Inauguration Day / Wireless Disaster

This post could be titled "What They Mean When They Sell You the Unlimited Plan."

The wireless communication industry is abuzz with the problems they're anticipating from the Obama inauguration. The pre-inaugural concert in Washington this past Sunday caused random dropped calls and pockets of poor or no service with more than one supplier.

"We did experience some mild call-blocking, as was expected, but with the capacity we added and the number of calls we got on the network and the amount of activity, our network worked about as well as we expected," Crystal Davis, a spokeswoman for Sprint Nextel, told the Post.

Oh, you bought the unlimited plan? Well, don't expect it to work to help you find your way back to the bus you came into town on. When they say "unlimited", they really mean the way they feel about how much they can bill you (up to $150/month)... err, I mean "unlimited" means how much service they would like to give you, up to the point when they can't actually give you any service at all.

The wireless industry is recommending text messaging for communication during the inauguration ceremonies. I don't wonder. My fiance's plan offers texting for twenty cents per message. And know what? Texting takes ZERO BANDWIDTH for the phone companies. That's because text messages ride for free in surplus space in the packets used to make the protocol work. The companies charge a lot for text messages because it's a popular way to communicate, and because they can. They cost the vendors functionally nothing.

Hello, America. The phone companies are are among the largest and most profitable in the country. They are breaking new grounds in designing consumer unfriendly terms of use and levels of service. Sprint has a program where they drop you as a customer if you complain three times in one year. They carefully avoid the crime of monopolistic collusion by all acting as if they're a monopoly. They promise unlimited service, and deliver whatever they feel like hacking together. Call them on it. Maybe the new Obama administration will hold up this kind of greed-capitalism to the light and show it for what it is. Or maybe not. But don't be fooled just because the TV and print media don't say anything about it-- they're all owned by the same companies!

The wireless industry sold unlimited service. And they reneged.