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- etc: Motorola partners with Microsoft to use Bing search and mapping on some Android phones sold in China.
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New York Times technology writer David Pogue made a great point when he wrote an article called "The Irksome Cellphone Industry" and launched an accompanying video called "The I-Hate-My-Cellphone Film Festival."
Pogue makes a few great points:
1) Text message fees are exorbitant.
2) Carrier double bill people because they charge both you and the person you are communicating with. In Europe only the person who initiates contact is charged.
3) Pricing is tied to handset subsidies regardless of whether you bought it from your carrier.
4) Cell service is not that great.
Pogue illustrated #1 by refering to "The True Price of SMS Messages," a blog post about the cost of data transferred by cell carriers like AT&T and Verizon compared to data transferred by Internet Service Providers (ISPs) like AT&T and Verizon.
Now it looks like on carrier paid attention and T-Mobile revealed a new pricing program called the "Even More Plans" that addresses some of the issues.
1) Contracts are optional.
2) Phone and data service is less connected to the price of a handset.
3) You can choose whether to pay for the handset upfront or you can work out a payment plan with T-Mobile.