I’ve lived under a rock for 10 years. I did Metro ages ago while most were still on contracts. Surely we’ve reached true capitalist open market freedom by now. Is it still total closed market, noncompetitive, privateering corruption?
You can sorta get close with MVNOs like Tello. I have a plan that’s $6.16/month, including taxes.
The unlimited data plan offers 35GB at full 4G LTE/5G speed with 5GB of hotspot included. Data speed is reduced after 35GB.
Wow. Truly unlimited. And how much does it get reduced?
Let’s check ToS.
Your data speed will be reduced to lower speeds once you have used 35 GB of data in a billing period.
Uh, huh. Very precise information.
Also…New and existing customers on qualifying plans including data have streaming video optimization technology automatically applied to our plans, and video is delivered at a lower resolution (typically 480p) rather than at a higher resolution which is better suited for larger screens. This helps customers stretch their Data Plans by reducing the amount of high-speed data consumed for streaming video.
What, how? How does that work?
Anyway, I am probably spoiled by Swan (4ka) in Slovakia.
It is the 4th carrier, weakening oligopoly of T-Mobile, O2 and Orange since 2015.
I have their unlimited data plan, which is 300GB, not 35GB, nor 5GB on hotspot. Of that I used 220GB so far in this month (usually I do around 100GB though). €13/month for me, €15 for new customers.
I am not even sure if limiting hotspot usage could be a thing in Europe. It sounds stupid enough.Limited hotspot usage was definitely a thing in Europe
Twenty years ago 😂
I have a limited understanding of how the video thing works. I think there is a black box installed locally at most ISP connection points. These are from the major streaming services like Google/YouTube and they sit inline with all if the traffic I/O. From what I recall seeing on reddit (not a primary citation worthy memory or source), people that worked on said ISP infrastructure had no idea what the black boxes actually do in full scope, but empirically, they cache the most active streaming content locally.
Speculatively, this was one of the big reasons YT changed so much in 2017 where they started focusing on promoting fewer prominent creators over an egalitarian community. They needed to promote a narrower scope that could be effectively cached. You can usually see this behavior by watching old and obscure content. It takes longer to load, change resolutions, etc., whereas on newer stuff that is popular, the content is nearly instantaneous.
Yep I’ve got my kids lines on Tello, very easy, no bs.
I think Google Fi works like you describe.
Ting
I’ve used it for years. I’m never changing.
Do you know if you can pause your service? I’m overseas for months at a time but like to be able to preserve my phone number.
IDK, I haven’t had a need to do that. But it’s a pay for what you use type of bill. Their support is real people, last time I used it was very pleasant. They might have something in their FAQ.
Sure would be nice to have real support compared to the garbage service I have right now.
Google Fi is similar, but I’m sure they are using it to farm the fuck out of your data.
What’s the alternative, pay so they farm the fuck out of your data? Do you think big carriers don’t do that?
Yeah, I’m a Fi subscriber, but some people might be averse to giving Google even more data about themselves.
There’s Ting but it ends up costing more. I just use a cheap mvno and am pretty happy.
As a non heavy data user, ting works great for me, and is still cheap.
We had that twenty years ago, it just wasn’t a very good deal. Nobody wants to pay 2¢ per text.
The US has had prepaid plans for ages. The first phone I got, back in 2006 or 2007 was like that. If I recall correctly, it was 25¢/minute to call and 10¢/text. If I bought a $25 balance card, the credit would expire after 90 days instead of the usual 30 (plus unused balance would roll over, as long as I had unexpired money in my account.
“like Europe”? Where in Europe. In Sweden pretty much every single subscription are unlimited calls and sms. Unlimited data is also becoming more common but you can still get a specific amount if you want. I have 100 GB but that’s way overkill for a phone. I can easily use terabytes on my computer but I have a hard time using just 50 GB on my phone.
An old friend from the UK moved to the States for awhile. They used to reminisce about buying sims at the corner store in Scotland and having reasonable rates for what they used instead of all the contract focused exploitation in the USA. IIRC they said that they had no periodicity to their purchase.
