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T-Mobile Rocks

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Re: T-Mobile Rocks

#91

Post by jrockway »

jeena wrote: post #69

I'm really confused when reading articles like this because it sounds like a different company to the one I know which was formed out of "Deutsche Post" during the 90ies and patronizing and shitting on its customers ever since, at least in Germany. The biggest thing with them this year was their 384kbps Speed Throttle[1], where after your family consumed 75GB of data (download and upload) the speed of your DSL (flatr…

T-mobile in the US has basically nothing to do with T-mobile in Europe. You can't even use a European T-mobile Wifi hotspot if you are a US T-mobile customer.

Re: T-Mobile Rocks

#92

Post by jeena »

josh2600 wrote: post #86
jeena wrote: post #69

I'm really confused when reading articles like this because it sounds like a different company to the one I know which was formed out of "Deutsche Post" during the 90ies and patronizing and shitting on its customers ever since, at least in Germany. The biggest thing with them this year was their 384kbps Speed Throttle[1], where after your family consumed 75GB of data (download and upload) the speed of your DSL (flatr…

So, shitty real answer: It's not profitable for T-Mobile to sell you that device at $404 if they can get someone else to pay $1200. Yes, that's shitty, but from an economic perspective it doesn't make sense for them to sell that equipment to you. The equipment, even unsubsidized, is a loss leader for the service. In short, it would be a good customer experience if they should you the phone, but it doesn't make econom…

I wouldn't mind if they didn't advertise it for 404 zl (ca. $130) in the shop, on TV, the radio and in newspapers.

Re: T-Mobile Rocks

#93

Post by thirdsun »

mikeash wrote: post #72
anxrn wrote: post #57

T-Mobile is shaking up the industry like Apple should have (and could have) done with the launch of the iPhone in 2007.

Let's not discount what Apple pulled off. Before the iPhone, carriers ruled handsets with an iron fist, dictating what features they would have and what apps would be available. Apple completely smashed that. Carriers now, for the most part, accept that they don't get to decide what your phone does, only how you use your connection with them. The carriers used to do things like disable Bluetooth and charge you extra…

To be fair this seems to be a US-exclusive experience. Things like these were unheard of in Europe. I feel that some european carriers just rather recently learned a thing or two from the US-carrier playbook, like charging for tethering, approving/delaying software updates, etc.

Still, I'm glad that the invention carrier-approved and net-locked phones never/rarely made it across the ocean.

Re: T-Mobile Rocks

#94

Post by jrockway »

throwaway9848 wrote: post #84

Ting, Ting, Ting. A thousand times Ting. A customer, not an employee. I won't gush, see ting.com, it's an MVNO on the Sprint network. EDIT: It kind of bothers me that someone downvoted this. It's not like I used an affiliate link or stand to benefit from this. Sorry for sharing :P

I don't think you actually save any money on Ting. Their biggest data plan is 3000M for $55 (with no text messages and no phone service), compared with T-mobile's unlimited everything for $70. The innovation they offer is that if you don't use anything and know you never will, you only pay $6 a month. But then again, I could get you the complete lack of calling, data, and text for $0 a month. You don't even have to buy a phone.

Re: T-Mobile Rocks

#95

Post by maxerickson »

tfigment wrote: post #89
mhurron wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing. I switched from Virgin to T-Mobile when it looked like I may be traveling internationally so I wanted a phone that would work in Europe. My coverage is a little better with T-Mobile and the ability to roam to other carriers in the event I am out of T-Mobile's coverage areas is nice. They had a better choice of phones too. The only bad thing I would say with Virgin Mobile is about the roaming, but if you are…

I have Virgin and agree with the points here. Basically roaming on the $35/mo plan is non-existent but I have never had an issue with my phone not working in the areas I live and visit (unless there was a tower down). Sprint's 4G coverage is very poor so if you expect that then good luck but my phone is not so I don't mind yet and can easily switch to another carrier like T-Mobile when I do.

Virgin Mobile USA is owned by Sprint and only works on Sprint towers, roaming is explicitly non existent.

Re: T-Mobile Rocks

#96

Post by rradu »

T-Mobile simply doesn't have any data coverage outside of major metropolitan areas. If you're someone that travels outside these areas, you will be unable to use your devices for anything but calls and texts.

That's a big caveat that should be mentioned.

(If you never leave the Bay Area, for example, then T-Mobile is a logical choice. It works well for me 98% of the time here.)

Re: T-Mobile Rocks

#97

Post by idupree »

mikeash wrote: post #67
kunai wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Barely. OpenDarwin is dead. WebKit was stolen from KHTML. CUPS has barely any development anymore. Apart from LLVM, what have they really contributed to OSS? Okay, it's more than Microsoft, but net contribution is still nothing compared to Google or Sun (when they were still alive).

WebKit is itself open source, so you can't discount that just because it was derived from another open source project. Aside from LLVM/clang and WebKit (both of which are significant enough to deserve massive accolades all by themselves), you also have stuff like launchd (which didn't catch on outside Apple, but hardly their fault), libdispatch, and mDNS. But apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine,…

Historical note: Launchd might have caught on if Apple had open-sourced it sooner.

The author of the Upstart init system, Scott James Remnant, wrote in 2006,

"How does [Upstart] differ from launchd?

launchd is the replacement init system used in MacOS X developed as an “Open Source” project by Apple. For much of its life so far, the licence has actually been entirely non-free and thus it has only become recently interesting with the licence change.

[...]

Had the licence been sufficiently free at the point we began development of our own system, we would probably have extended launchd rather than implement our own. At the point Apple changed the licence, our own system was already more suitable for our purposes."

http://netsplit.com/2006/08/26/upstart-in-universe/

Re: T-Mobile Rocks

#98

Post by throwaway9848 »

jrockway wrote: post #94
throwaway9848 wrote: post #84

Ting, Ting, Ting. A thousand times Ting. A customer, not an employee. I won't gush, see ting.com, it's an MVNO on the Sprint network. EDIT: It kind of bothers me that someone downvoted this. It's not like I used an affiliate link or stand to benefit from this. Sorry for sharing :P

I don't think you actually save any money on Ting. Their biggest data plan is 3000M for $55 (with no text messages and no phone service), compared with T-mobile's unlimited everything for $70. The innovation they offer is that if you don't use anything and know you never will, you only pay $6 a month. But then again, I could get you the complete lack of calling, data, and text for $0 a month. You don't even have to b…

I save a significant amount of money, but you're right that if you're a heavy mobile data user other plans might make more sense. I am not: less than 1K voice minutes, 1K texts, and 250MB data between 2 lines (~$800 up-front for pretty decent smartphones). I pay $35-50/month. And not having a contract is nice.

I would be remiss not to give them a huge amount of credit for their support staff. They really care about that. The only time I called in, a live person answered the phone after 1 or 2 rings and then proceeded to solve a somewhat technical problem without transferring me.

Anyway, I don't want to sound like a paid plug for them. But I like them a lot.

Re: T-Mobile Rocks

#99

Post by greenmountin »

Shivetya wrote: post #83
stevenleeg wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But at least there are no 2 year contracts to keep us locked into T-Mobile if they ever turn into dirtbags!

I am so tired of two year contracts, but I have a list of 'approved' carriers I can choose from and have my phone partially paid for. Until recently T-Mobile was not on the list. Now all I need to do if wait out my current two year with the other guys. There is certainly nothing smart about paying seventy, eighty, or more, per month for a smart phone. If anyone is smart its the guys charging for it and getting it.

Two year contracts are a lie, a prop, an illusion. If you break it, you basically pay back the prorated part of the phone discount you got. If you go to a carrier without phone subsidies, they'll charge you less month-to-month an amount equal to the monthly prorated phone discount.

This was my realization when pricing out basic phone service with T-Mobile, ATT, etc. You have to really work hard to pay different. Just don't be afraid to break the contract, it's not a real penalty.

Re: T-Mobile Rocks

#100

Post by fersho311 »

My company uses ATT and Ive switched to using my company phone 100% of the time. However, I still have my TMobile sim pard sitting around and I'm still paying monthly payments even I don't use my TMobile plan at all. Had it been any other carrier, I would have cancelled in a heartbeat.
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