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Forget the Cellphone Fight — We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own

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Re: Forget the Cellphone Fight — We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own

#11

Post by jdechko »

Thiz wrote: post #4

Vote with your wallet. Don't buy locked phones. Once the consumers know the power they have in their hands, change will come easier.

I'm torn on the issue of buying locked vs unlocked. I have a family to support, so I don't have $500 or more to spend on an unlocked iPhone. Even if I had the money, I live in the US, and I haven't traveled outside of the country in over 10 years. Finally, there is no monthly discount on service if you bring an unlocked phone to a carrier, so that's the third strike. I'll continue to buy a new locked device every couple of years and take the subsidy, thanks. I'll also be having my 4S unlocked when this contract is up.

Having said that, I agree that it should be easier to unlock phones in the US, even if it's just for international coverage (which would be something).

Re: Forget the Cellphone Fight — We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own

#12

Post by icebraining »

jdechko wrote: post #11
Thiz wrote: post #4

Vote with your wallet. Don't buy locked phones. Once the consumers know the power they have in their hands, change will come easier.

I'm torn on the issue of buying locked vs unlocked. I have a family to support, so I don't have $500 or more to spend on an unlocked iPhone. Even if I had the money, I live in the US, and I haven't traveled outside of the country in over 10 years. Finally, there is no monthly discount on service if you bring an unlocked phone to a carrier, so that's the third strike. I'll continue to buy a new locked device every cou…

I don't have $500 to spend on an iPhone either, so I just don't buy iPhones.

Re: Forget the Cellphone Fight — We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own

#13

Post by icebraining »

venomsnake wrote: post #10
Thiz wrote: post #4

Vote with your wallet. Don't buy locked phones. Once the consumers know the power they have in their hands, change will come easier.

That is fallacy. Carriers are oligopoly with high cost of entrance. So if all carriers provide only locked phones there may not be enough devices on the market. There should be laws preventing forced vertical integration. If you sell hardware you cannot restrict the os(you are free to provide os, but locking of the bootloader should be left to the user). If you sell OS you cannot limit what applications the user can…

Why are you limited to carrier-provided phones?

Re: Forget the Cellphone Fight — We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own

#14

Post by larvaetron »

mseebach wrote: post #5
uvdiv wrote: post #2

Meanwhile, progress is being made to legalize cellphone unlocking. With grassroots groups leading the charge, the Obama administration announced its support for overturning the ban last week. I'm astonished that people overwhelmingly believe this falsehood. The White House response opposes legalized phone unlocking, except to phones already out of contract. When they say they "support unlocking", they have a differen…

> We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own You don't own a subsidised cell phone until your contract is out.

A contract for 12/24 months of service has nothing to do with ownership of the phone. If you paid for it, it's yours.

Re: Forget the Cellphone Fight — We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own

#15

Post by bostonpete »

uvdiv wrote: post #7
bostonpete wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm astonished that people overwhelmingly believe this falsehood. Maybe that "falsehood" doesn't conform to your beliefs about what sort of unlocking should be allowed, but I think the quote you highlighted is a reasonable one. There are legitimate reasons to allow restrictions on what can be done with subsidized devices which are still bound by a service agreement. Your comment suggests that you're astonished that…

Maybe that "falsehood" doesn't conform to your beliefs about what sort of unlocking should be allowed, I think their definition disagrees with most peoples' definitions, including the one in the petition itself: "As of January 26, consumers will no longer be able unlock their phones for use on a different network without carrier permission, even after their contract has expired. " Unlocking phones under contract is i…

> Unlocking phones under contract is implicitly their core complaint.

That's not so clear to me. You conveniently neglected to italicize "even after their contract has expired", which along with this phrase -- "decreases the resale value of devices that consumers have paid for in full" -- seems to be included highlight the fact that the situation where a phone has been paid for in full is potentially different from a subsidized phone which is still being paid off.

Agreeing with the petition for that subset of phones isn't failing to respond to the petition.

Re: Forget the Cellphone Fight — We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own

#16

Post by mokus »

larvaetron wrote: post #14
mseebach wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own You don't own a subsidised cell phone until your contract is out.

A contract for 12/24 months of service has nothing to do with ownership of the phone. If you paid for it, it's yours.

That's exactly the point. You didn't pay for it until you gave them their 12/24 months of service fees (or early-termination fee).

Re: Forget the Cellphone Fight — We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own

#17

Post by uvdiv »

bostonpete wrote: post #15
uvdiv wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe that "falsehood" doesn't conform to your beliefs about what sort of unlocking should be allowed, I think their definition disagrees with most peoples' definitions, including the one in the petition itself: "As of January 26, consumers will no longer be able unlock their phones for use on a different network without carrier permission, even after their contract has expired. " Unlocking phones under contract is i…

> Unlocking phones under contract is implicitly their core complaint. That's not so clear to me. You conveniently neglected to italicize "even after their contract has expired", which along with this phrase -- "decreases the resale value of devices that consumers have paid for in full" -- seems to be included highlight the fact that the situation where a phone has been paid for in full is potentially different from a…

[...] which along with this phrase -- "decreases the resale value of devices that consumers have paid for in full" -- seems to be included highlight the fact that the situation where a phone has been paid for in full is potentially different from a subsidized phone which is still being paid off.

The petition is about both of them. Another of its complaints applies only to phones with contracts: roaming fees,

Consumers will be forced to pay exorbitant roaming fees to make calls while traveling abroad.

(The point being that travellers' inability to deal directly with other telcos, because of the locks on their phones, gives telcos monopoly power, allowing them to charge monopolistic rates).

You conveniently neglected to italicize "even after their contract has expired"

I did italicize it -- that's what I was emphasising! It's double-italicized so it became normal again, according to this rule, which I infer is a bit obscure (sorry for the time-wasting!)

If something within a run of italics needs to be italicized itself, the type is normally switched back to non-italicized (roman) type

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italic_type#Italics_within_ita...

The first italicisation is what I understand to be HN convention: to italicize quoted text.

Re: Forget the Cellphone Fight — We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own

#18

Post by pasbesoin »

mokus wrote: post #16
larvaetron wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A contract for 12/24 months of service has nothing to do with ownership of the phone. If you paid for it, it's yours.

That's exactly the point. You didn't pay for it until you gave them their 12/24 months of service fees (or early-termination fee).

An argument against this has been that, regardless of the phone's status -- locked or unlocked -- you are bound by the terms of the contract you entered. Specifically, you are still paying the monthly fee and so paying off the subsidy on the phone (one can argue, although a true, cost-based accounting argument might have you paying off that subsidy in a smaller subset of the initial months).

What unlocking then provides, is the ability to escape onerous terms and fees for additional service, such as roaming fees when traveling outside of the normal service area.

If, with a GSM model, for example, you can pop in a different SIM under those circumstances, should you be able to?

Given some the the shenanigans that have occurred in this industry, including outsized roaming fees, I tend to be in favor of saying "yes", to this.

Or, put it this way: Competition's good. Even, or especially, within the term of rather long (with respect to technical and economic developments within the telecommunications industry) two year contracts.

If, with a bit of effort and trouble, you can escape absurd roaming fees, new data cap restrictions, et al. Then, perhaps, your current, contracted carrier will feel more incentive to compete with reasonable terms and pricing.

Re: Forget the Cellphone Fight — We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own

#19

Post by Sanddancer »

mseebach wrote: post #5
uvdiv wrote: post #2

Meanwhile, progress is being made to legalize cellphone unlocking. With grassroots groups leading the charge, the Obama administration announced its support for overturning the ban last week. I'm astonished that people overwhelmingly believe this falsehood. The White House response opposes legalized phone unlocking, except to phones already out of contract. When they say they "support unlocking", they have a differen…

> We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own You don't own a subsidised cell phone until your contract is out.

I don't "own" a car I buy on loan until I pay that off. That doesn't preclude me from replacing seats, putting in a turbo, etc. Why should a phone be different?

Re: Forget the Cellphone Fight — We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own

#20

Post by res0nat0r »

Sanddancer wrote: post #19
mseebach wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We Should Be Allowed to Unlock Everything We Own You don't own a subsidised cell phone until your contract is out.

I don't "own" a car I buy on loan until I pay that off. That doesn't preclude me from replacing seats, putting in a turbo, etc. Why should a phone be different?

You can do many of those things to your car, but some of them might nullify your warranty.
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