[OT] android phone, possible to get a good deal?

[Tim Bogart]

A little history... Remember, MCI went bankrupt and was eventually bought by 
Verizon.  MCI was in competition with Verizon and tried desparately (and 
unsuccessfully I might add) to enter the LEC (Local Exchange Carrier) space. 
 But in order to do that, not having a local infrastructure themselves, were 
reliant on leased lines from the incumbent LEC, Verizon.  Verizon would stall, 
lose orders, and generally not cooperate, and resort to ANYTHING to keep MCI out 
of the LEC market during that time.  When MCI was restructuring its debt, it was 
for sale.  Now, Vint Cerf used to work at MCI as I did.  There was a reason Vint 
worked there.  It was because MCI had more global internet infrastructure than 
any other company in the world and had by far the largest global network by that 
time.  AT&T liked to think and claim that they did, but MCI was able to force 
them to withdraw those claims multiple times.  But, to the point... during the 
restructuring, it was rumored more than once that M$ was considering buying MCI. 
 Now think about that scenario for a minute.  Talk about a nightmare!  M$ owning 
and controlling the lion's share of the Internet by buying the largest Internet 
common carrier there was?... Geez!  Just the thought gives me the creeps.  I'd 
rather eat razor blades than think about it.  

My point being that common carriers using technological strong arming to secure 
and maintain market space is commonplace.  It won't be until somebody throws all 
the switches to the "on" position and uses that to compete 'til all the others 
will be forced to do the same.  Like MCI did with "Friends and Family" and 
including call waiting, call forwarding, voice mail, caller ID, and all the 
other goodies in the package.  What a lot of people forget is that all of these 
features are included in the switching and routing equipment.  They keep 
charging people for turning them on (and charging for connection fees, unending 
service contracts, stifling early termination penalties and all other sorts of 
heinous junk) until one company steps out of that mold.  It's just a matter of 
time.  And it will probably be a new start up.  One day some body's going to do 
it and then we will all be able to get the combinations of goods and services we 
desire.

My $0.02

Tim



________________________________
From: R P Herrold <herrold at owlriver.com>
To: Main PLUG discussion list <plug-discuss at lists.plug.phoenix.az.us>
Sent: Sat, September 18, 2010 6:53:29 PM
Subject: Re: [OT] android phone, possible to get a good deal?

On Sat, 18 Sep 2010, Jim March wrote:

> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16875176145
> 
> To get Android 2.1 you have to spend almost $500:
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16875176195
> 
> Wait just a bit and that should be upgradeable to 2.2?

Not being sold at at New Egg, but I see Archos 7 and 10 internet tablets, for 
about $300, running Android 2.2 out of the gate, and seemingly well supported as 
to following new releases at Angstrom

I have devices at older Android levels (it is not clear they have the processor 
'horsepower' and ram to support later Android levels, which I imported directly 
from China) being a couple of essentially unsupported, no-name development 
chassis. I will be seeing about building trimmed down versions, and loading 
later Android versions over the mext couple weeks, via the Angstrom builder

-- Russ herrold
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