Besides home where I amazingly get "4G" where I travel is 2G so yeah - the irony is I'm typing this while using a Verizon LTE Mifi hostpot from said "2G" location.
Project Fi by Google
571–580 of 608 posts
Re: Project Fi by Google
#572Earlier quoted context omitted.
A carrier in germany has to build 26 times less towers than a carrier in the US, because germany is more than 26 times smaller than the US. I would think the increased expenditure of 26 times more towers would increase the cost of plans. Europe also never had the culture of carrier subsidized phones, and so were never accustomed to paying more in monthly fees in exchange for low to no cost upgrades of hardware. Tethe…
Europeans never paid for speed, that's completely incorrect. There's no tradeoff - mobile phone usage in Europe is simply much, much cheaper because there's not the same quadrupoly that exists in the US (thanks to government intervention and much stricter competitivity laws). That's an interesting attempt to justify the price, but it completely fails to take into account that simply calculating area is nowhere near a…
> Europeans never paid for speed, that's completely incorrect.
https://www.dna.fi/liittymat https://kauppa.saunalahti.fi/#!/matkapuhelinliittymat
I understand that theres a lot of variety in Europe, but to say that tiers by speed doesn't happen is factually incorrect.
>There's no tradeoff
I never said there was, I am simply pointing out differences in how the markets are set up and function in these vastly different continents
>there's not the same quadrupoly that exists in the US
This is true, this is the biggest problem with the US cellular market today
>That's an interesting attempt to justify the price
I'm not trying to justify anything, just explain some of the differences.
>but it completely fails to take into account that simply calculating area is nowhere near accurate for the number of towers - it depends on where people live
It depends on hundreds of factors - population density, building density, building materials, types of cellular radios used (CDMA vs GSM have different ranges), terrain, interference, number of carriers, etc
The difference in land area is definitely a factor - i never said it was the only one. My mistake was obviously saying '26 times more towers', which i admit was a careless thing to say, but i think it still made my point. The US has significantly more infrastructure than any single european country, in part due to its much larger coverage area.
>Fortunately people live close together, so towers don't need to cover every square inch of the country.
Much truer in Europe than in the US - US: 32.65/sq km UK: 262/sq km [1]
>If you look up the number of towers, you'll find that the US has roughly 120,000 mobile base stations
I see 205,000[2] - which puts the US at ~10 times the towers of the UK
>So your argument does not hold. do you think that the cost of ~10 times more infrastructure is not part of the higher prices in the US compared to the UK? My argument was that having to spend much greater amounts on infrastructure is one of the reasons for a price difference, i didn't say it was the only reason or explanation just that it's worth noting.
>I'll never understand how people think that you get "low to no cost upgrades" of hardware.
This is just the psychology of purchasing. People don't like spending a lot of money at once and would prefer to spread costs out over time - I completely agree that the 'subsidized' model is garbage, but i haven't been able to convince a single family member to switch to buying phones outright no matter how many times i show them the lower cost after the full two years. Of course by low to no cost i meant when you walk into the provider's location after two years, you walk out with a new phone that you paid very little for during that transaction. It doesn't seem to matter to most people that they end up paying more than the phones full retail cost over the course of two years.
[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_de... [2]http://www.statisticbrain.com/cell-phone-tower-statistics/
Re: Project Fi by Google
#573Earlier quoted context omitted.
A carrier in germany has to build 26 times less towers than a carrier in the US, because germany is more than 26 times smaller than the US. I would think the increased expenditure of 26 times more towers would increase the cost of plans. Europe also never had the culture of carrier subsidized phones, and so were never accustomed to paying more in monthly fees in exchange for low to no cost upgrades of hardware. Tethe…
There are considerably more providers than actual carriers in Germany. The way frequencies are assigned in Germany probably plays into this, but in a nutshell: many if not most people don't have contracts with the actual network operators (i.e. carriers) but with companies that are merely service providers. There are a lot of spin-off companies offering discounted monthly or pre-paid plans contracts compared to the e…
>There are considerably more providers than actual carriers in Germany
The same is true in the US, they are called MVNO's http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_mobile_vi...
>What you say about subsidized phones is patently false
You are most likely talking about carriers allowing people to finance their phones in europe. Where you can pay an additional 20 euros a month to get the new iphone or whatever.
This is not at all what i'm talking about.
In the US, when you open a cell phone contract, you get a new phone at a discounted price. You sign a contract and you get to choose from the carriers selection of phones, older phones being completely free, newest phones costing 200 dollars. The rest of the cost of the phone is hidden inside of the cost of the plan itself. There is no line item for how much you are paying for the phone each month, it is simply part of the pricing of the service itself. When your phone has been completely paid off, you will never know because your plans price will not change.
In europe, you finance phones, when they are paid off you stop paying for the phone and you then own the phone. your bill goes down. This is not at all the same behavior as the subsidized phone system in the US.
>German providers offer unlimited low-speed data with a varying amount of high-speed data
This is what im talking about, this does not exist in the US. There is no variation of speeds, you either have data or you dont.
There is some subversion by carriers using 'throttling' where they slow certain lines down to a crawl when the carrier decides they've used too much data for the month, but that is by no means a part of how plans are priced.
>So, yeah, your information seems to be a bit out of date
admittedly so, i haven't been in europe for more than a week since 2013 - and have never spent much time in germany
Re: Project Fi by Google
#574Couldn't the separation of talk/text and data be eliminated? Is there a difference anymore or is it just marketing?
Re: Project Fi by Google
#575For those who don't want to read the FAQ or find the video incredibly unhelpful [1]: a. It only supports the Nexus 6 out of the gate. b. It automatically switches you to the "fastest" network available. Partners out of the gate are Sprint and T-mobile. Sounds like it prefers Wifi, then 4G LTE, and then degrades down to 3G or 2G. c. Pricing is $20 for unlimited talk (domestic) and text (domestic and international) and…
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Re: Project Fi by Google
#576Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The only thing Google's promising that Republic isn't is the international service. Can you comment on tethering? IIRC, my Moto X through Republic doesn't allow tethering.
Fi is a metered data service. Republic Wireless is an unlimited data service. Fi makes money on tethering. Republic Wireless loses money on tethering.
Thanks. For me, unlimited data for $25 with Republic vs 1GB for $30 with Fi doesn't make a big difference. But being able to tether is a differentiator.
Re: Project Fi by Google
#577Can anyone explain why the data charges are set up how they are? Why have you choose a "plan" in increments of $10 and then refund/charge you (per MB?) for going under/over your "plan"? Why not just charge you for usage at the end of the month? It comes out the same, and one is weird and the other is very simple.
Republic's Maestro seems to be similar: "Get paid back" for data you don't use. Why? It just makes me keep rereading looking for the catch.
Re: Project Fi by Google
#578Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are considerably more providers than actual carriers in Germany. The way frequencies are assigned in Germany probably plays into this, but in a nutshell: many if not most people don't have contracts with the actual network operators (i.e. carriers) but with companies that are merely service providers. There are a lot of spin-off companies offering discounted monthly or pre-paid plans contracts compared to the e…
>There are considerably more providers than actual carriers in Germany The same is true in the US, they are called MVNO's http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_mobile_vi... >What you say about subsidized phones is patently false You are most likely talking about carriers allowing people to finance their phones in europe. Where you can pay an additional 20 euros a month to get the new iphone or whatever.…
It is also throttling in the EU (At least in NL). If I pay for an 'unlimited' data plan it's usually something like 2GB at 4G and then "2G" speeds (64kbps) after that. It's just throttling, as your phone remains connected at "4G".
Now many providers have dropped the "unlimited 2G" data claim and just stating the rate limit after you use your high-speed bucket.
Re: Project Fi by Google
#579For those who don't want to read the FAQ or find the video incredibly unhelpful [1]: a. It only supports the Nexus 6 out of the gate. b. It automatically switches you to the "fastest" network available. Partners out of the gate are Sprint and T-mobile. Sounds like it prefers Wifi, then 4G LTE, and then degrades down to 3G or 2G. c. Pricing is $20 for unlimited talk (domestic) and text (domestic and international) and…
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…
"...it still seems dumb -- accepting a little money today at the cost of cutting your own throat in the long term. But then there aren't many providers in the US that aren't dumb"
Well, if history proves anything is that most of their investors will prefer an immediate cash-in that will raise the results and the stock price, over the long-term sustainability of the company.
Re: Project Fi by Google
#580Earlier quoted context omitted.
On most android phones that thing is part of the display that contextually hides itself, and doesn't take up extra physical space
"Most"? I've not had a single Android phone where the buttons have been part of the display. A few tablets, but no phones. I'm sure there are plenty of phones that do that too, but I've somehow managed to avoid them for the 6-7 or so Android phones I've owned.
Pretty much every Android phone released in the last 2 years besides those made by Samsung (which is admittedly a large percentage) have had on screen keys.