Verizon has confirmed the information in the leaked slide we reported on two weeks ago. They’re ending their “New Every Two” policy. New customers after Jan 16 won’t get the credit, and current customers won’t get the credit after their next contract renewal. [More]
telephony
Sprint Raising Data Rates By $10 Per Month For New Activations
Starting January 30, Sprint is raising data rates by $10 a month for new phone activations. The rate increase will not apply to existing customer unless they upgrade or activate another smartphone. [More]
Verizon Good At Overbilling, Not So Much The Other Stuff
Elliot has been to heck and back with Verizon. His Samsung Rogue refused to charge, so he got them to replace it with a refurbished one. The “new” phone began randomly shutting off by itself. Elliot got Verizon to give him a full replacement, but they mailed it to his old address. After more shipping woes, he finally got a working phone. Then his bill arrives, about $1,000 higher than it’s supposed to be. [More]
CTRL-H Replace, Voila! AT&T's 3G Network Is Now 4G!
“AT&T Inc. flipped a switch and turned on its 4G wireless network Wednesday,” reports the WSJ. “The switch, however, was in the company’s marketing department.” Taking advantage of loose definitions for what qualifies as 4G, AT&T has simply relabeled its existing, and much-maligned, 3G network as 4G. [More]
Verizon Switching "New Every Two" Plan To 20 Months?
Verizon Wireless could be changing it’s “new every two” upgrade policy, making customers wait until their contract is almost up before they upgrade phones, according to what appears to be a leaked internal slide posted at Android Central. [More]
Time Warner CSR Agrees Their "Soul Being Sucked Away"
Rachel shares an interesting transcript of a chat she had with Time Warner. She was complaining about how Time Warner automatically raises its rates every year, and, in the end, got the CSR to confirm that they felt their soul was “being sucked away” from having to explain this policy so many times. [More]
Guy Tries To Give Up Cable, Wimps Out In Under A Month
A Cnet editor and his wife tried to “cut the cord” and ditch his pricey FiOs cable bundle, and either get their content free or through online downloads. Less than a month later, he’s back on the sauce. What a milksop! [More]
FCC Ruling On Net Neutrality Is A Big Compromise
The FCC has ruled on net neutrality and offered up a compromise solution: ISPs can’t throttle fixed line computer users based on what kind of content they’re accessing, but wireless providers can. [More]
Consumer Reports Says AT&T Is "Worst-Rated"
It won’t come as a surprise to its users who have had to deal with dropped calls and poor customer service, but AT&T ranked dead last in a new Consumer Reports survey of wireless carriers. [More]
Comcast Suffers Major Midwest Outage
Another major outage hit Comcast customers, this time in the Midwest. Like the outage that occurred exactly a week ago on the East Coast, this one too started on a Sunday and involved their DNS servers being down. [More]
Carjacker Gets Tracked Down In 7 Minutes Thanks To Droid App
Droid does…justice? A guy who got carjacked was able to track the thief and send cops to surround him in seven minutes, thanks to the Lookout app installed on his Droid left in the car. [More]
Verizon's New 4G LTE Network Hits 21 Mbps In PC Mag Test
A PC Mag reporter tested out Verizons’ new 4G LTE Network and maxed out at 21 Mbps in his home test. Of course, no one else is on the network right now, which hits streets December 5th, but that’s a pretty sweet rate for shoveling data through the air (in America at least). Verizon is also keeping your monthly cap pretty darn low, and expensive. [More]
Comcast Outage Hits Parts Of East Coast
A Comcast TV and internet outage hit Boston and parts across the eastern seaboard yesterday, with a fix still pending this Cyber Monday. [More]
Update: Couple Waits 7 Months For FiOs Refund. Instead, They Get A Debt Collector.
There could be some relief on the way for the couple, who, after waiting 7 months for their $144.81 refund from Verizon FiOs, got a call from a debt collector instead. [More]
Test If Your ISP Is Shaping Your Download Speed
Ever have one of those days where you’re browsing along, everything is cool, but then it seems like whenever you try to watch YouTube or download, your speed suddenly plummets? Your ISP could be “shaping” your traffic, intentionally throttling your rates for certain kind of media. To test it out, you can try running this Glasnost test. [More]
LG Shooting New Phone Ad With Fancy Carousel
I stumbled across a shoot yesterday in Brookyln for a new LG phone commercial featuring a big ol’ carousel they stuffed into a warehouse in the Gowanus Canal area. [More]
I Can't Find My Phone Dials Your Cell For You
Wallet, keys, check. Cellphone? Gah! Where did I put that darn thing? [More]
Tmobile Throttles Unlimited Data Plans, Forbids Tethering
Tmobile is going after technically inclined customers who use their cellphones as a cheap wireless modem with a two-pronged approach. [More]