CellRev

The problem with the American wireless industry today is rooted in the digressive practices of mobile network operators. For the past 30 years, operators in this country have had very few legal requirements imposed upon them regarding how they can build their networks and run their businesses. This has resulted in their continued use and development of draconian, anti-competitive business models – models which could have been justified in the 1980’s when mobile communications was fundamentally expensive, but today are no longer relevant or fair. Mobile operators are by function “pipes”, providing a utility in the form of radio waves, the same way that a cable company provides you with an internet connection and an electric company with electricity. Although 30 years ago mobile service was an expensive luxury, today it is a critical utility. The problem is that mobile operators are still acting like they are selling a luxury service, not a utility.

Today, mobile network operators have complete control over not only which devices their customers may connect to their networks, but what software runs on those devices and how that software may be used. Consumers can’t use devices which were sold by a particular wireless operator with another, regardless of technological compatibility, because this is prevented in the software of the device, which is crippled to only work with and support the business of one operator. Mobile users must almost always notify, ask or pay to make changes in the way they operate their own devices – their own property. This level of totalitarianism is practiced by all American operators and is most blatantly seen in the way that they customize and limit the functionality of the devices they sell, stripping out any features which might compete with their own services and making it technologically impossible or very difficult for consumers to add anything non-operator approved to their devices. For example, many phones in their international iterations come with numerous third party programs for downloading new software, music and ringtones, but features like these from third parties are never seen on American devices, since operators have them removed and replaced with there own inferior programs which usually require an illogical service fee in order to use.

Another common practice employed by mobile operators is to charge different rates for the same service, simply because the service is used differently. For example, all American mobile operators offer what are called “data plans”, where they provide the customer with a specified amount of data transfer in a given time frame for a fixed fee. The price of the data plan does not depend only on how much data is transferred by the customer though – the mobile operator markets and mandates the purchase of differently priced data plans depending on what device the customer uses, regardless of the technological fact that all mobile devices transfer data in the same way on a given network. This results in consumers having to pay magnitudes more for a particular amount of data transfer simply based on what device they are using.

Interestingly, a comparison between the computer and wireless industries is rarely made. Like with mobile devices and services, most people own both a computer and subscribe to an internet service, but unlike wireless, there is a clear separation between the service and the computer with which it is used. In America, if you want to buy a new computer and your internet service provider is, for example, Comcast, you don’t need to ask Comcast if you can get a new computer, you don’t even need to tell them. If you want to install a new application on your computer, Comcast has no say in that decision either. This is a fundamental freedom understood by all computer users – internet service is a utility. If your electric company charged you more for the power used by your refrigerator than the power used by your coffee machine, would that be acceptable? How about if your water company charged more for the water you drank than the water used by your dishwasher? No, these would not be acceptable, because the water, power and internet providers simply charge you for what you use, not how you use it – they have no say in what equipment you connect to their service and how that equipment is used. Yet despite all these universally understood freedoms we have in other technological sectors, Americans continue to accept the ridiculously unjust practices of mobile network operators.

In conclusion, the lack of mobile rights in America, resulting from the unregulated practices of mobile network operators, is a serious problem indeed. Though there are ways for you, the consumer, to make a difference!