FOR INDIVIDUAL PLANS IN THE UNITED STATES:

VERIZON:

Unlimited Talk = $70 a month
Unlimited Text = $20 a month
25 MB Data = $10 a month <— STUPID. Almost all users will exceed this.
5 GB Data = $30 a month
Tethering = $30 a month

Data over 5 GB = $0.05 per MB = $50 per GB.

—–

AT&T:

Unlimited Talk = $70 a month
Unlimited Text = $20 a month
200 MB Data = $15 a month <— covers 68% of iPhone users.
2 GB Data = $25 a month <— covers 98% of iPhone users.
3 GB Data = $35 a month
Tethering = $20 a month

Data over 5 GB = $0.05 per MB = $50 per GB.

—–

NOTES:

AT&T's rates are very favorable compared to Verizon's rates.

AT&T's Tethering rate is less than Verizon's

For the 98% of users who use less than 2 GB a month, AT&T is $5 a month cheaper than Verizon, saving $60 a year. With tethering, AT&T is $15 a month cheaper than Verizon, saving $180 a year.

Ideally, AT&T should also have a limit of 5 GB a month, like Verizon. This makes it easier to use video conferencing on the new iPhones. After all, AT&T in the 1970s did envision someday having video conferencing on phones. The 5GB limit would still be a good cutoff point for heavy data users.

And how long will it take 4G LTE to show up in Iowa City? It took Verizon until early 2009 to give us 3G service. It seems unlikely that the iPhone will have bludgeoned Verizon enough for them to change their practices until at least some time in 2013.

The Android phones have the same kind of problem as Windows PCs. They appear to be made from cheap materials and the interface is relatively slow and unreliable. The “openness” of the operating system will create security problems in the longer run which Apple is trying to address through the AppStore model.

Finally, the CDMA model is weak relative to the GSM model because it is not capable of simultaneous voice and data transmission. The LTE will solve this problem.

If that were true, then my own blog post, saying how unresponsive and clueless the guy was, was equally wrong.

We’ve now got word from Verizon that the CEO’s letter was meant to address me AND several other articles–so we’ve put my post back up!

Complicated, I know.

dp

the transcoding for utube (at what datarate was that? – 64kbps????) makes both clips almost totally unintelligible – or at least I distinguishable from the tiny video on an old Nokia 5870 candybar phone! (180×120, upsampled).

I refuse to believe that either the apple or fliphone produce such garbage natively!

pls show the actual h264 source files so readers can make an accurate – and useful – comparison!

btw: I don’t know what u r doing wrong in the transcoding, but I have seen much better quality posted on utube – you might want to figure that one out.

FAIL.

The real problem here is that you assume everybody knows what the hell a “Flip Ultra” is. (I don’t} I’ll assume it’s a another phone camera of some sort (a flip phone, I guess) since that is what the iPhone camera is.