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

[fouldragon at aol.com]

Considered Cricket?  They've been aggressively advertising 'now with 
smartphones', and obviously it's a no-contract endeavour. No knowledge 
about tethering; I'm saddled with AT&T, and didn't much care for the 
Android phone I tried, so I am the one person using a Pre. :)


-----Original Message-----
From: Tim Bogart <timbogart at yahoo.com>
To: Main PLUG discussion list <plug-discuss at lists.plug.phoenix.az.us>
Sent: Sat, Sep 18, 2010 7:35 pm
Subject: Re: [OT] android phone, possible to get a good deal?



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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