

Why AT&T is increasing its Pricing - proee
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704025304575284643351533652.html

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hugh3
The answer "because they want to make more money" doesn't seem particularly
insightful.

 _AT &T is moving from an all-you-can-eat data structure to one where the
people who consume the most network pay more._

Of course this wouldn't be a problem if Steve Jobs hadn't made an implicit
promise that you'd be able to get all-you-can-eat data from AT&T for $30 on an
iPad, motivating many people to buy one. I _almost_ bought one last weekend
based on this assumption, now I'm glad I didn't.

But does anyone know whether a high-bandwidth user really costs AT&T
significantly more than one wandering around with their phone on downloading
just a trickle of data. AT&T already paid for their infrastructure, right?

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noelchurchill
If you had bought one last week then you would have gotten the all you can eat
plan for $30.

I think that plan is still available until next monday, unless I'm mistaken
and it ended last monday...

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ben1040
>If you had bought one last week then you would have gotten the all you can
eat plan for $30.

But you can't sign up for the unlimited plan and turn it off whenever you
please, which is how Apple is _still_ advertising the iPad despite these
changes being announced. [1] At this point nobody can a new iPad and still get
this old pricing, given that the iPad is backordered 7-10 days and the changes
take effect in 4 days.

[1] <http://www.apple.com/ipad/3g/>

~~~
proee
How can they continue to advertise unlimited? This is downright lying.

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bradleyland
The comparison to Apple is kind of a side-show to the real problems facing
AT&T. AT&T is suffering tremendous negative consumer perception, and they
don't have any significant prospects for future growth, so their stock goes
mostly sideways despite the fact that their business is solidly entrenched by
ironclad spectrum licenses and consumer lock-in service contracts. It's not
that they're struggling. Their quarterly report shows quite the opposite:

[http://www.att.com/Investor/Growth_Profile/download/master_Q...](http://www.att.com/Investor/Growth_Profile/download/master_Q4_09.pdf)

For the three month period ending 12/31/2009 they posted $13.8 billion in
revenue and $3.4 billion in income for their wireless division. Not to shabby.

The bottom line is this: they're raising prices because they can. Verizon,
Sprint, and T-Mobile will happily follow suit once they've observed any
potential customer-base attrition and are convinced that they can do the same
without repercussion.

In this context, the comparison to AAPL just seems silly.

~~~
wheaties
They're not only raising prices because they can, they're raising prices
because they should. Higher prices will allow them to invest more in upcoming
technologies like 4G networks.

\- I don't mind paying more if I use more. \- I do mind, however, if someone
paying the same as me is ruining my connection.

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Alex3917
This is pretty much the greatest change ever.

I'd consider myself a heavy iPhone user, and yet the most data I've ever used
in a month is 175MB. Why?

* My email is set to download manually. * I buy and purchase apps and music using the computer instead of over the 3G. I update my apps over the computer as well. * I don't stream music, and I don't use YouTube very often.

Despite the fact that it's not uncommon for me to be surfing the web on my
phone for more than an hour a day, I've never come close to the limit. For me,
not only am I going to save $15 a month but the service is going to get a ton
faster too. How can anyone consider this a bad thing? Just plug your phone
into the computer when you want to update your apps, and that's pretty much
the only change most people will need to make to save $15 a month.

~~~
tocomment
I'm right around 175MB too, but for me that's too close for comfort. I don't
want to worry about hitting 200MB one month. If they offered 500MB, or 750MB
I'd certainly get that.

~~~
msmith
Going over the 200MB plan isn't such a big deal, as long as you don't go waay
over. I'm in the same boat. On average, even with the occasional overage I'll
probably be spending less than I did with the $30 unlimited plan.

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DrJokepu
I think network infrastructure and retail mobile operators should be separated
by legislation and network infrastructure companies should not be allowed to
favour one or another retail operator. This would help competition as
launching even a national retail operator wouldn't require anymore to invest
heavily in network infrastructure as well as it would force network
infrastructure operators to be more competitive because large retail operators
would probably apply a lot more pressure on them to invest in their networks
than individual customers.

This would help to get rid of the current oligopoly in mobile communication
market and individual customers would win.

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maukdaddy
Comparing stock prices directly for these two companies is ignorant - they are
completely different. AT&T is an ancient telco with dividend, while Apple is a
(relatively) young, tech, growth stock.

~~~
hugh3
Calling a $250 billion company a young growth stock seems somewhat ambitious.
They're dominant in several product categories, a very significant player in
others, and have room for really significant growth in only a few.

Much like AT&T, I suppose.

Personally I'm bearish on Apple's long term prospects for this reason: right
now they're making a killing on selling mp3 players, a category in which they
have a market share approaching 100%. But this is a dying category -- in the
future people will increasingly listen to music on their phones, and Apple has
some very serious competitors who aren't going to let Apple take over the
entire mobile phone market.

~~~
gte910h
>Apple has some very serious competitors who aren't going to let Apple take
over the entire mobile phone market.

Serious? Please. They'll be serious when they get standard Android releases
that upgrade within months after the version release. As it is now, the MOTO
Cliq is still running 1.5, and the G1 is still pegged at 1.6.

As is now, android is fragmented in pretty much equal thirds (1.5, 1.6 and
2.1), and Symbian requires C++ to get much done in it.

Google refuses to acknowledge that people aren't getting updates for the
phones they've purchased, and that apple is eating their lunch by releasing
new Os versions even for their oldest phones still.

I'm very pissed off at Google here for this. I'd really like Android to be a
competitive chance against the iPhone, but once the iPhone gets on Verizon, I
think you're going to see Android adoption tank.

Edit: Additionally, Google refuses to go the last mile to get paid developer
accounts working for more than 9 countries. This blows up the Android
ecosystem, as there are absurd levels of "good enough" free apps out there
pushing out fantastic paid app development.

And not to mention the copyright infringer aspect enabled by the busted
"returns" system. It's absurd it's trivial to keep an app you pay for then
return, yet they force devs to allow a user to return the app.

~~~
hugh3
_I'm very pissed off at Google here for this._

Clearly so.

~~~
gte910h
Yes, and both camps accuse me of being a lover for the other. As a
professional app developer (mostly iPhoneOS, a little Android though), it's
more my glare is leveled at the strong deficiencies in BOTH platforms.

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tocomment
I don't object to a bandwidth cap. I object to not knowing when I'm over the
cap and getting a $1000 bill.

I wish they would just turn off my service if I reached a cap, or at least
notify me.

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staunch
This title is misleading. The article isn't very good and certainly doesn't
have any real answers. It's pure speculation.

