the difference is that 99% of the time there is very little reason to have weather update every fifteen minutes, whether it is done automatically or manually, and that is coming from a fellow weather geek.

The cost of the device is irrelevant if you really think about it and compare it to other items a person owns. I have a boat but understand I could never use it enough to justify the cost. Winter really sucks in that regard.

Like I said, if someone wants to use that much data on frivolous things I could care less, but then don't complain when they want to throttle your plan.

[LMITOUT]

I've been looking at this from a user and inverster point of view. From a user, I want my unlimited or cheaper data. Like everything else in electronics, why doesn't data get cheaper over time? This question really bothers me.

I would assume that the price never reduces due to the fact that the loads on a provider's network are constantly increasing which causes them to continually add and improve infrastructure. Think about the type of data people are using today compared to just five years ago. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Netflix, etc. Not to mention that by the time they almost get caught up building out their network it seems that a new network system is developed and they almost have to start over again (analog-digital-3G-4G-LTE, etc).

Then there is the smartphone demographic. Now everyone and their mother has some sort of smartphone that is pulling data when not all that long ago it was mostly "geeks" and the younger techy crowd. Heck, even my dad has a RAZR now and has figured out how to upload videos to YouTube, yet a while back he wasn't willing to part with his analog bag phone until they threatened him that analog was going away and he wouldn't have service anymore. LOL! There are just more people using data and it keeps increasing which costs the carriers money.

The other thing is the iPhone phenomenon. After it was announced that the iPhone would be on carriers other than AT&T, people were nervous that their plans would become more restrictive after seeing what happened on AT&T due to the increase in data used by all those who switched to the hottest device on the market. And guess what? Here we are talking about VZ's data plans.

I'm on Sprint and so far nothing has changed with my data plan, but they got the iPhone later and Sprint users are also wondering if this is going to happen to them as well. I would have to think that it is only a matter of time. BTW, I upgraded to the HTC EVO 4G LTE and it is one sweet device.

[LwnmwnMan2]

I imagine it will shake itself out eventually.

Verizon dropped the double data promo, but as soon as the phone sales slip, they will post the promo again.

Same thing if many many people start to bail to Sprint, T-mobile, etc., they will run promos again to get you back.

I guess I'll have to weigh do I want to keep the Maxx (doesn't seem to be a new Motorola Droid coming out too soon anyways) and stay grandfathered in, or switch to a different carrier that may or may not have coverage where I go?

[upnorth]

I tend to think that most providers are going to be dropping their unlimited plans in the not too distant future too. Either that or they are going to have to raise rates to cover the costs of the increase in bandwidth.

[Kyhl]

I was starting to thing that the unlimited plan users were a small part of the mobile plans until I found a market research article from iGR on reuters this morning. It's a short article, google "iGR research unlimited" to find it.

Quote:

New iGR Study Shows That Unlimited Mobile Data Plan Users Are Those That Carriers Don't Want to Upset

...of all subscribers surveyed, 41.3 percent

reported having an unlimited data plan. Of the combined subscriber base

of Verizon Wireless and AT&T Wireless, 38.7 percent have unlimited data

plans. This AT&T Wireless and Verizon Wireless subscriber base was

profiled and tendencies were found in age, income and educational level,

among other categories....

..."The importance of this client base cannot be overstated -- unlimited

mobile data plan users are some of the most valuable subscribers in the

industry," said Iain Gillott, president and founder of iGR, a market

research consultancy focused on the wireless and mobile industry. "Our

research shows that these two carriers need to be very careful to offer a migration plan to replace the grandfathered unlimited plans that provides the data service, value, and recognition that meets these valuable consumers' needs...

[zamboni]

If you don't live in 4G land like me, it shouldn't apply to me. Verizon sucks, period. They need to make everywhere 4G then

[Kyhl]

They are working on it. Check their press releases. They are rolling out more 4G areas almost every day. Unfortunately for us, it is high density areas, mostly on the east coast lately.

I do miss 4G when I leave the metro. I don't know how people survive on their slow iphones. They don't know what they are msising.

[LwnmwnMan2]

They are working on it. Check their press releases. They are rolling out more 4G areas almost every day. Unfortunately for us, it is high density areas, mostly on the east coast lately.

I do miss 4G when I leave the metro. I don't know how people survive on their slow iphones. They don't know what they are msising.

I say the same thing when I'm relegated to using my wife's Droid X if my Maxx is dead.

[DTro]

Well I went ahead and just did the changeover tonight. As it turns out it's actually a better deal for my wife and I. Not only do we now get unlimited anytime minutes, we both get unlimited texts and also included mobile hotspot. For now we won't be going over 2GB's combined so price wise it was a wash.

Depending on your situation, this might be a good thing.

[minndonn]

Verizon is definitely upgrading their systems to 4g pretty fast and hope to have everything 4g in 2014. This is keeping my son busy with 60 to 70 hour weeks. I updated to the maxx so I could keep unlimited until i change phones again. Interestingly I speed tested when in Duluth on 4g and the speed was 8.87 mbps. A friend had ATT 4g and we did the same speed test on theirs and the speed was a little over e mbps . quite a difference. The signal strength was good in both cases.

[Scott K]

I dont think ATT has 4G in Duluth do they?

I also have noticed, the speed test isnt a really good judge to the actual speed. It is best to just find a page, and hit search on both phones at the smae time. You will be surprised, that a lot of the times, ATT's 3g, will actually load as fast, or faster then Verizons 4g. Not all the time though. But to be honest, we are usually talking a second difference either way, and it isnt really worth bragging about either service over the other.

[upnorth]

AT&T does have 4G in Duluth. Not the Range areas yet tho.

[Scott K]

AH, I didnt know that.

[upnorth]

My daughter lives in Duluth and has AT&T and she gets 4G there, but not up here.

[LwnmwnMan2]

My wife's X2 is getting a little buggy, so I went in to upgrade a line to a Galaxy S3.

Turns out, if we switch to the new share everything, our monthly rate is going to go up about $65 per month, WITH a 22% discount that my wife gets from her job.

2 smart phones at $40 each, 3 basic phones at $30 each (up from $10 per month, each) then 8 gb per month at $90.

Right now I pay about $215 / month for 1400 minutes, unlimited everything else.

The new bill will be $270 for unlimited everything else, 8 gb data.

My last 3 months' data usage was 6.333 gb / month.

I will be watching for phones on the secondary market.