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General discussion

Rise against verizons data packages!!

Oct 14, 2010 5:55AM PDT

Please contact your states and the us attorney generals office and file a complaint against Verizon and their requirement to force us to pay for data packages we don't need or require! Just because we want a fancy phone doesn't mean they can charge more for it. It is our right to choose which phone we want but to impose a forced charge for a data package is wrong! that is our decision not theirs! We must band together and write to the attorney generals office and file a formal complaint the more we can generate the better. Verizon is trying to run a monopoly here and so are any other carriers trying to impose these required data charges! Please join me and contact your attorney general today!

Discussion is locked

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I don't understand
Oct 14, 2010 12:06PM PDT

Are you saying you have a right to free data?

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No thats not it...
Oct 14, 2010 4:13PM PDT

I am saying we have the right to chose whether we want to use their data or not to. The phones are reprogrammed to use their data rather than using any available wireless stream. In other countries this is not an issue as their data is free any way. But here Verizon wants us to only use their data stream so they can charge us. Its free if you get a wireless connection and faster. Most people have a wifi in their home but your smart phone will not use it unless Verizon data stream is not available. All that needs to be done is Verizon change the programing to any available connection (which is normally how they are first set up from the manufacturer} and then You can block data from Verizon. But then Verizon wouldn't make money on data. As wifi is being implemented for free in most cities now there is no use for a data package unless you travel. Verizon and the other carriers are scamming us.

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If Verizon gives you a subsidy on a smartphone
Oct 14, 2010 11:01PM PDT

they can require all sorts of things as a part of the contract. Somebody's got to pay for the phone. If you buy your own phone at full retail price, different story.

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Wrong...
Oct 15, 2010 12:12AM PDT

Even if you buy your own phone full price. If it is a smart phone verizon will add on the data package automatically. You don't have a choice.

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Sure you do.
Oct 15, 2010 2:07AM PDT

It was your choice to do business with Verizon!

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Sure you do too
Oct 15, 2010 5:02AM PDT

So your OK with paying Verizon 30-40.00 per line extra a month forever? that's 360-480.00 a year extra for something that is already available for free? Hey can you go ahead and start sending me a check too? Happy All the carriers have already agreed to implement this, in the near future. Eventually it doesn't matter who you'd go with. Or who you do business with. Smart phones have been around for years now without the required data charge. Why now all of the sudden do they want you to pay for it? Because they want to Screw the American people some more!

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YES!
Oct 15, 2010 5:10AM PDT

And it would be your choice to do business with them or others.

Why would you not exercise your freedom to not buy such things?
Bob

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Ok, I'll exercise my freedom
Oct 18, 2010 7:45AM PDT

OK, I would like to exercise my freedom to not have to buy a data package.

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Plenty of phones without that need.
Oct 18, 2010 9:08AM PDT

But they are just that. Phones.
Bob

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Voice calls are becoming less and less essential
Oct 18, 2010 10:37AM PDT

Why you could just stick with a VOIP app. I'd rather the freedom to not have to pick a voice plan.

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RSN
Oct 18, 2010 2:32PM PDT

I'm seeing the beginning of some droid pads that with a data plan only may do that. Cricket here has a data only plan for 40 a month.

You may get your wish.
Bob

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Everyone else is doing the same...
Oct 15, 2010 7:31AM PDT

That's also a very poor excuse for bad behaviour from companies. Just don't buy from them?? Makes about as much sense as telling the North Koreans to move to Sourh Korea, people move country all the time right, just leave that country and the government will have to change their ways or be left without peope to govern! Yep I've just solved the problem of tyrannical governments once and for all!

The real problem here is that carriers don't make it clear what your paying for. The subisidy should be a separate item on the bill. With optional voice or data plans that cost less than the current ones. Of course it would be nanny statism for the government to force this, but as consumers we should strongly advocate for it.

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I'm unsure what you are proposing.
Oct 15, 2010 7:35AM PDT

Are you saying that it's time for the free market here to come to a close? Should the governments run the show?

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No, I'm fully pro-free market
Oct 15, 2010 7:45AM PDT

What I'm saying, is that it bugs me when you ignore wrong a company is doing and just say, ohh it's ok it's the free market they can do whatever they like. Where's the outrage and complaining, as geeky knowledgeable consumers in a free market that is our duty. It's not enough to just say don't buy from them. Often there will be no alternative or limited options. Or other factors like network quality that take more importance in your buying decision. What I'm saying is that is falls to us and the media to fix this problem. Not the government and not regular joes refusing to buy.

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Then do that.
Oct 15, 2010 7:53AM PDT

I haven't seen folk applying themselves to such work. The free market does work. However the entitled seem to be among us too. Those are not regular joes.
Bob

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This isn't the free market.
Oct 17, 2010 11:50PM PDT

It's an oligarchy whereby two or three carriers control bandwidth that is supposed to be owned by "the public". And they all seem to overcharge the same amount for text massages and refuse to give anyone discounts for non-contract phones that just about every other carrier would do.

Convenient, huh? Some might even call it collusion.

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It's a free market.
Oct 18, 2010 2:07AM PDT

You can choose not to buy their products. Unlike other services you can live without such. I've heard this before so my only thought here is for you to make a Proposition and get it to the voters.
Bob

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A free market is one in which anyone can compete.
Oct 18, 2010 3:12AM PDT

Not just a handful. Make wireless like phone lines, open to any company that wants to compete, and you will have a real free market. Until then its a oligarchy of large companies who use their market dominance to keep margins high across the board.

As long as the FCC makes deals with just 4 major carriers and excludes others it isn't a free market. Same with most cable companies around the country, Don't like Comcast? In most places that's just too bad because they have exclusivity agreements with most municipalities. That is slowly changing in some large markets but its not changing nearly fast enough.

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Yeah, I Don't Know Why They Do That
Oct 15, 2010 10:38PM PDT

They may do it because they figure, "Well, they're getting the Droid Incredible for example, so they MUST be using it for Facebook and internet". Now, Fedup, you may not realize you're using data. What phone do you have? And isn't the point of a smartphone to use data?

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Data from the wireless is free....
Oct 16, 2010 12:34AM PDT

All the smart phones have wifi accessibility so if you want to get on your home network wifi. (which is free data and 5 times faster than Verizon data stream) you cant unless the Verizon system is unavailable. Now, if your at a coffee shop you can access their free wifi or at work ,if its there, All for FREE Happy now lets say you go some where that you don't have access (which now a days is getting less and less)you just wouldn't get on it unless you had to. Verizon would charge you if you did. That's how its been the last 6 years Ive had my phones they are all smart phones with wifi accessibility and I've never had a data package. And this is what I have always done never had any data charges! Now verizon wants to charge me 35.00 a month for data usage I've never had a problem with. They are forcing us to use their slower data stream. Even the other phones they are tacking on 10.00 a month data fees for data those phones will never use how many people really use email on the phone less than 1.5%! free money for Verizon!

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What Phone?
Oct 16, 2010 1:07AM PDT

Now I get your point completely, and I do agree with you, but what phone do you currently have and why?

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Phone Specs
Oct 16, 2010 3:56AM PDT

I have my sons old LG Boulder only because it doesn't need data and I refuse to pay the extra data fees. I had a black berry and was going to switch to an android when I found out about what they were doing. I miss my apps though.....I currently have 5 phones on our plan so If we all upgraded it would be an additional 10.00 to 30.00 per line depending on phone and data package they require with it. From what customer support said they all phones will have a data package added to it. Which is Wrong. Just because I ordered steak doesn't mean I want to pay extra for mushrooms I don't want. You know what I mean...

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Simply Not True
Nov 8, 2010 4:49AM PST

"All the smart phones have wifi accessibility so if you want to get on your home network wifi. (which is free data and 5 times faster than Verizon data stream) you cant unless the Verizon system is unavailable."

You got some bad information. To use your home Wifi network, all you have to do is use the little widget on, for example, the HTC Incredible. That turns off your access to Verizon's 3G network, and you can just turn Wifi on and it will connect to your home network easily.

If you leave Wifi on all the time it will alert you whenever there are unsecured Wifi networks, and if you have connected to them before and saved them, it will automatically connect you to them and turn off access to Verizon's 3G data network.

I do agree with you that only having one $29.99 plan was too expensive for a lot of people, so I'm glad that they added a new less expensive plan.