Ron Schenone

Is It Time For All Cell Phones To Be Unlocked?

Posted by on Jul 19, 2010 | 9 Comments

During the past few weeks we have been captivated by the reception problems that Apple says all cell phones exhibit. Whether this is true or not is up for debate. But one fact about the cell phone industry no one can dispute is the way cell phones have been locked to a specific carrier. There is once again a movement that is trying to get the FCC to unlock all cell phones and let the consumer decide which carrier they wish to use. In a recent article it stated that:

For more than a year, the FCC has been examining exclusive contracts after members of the Senate Commerce Committee urged the commission to review the issue. Handset providers and carriers offer their phones on different levels of exclusivity with Apple’s iPhone offered only by AT&T in the U.S. and other carriers having different degrees of exclusivity for mobile phones from a variety of providers.

The RCA has hammered away on the issue for years, arguing that rural consumers in particular often can’t get the phones they want and have to pay high rates for what is available for them.

Long complaining about the “digital divide” that exists between rural and urban America, RCA has argued that the end result for consumers of exclusive handset provider-carrier deals has been that consumers must “pay a premium price for the handset because the market is void of any competition for the particular handset.”

If you live in a rural area of the U.S., where AT&T doesn’t provide service, you cannot use an Apple iPhone. While Apple is pleased that it has sold three million iPhones in three weeks, those sales could explode if the phone were unlocked.  Having once lived in a rural area in which AT&T did not provide service, the availability of any type of a smart phone was non existent for many of us.

What do you think?

Comments welcome.

Source – InformationWeek

  • Pingback: Do You Want to Read Tweets From the Womb? ~ Chris Pirillo

  • D

    Whatever happened to a phone you can talk on…rather than an overpriced toy to make others gawk. I remember the same thing happening when the cell phone came out. You had people with 0 life talking into their headset to have the “awe” factor of being/having something new. The same ones are doing the same thing again…only with these toys they spent too much money on. There’s an old saying…”Just because you can…doesn’t mean you should.” Or…”They’ve got too much money and too little brain.” You want to impress…jump off a skyscraper and survive. Who cares what type of overpriced toy you spent too much money on?

  • http://www.thebluedot.net Blue Dot

    It would be difficult to make all phones unlockable. When comparing GSM and CDMA phones for example, companies would have to make CDMA phones dual compatible in order to be unlocked. Of course you can flash a CDMA device but that is not always a sure fire way to get all the phone features working on another carrier.

    With GSM phones you can just call your carrier and have them unlock the phone if you are traveling if you arlready a paying customer of that service.

    I think keeping phones locked drives competition between carriers. If AT&T didn’t have exclusive rights to the IPhone, would Google Android phones ever made a push for the market? This is question everyone must ask themselves. Sure it would be great if you could get a any phone working on any carrier, but I am sure there will be a slow down in pushing forward new cellular technologies.

    • http://wp3.lockergnome.com/nexus/blade/ Ron Schenone

      Thanks Blue Dot for the comments.
      Your input is appreciated.
      Regards, Ron

  • Don Naphen

    I think for this to become a reality Ron, the service providers (Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, etc.) would have to establish standards in the industry, and of course this just isn’t going to happen! Competition drives the market, not convenience. Each provider offers their own unique product/service. I do think that in hindsight, Apple regrets making AT&T their exclusive partner with the IPhone. The phone has its shortcomings to be sure, but many issues related to dropped calls, poor signals and slow network connections can be attributed to AT&T. Their network just wasn’t capable of handling the sudden influx of IPhone users and their demands for bandwidth. It literally sucked their resources dry. Even Verizon (my provider thank God!) wouldn’t be able to handle the demand. I personally wouldn’t consider any phone without a slideout keyboard, as I text a lot. Touch screen typing just isn’t an option for me.

    • http://wp3.lockergnome.com/nexus/blade/ Ron Schenone

      Heh Don,
      A QWERTY is a must for texting.
      I hear you about the problem of standardization, but I believe it could be done if the providers
      were forced to do it. I’m on the Verizon networks as well using Straight Talk and thus far it beats
      AT&T which I previously used.

  • Todd

    Unlocking cell phones should be MANDATORY. While I am a free marketer, diverging cell phone technologies was the dumbest thing the FCC did in years. A standarised user access module (SIM card) is the answer.

    Look, people went for cell phones big time even though they were pricey. Phones were actually MUCH more expensive ten or fifteen years ago. A NEC brand installed 3 watt mobile phone was over five hundred dollars for years. It was the analogue AMP phones that worked on any carrier you wanted. Same as any phone back then. Then came PCS/digital phones and blamo, three or four differing technologies all locked to certain carriers. This has done nothing but artificially keep retail cell phone prices high. All the while ‘justifying” long term contracts at exorbitant monthly rates.

    Each carrier claims to have the best hardware technology with their devices and of course, you get a cheap price for the phone by paying for the subsidy over a two year period. Of course you can go no contract with my carrier (AT&T) by paying “full price” for the hardware. The phones all carry a stupidly high manufacturer suggested retail price to discourage you from doing anything but signing a long contract.

    In reality, everybody knows that electronics sell for “street” prices, not retail. If the carriers had been kept out of the hardware business you would be buying your phones at Walmart and Best Buy and calling up providers for cell phone SERVICE instead of worrying about paying your way out of a contract. In my opinion the gov should have demanded SIM cards for ANY technology the carriers wanted to develop. I care not whether it is CDMA, GSM(though it makes sense in global economy) or whatever. Just make them usable by the consumer. How much better would plan pricing be if the carriers knew you could drop them like a rock and go elsewhere?

    This is just what happened with Bell years ago. They gave dire predictions of bad service, escalating rates, etc if they had to compete with others. All the fear mongering of a monopoly desperately trying to hang on to customers. Ten years later long distance was so cheap it was practically being given away. Now it is clear that wireless everything is the way of the future and they are desperately trying to force customers to stay with them AND make them pay more. Witness the manouever last year by all U.S. carriers to demand a data plan if you dared to use a smartphone on their systems. Even if you didn’t use data but wanted a phone with PDA technology. Unlock the phones and the customers choices NOW.

    • http://wp3.lockergnome.com/nexus/blade/ Ron Schenone

      I agree with you Todd.
      Thanks for the comment.
      It is appreciated.
      Regards, Ron

  • Seven Gunn

    What this would do is increase the price of cellphones. Just look at the price of Unbranded phones already on the market.