Why do some people here have a hard-on for hating America? Unlike Europe and Asia, our communication infrastructure was much better when cellphones became popular. That is why communication is cheaper here compared to those two regions. Hence, Americans are adversed to spending so much money on communication devices that serve niche purposes considering the high usage of other communication tools, namely personal computers on the internet. Hence, unlike Europe and Asia where the phone is everything, in America the phone complements the computer, it doesn't replace it. Therefore, we are loathe to spend $600 on a device whose services can be easily duplicated on a cheap personal computer connected to the internet.
So, subsidized phones are here to stay in America, like it or not. Give me a $10 phone and a $40 service anytime. Anything more will have to be subsidized by my employer.
$200 iPhone w/ 2 year contract
$600 smartphone with no contract.
iPhone requires $30 data plan. Of course ATT just forces "smart phones" to buy $30 plans. Throw in an unlocked HTC HD2 or fine... an unlocked HTC Hero which gets ATT3G courtesy of Canada's Telus. $15 / month plan * 24 months = $360. You pretty much made up the difference.
The problem with subsidies is that phone companies focus so much on paying for phones to attract customers. This was certainly a good thing in the early days of cell phones when people were hesitant to jump on the bandwagon. The cost of entry is a huge barrier. Not everyone wants a $200 phone. People want FREE phones. The money companies spend on phones can go to improving the network. I'd rather have ATT spend money on improving its network rather than buying more phones.
Subsidies are there around the world, but it's not a huge selling point. How many commercials do you see a day going Buy one droid get one free? Or other Get this phone FREE for the holidays... blah blah blah. Honestly, having gone to China, Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, I've seen more phone deal commercials on TV in the US than in Asia. It's the American mentality of subsidies. We all expect free phones left and right. There are free phones in Taiwan where I'm at right now too. But if you want something more powerful like a Nokia N97, it's not going to be buy one get one free for $99. It's gonna cost a little more, but not the full $500 or whatever it is at NokiaUSA.com.
The phone is not everything in the US because it's not VIEWED as one... not until the iPhone really popularized smartphones. IT was BlackBerry or bust. WinMo phones in the US were terrible. The HTC phones didn't really hit yet and they were mainly built for overseas use with their frequencies. The iPhone did wonders for the American market. It introduced the concept of 3G that 99.9% of the people never cared about. For the first time, people CARE about a 600mhz Cortex A8 processor and Anand himself laughs at the Nokia N97's ARM11 processor in the iPhone review (I bet he didn't even use one before he made that comment). I'm glad people now appreciate smartphones more and 3G. I'm glad the iPhone revealed that ATT's 3G network is a piece of crap. This is a wakeup call that's helped.
I don't know what you mean about infrastructure for communication being better. Our 3G networks were deployed later and while you can make the argument about population density and stuff, it's amazing that 3G is everywhere. I took the HSR in TAiwan today that goes through mountains and stuff and it's amazing 3G was there all the way with me. The problem is that even in our URBAN areas, our 3G networks are lagging behind.
http://www.worldtimezone.com/gsm.html
If it's a choice between the countries in the Americas versus the rest of the world, it's pretty easy which to pick first. India probably has 250+ million potential customers alone.
I like how you scroll down and it says 3G 2100 almost all the way across the board... LOL. Remember in 2005 when a lot of phones were not GSM850 compatible yet? But there were a good chunk of quad band phones out. I think by 2007, almost every phone was quad band capable.... at least the feature fancy phones they sold around the world. I remember by 2007 I had no problem just picking out almost any phone since they all had GSM850 for my use on AT&T. The trick was getting something that wasn't just UMTS2100. Unfortunately it's 2010, and the same problem exists. UMTS2100 is still everywhere. I think some phones now add in Band VIII which is UMTS 900 but this is again not for the US.
I think if there was enough demand like GSM 850, then manufacturers would add it in.
Hey, I'm on the same boat too. I want AT&T 3G. But it's easy to see why it's not being done, and it's certainly NOT HTC's fault or Nokia's fault or Sony Ericsson's fault.
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