241–250 of 608 posts
I found the link to the coverage map in the FAQ: > https://fi.google.com/coverage Looks like it blankets most of Canada with 2G service. I guess through roaming agreements from Sprint/T-Mo. I wonder if they are selling to Canadian residents?
Attempted to request an invite but it doesn't allow Canadian postal codes (ie: V5H 2T3), only stuff like 90210.
Sigh.
1. Wow, it's available in Canada right off the bat. This must be a first for Google.
2. Does nobody in Montana own a cell phone? Alberta is probably equally empty as Montana, and yet almost their entire provice has coverage.
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What I don't get is, what's in this for Sprint and T-Mobile? Currently a user of their network is a customer they "own" -- they deal with that customer directly. Now they have Google sitting between them and the user, which effectively commoditizes their service; Google could switch them out for another network down the road without the user ever knowing or caring. That's great for Google, and probably also great for…
Google is charging a significant markup over T-Mobile's existing rates ($30/month for 5Gb vs $70/month through Gooogle.) So Fi is really only interesting for people doing significant international roaming.
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>What makes Google competitive in any industry? Having a goose who lays golden eggs (search + adsense) to subsidize development?
Basically any new business needs capital, so not sure what you mean here. Where do you think VCs get their money, for instance?
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Or better yet: why aren't they offering an unlimited data plan like what T-Mobile and Sprint (Google Fi's "partners") already offer? Why aren't they even at least going with T-Mobile's approach of "throttle the connection once you go past your data cap, but don't charge overages"? It's like they're taking the best things of both carriers - their unlimited data plans - and pretending those things don't exist, that the…
> Or better yet: why aren't they offering an unlimited data plan like what T-Mobile and Sprint (Google Fi's "partners") already offer? Because they're acting as an MVNO, and have to pay Sprint and T-Mobile for each MB they deliver to the handset. Google is not trying to replace carriers, they're trying to improve the experience as an MVNO (they providing what Republic Wireless does on a much larger scale).
The big thing about this from my perspective is that it abolishes roaming. One plan, and you pay the same whether you use it in your home country or anywhere else. I'm not aware that anybody else is offering that, especially not at that price. As a German living in the UK i currently juggle two SIM cards, and whenever I fly back home I have to mess with the data flatrate there since it's worth activating the monthly…
Regarding juggling sim cards: I recently traveled between a few EU countries using a 3 UK pay-as-you-go card (with the their roaming package http://www.three.co.uk/Discover/Phones/Feel_At_Home). It worked well, and even in the middle of nowhere in Italy, I had good coverage. It was a PITA to top-up before I left from the US. But if you are already in the UK, that is probably a non-issue. I think it was 15EUR for unlimited data + N/minutes & texts.
I am sure there are probably downsides, but it might be something to look into while Fi is still in infancy.
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This looks to me like a pure "commoditize your complements" play. All of Google's products require great mobile internet everywhere. By getting involved in that market, they can help make it much more competitive (at the moment, cell reception is expensive and shit). It's like Google Code. Google didn't particularly want to be in that business, but Sourceforge was complete shit, and the open source ecosystem was key…
Same with the new Pixel. A device to inspire Chromebook makers to make better, more powerful Chromebooks. And they (Google) themselves said that they don't aim to sell a ton of Pixels and make a lot of money out of it. I think they do it fairly.
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Just as a point of reference, this is about on par with AT&T family share plans - I pay $145 a month for 3 iphones, unlimited text and talk with 10 gigs shared data. With taxes and fees it comes out to right around $160 (which would be the same here if I used all 10 gigs). The down side is that I'm not refunded for any unused data, so I pay that every month. But we use a good chunk of it every month, so this wouldn't…
I also use an AT&T share plan and they recently started rolling over unused data. So while I'm not getting money back I feel like I'm at least accruing something when I don't get close to my max. Depending on your plan they might be doing the same for you now too?
I think AT&T only rolls over data to the next month, so you aren't actually accruing anything. Unlike T-Mobile, who I believe roll over data for up to 12 months.
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My best guess is that these carriers regret offering unlimited data.
I see a lot of new offerings that have unlimited slow data. I doubt they regret it; it gives people peace of mind while still giving them incentive to upgrade.
I wish Google and Apple would copy the concept and just have their phones always be on the network, with cell plans just serving as a way to get voice service and get a decent download speed. Now that Google has built out an MVNO, they could definitely enable such a thing.