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A World Without Wi-Fi Looks Possible as Unlimited Plans Rise

bloomberg.com

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Re: A World Without Wi-Fi Looks Possible as Unlimited Plans Rise

#11

Post by Frqy3 »

Even if mobile carriers introduce truly unlimited plans and excellent indoor coverage everywhere, they will also need to open extensive APIs to enterprises if they want to entice them away from Wi-Fi.

Enterprises (including businesses with public access areas such as shopping centres and stadiums) want the extra control and information (such as the location of consumers as they move through shopping centres) they have with their Wi-Fi networks that they can get today.

Conversely, the mobile carriers will probably be wanting to incorporate the Wi-Fi access into their mobile networks as another access type. Apart from the control aspect, having combined and coordinated access to both licensed and unlicensed spectrum allows a better infrastructure cost to capacity tradeoff.

Re: A World Without Wi-Fi Looks Possible as Unlimited Plans Rise

#12

Post by arethuza »

akoster wrote: post #5
0x0 wrote: post #3

Have fun not being able to update iOS (even if the iOS update is only 20mb), or downloading or updating the Facebook iOS app since it's bigger than 100mb! :)

Also, have fun trying to use your "high-speed"data connection in buildings with terrible reception. Disclaimer: I've worked in many of these

We recently purchased a house 9km from Edinburgh with no mobile signal - fortunately the Vodafone signal booster device we got (which relies on broadband) appears to work really well.

What we hadn't noticed is that you get a decent signal in the garden but not in the house. Probably as we are right next to a small hill of solid volcanic rock that is between our house and the nearest mast.

Re: A World Without Wi-Fi Looks Possible as Unlimited Plans Rise

#15

Post by johnchristopher »

Frqy3 wrote: post #11

Even if mobile carriers introduce truly unlimited plans and excellent indoor coverage everywhere, they will also need to open extensive APIs to enterprises if they want to entice them away from Wi-Fi. Enterprises (including businesses with public access areas such as shopping centres and stadiums) want the extra control and information (such as the location of consumers as they move through shopping centres) they hav…

I am pretty sure Bluetooth geoloc and NFC stacks provides better tools for marketing and tracking purposes.

Re: A World Without Wi-Fi Looks Possible as Unlimited Plans Rise

#16

Post by jankotek »

fleshgolem wrote: post #6

As per usual: Good job of extrapolating american circumstances to the rest of the world

Quite opposite. US is far behind and expensive. UK and Ireland had unlimited data plans 5 years ago for 20 euro/month. Today even Turkey or Vietnam have better data deals than US.

Re: A World Without Wi-Fi Looks Possible as Unlimited Plans Rise

#17

Post by jrockway »

msimpson wrote: post #8

> With every major U.S. wireless carrier now offering unlimited data plans, consumers don’t need to log on to a Wi-Fi network to avoid costly overage charges anymore. That’s a critical change that threatens to render Wi-Fi obsolete. Does anyone at Bloomberg understand data caps or throttling?

That statement sounds technically correct to me. You don't need to log on to a Wi-Fi network to avoid costly overage charges. You do need to log on to use the Internet usefully, however.

Re: A World Without Wi-Fi Looks Possible as Unlimited Plans Rise

#18

Post by the-dude »

arethuza wrote: post #12
akoster wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, have fun trying to use your "high-speed"data connection in buildings with terrible reception. Disclaimer: I've worked in many of these

We recently purchased a house 9km from Edinburgh with no mobile signal - fortunately the Vodafone signal booster device we got (which relies on broadband) appears to work really well. What we hadn't noticed is that you get a decent signal in the garden but not in the house. Probably as we are right next to a small hill of solid volcanic rock that is between our house and the nearest mast.

> signal booster

I think the correct term is femtocell

Re: A World Without Wi-Fi Looks Possible as Unlimited Plans Rise

#19

Post by ferbivore »

croon wrote: post #9

> Customers will get full LTE speeds until they reach 22GB of usage, after which they’ll be subject to reduced data speeds and de-prioritization. > Hotspot tethering — up to 10GB at LTE speeds — is included, as are calls and texts to Mexico and Canada. That's certainly an alternative take on the definition of "unlimited" than the one I'm accustomed to. Curious: What's the reduced speed? Is it less than 1Mbit/s? If so…

Carriers have been using this particular definition for years. I used to have a plan that included 5 GiB of HSPA+ traffic, followed by an all-you-can-eat 50 KiB/s buffet. Technically unlimited!

Re: A World Without Wi-Fi Looks Possible as Unlimited Plans Rise

#20

Post by wccrawford »

croon wrote: post #9

> Customers will get full LTE speeds until they reach 22GB of usage, after which they’ll be subject to reduced data speeds and de-prioritization. > Hotspot tethering — up to 10GB at LTE speeds — is included, as are calls and texts to Mexico and Canada. That's certainly an alternative take on the definition of "unlimited" than the one I'm accustomed to. Curious: What's the reduced speed? Is it less than 1Mbit/s? If so…

T-Mobile's 10G plan says it reverts to 3G speeds after you hit your data cap. (This is the plan I'm on.)

Their "unlimited" plan doesn't seem to have that clause, but it does say that after 30GB you'll be prioritized behind other customers and might see a drop in speed.

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