OK, so a reader pointed out to me that he really does have unlimited data on his iPhone. And he's right; AT&T does offer such a plan, and at a very reasonable price. The reader mentioned $20; I'm sure you can get this service for $30 from AT&T or as little as $15 from Verizon. I in fact saw the problem almost immediately after my last post - instead of unlimited, I should have used the term unrestricted.
And that's the plan I think I have, albeit that Verizon is now acknowledging that there are now indeed limits - I keep my traffic under 5 GB/month, or they throttle me to no more than 200 Kbps for the next month. I'm not sure about the legality of such a move on their part, but then, as I admitted, I didn't read my contract before I signed it.
But my 5 GB, for $44.99/month plus another $15/month for dial-up networking (listed on the bill as "Broadband Connect Unl Data", the "Unl" I assume standing for unlimited at least until the legal department changes the definition of "Unl") allows me to connect my notebook or other device to the Verizon Wireless network and presumably send anything I want to any application. AT&T calls this "tethered".
In my exploration of possibly getting a Voyager, I discovered I could in fact get unlimited data on that device for $15/month. All the Web browsing I want (with the very good browser on the Voyager), which is my primary activity anyway, and lots of Verizon-specific services as well, none of which are of any interest to me at all. But, if I wanted dial-up networking (tethered access), an essential feature I absolutely must have, then the price goes back to $60/month.
So - there's the restriction, and that's the kind of plan that the carriers offer today. If I get to do what I want, unrestricted, it's going to cost me, because the carriers want to limit this kind of activity, presumably because they can charge a high price for it (based on market demand), but also because they need to restrict the number of users choosing this option because they simply don't have the network capacity to offer it. I sense the former is a lot more important at present than the latter, but the latter would be a big problem if they lowered the price.
Given that most of the "Mobile Web" browsers on handsets are glorified WAP engines, the data demands of most users are pretty low, and thus the price can also be such. That isn't true of business users, and I suspect, shortly won't be the case with consumers either.
Mathias is a principal at Farpoint Group, a wireless advisory firm in Ashland, Mass.
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