SERO was available to the general public until about this time last year. They even provided a generic email address to use for the "referral" (I think it was something like "sero@sprint.com"). Anyone who did the tiniest bit of googling could find out about it and sign up for it.
They don't offer it to non-employees right now, but a smart consumer would have been aware of it and could have taken advantage while the offer was available, just as smart consumers will take the trouble to hunt up a coupon before they order a notebook from Lenovo or Dell. Certainly not an unrealistic option.
Sure...and I would have if I had any more than a zero desire to be a sprint customer. I would have researched their service plans some more, but clearly it's not meant for the general masses if you have to jump through a couple small hoops to get it. Now that it's not offered it's even more of a moot point on your behalf of the argument. Even if I were to consider, I wouldn't have been eligible to change over to sprint before the program ended to the public because I was under contract with verizon.
I have the precursor to the Touch, an HTC 6800. It was $400, minus $200 for a two year contract, minus a $100 manufacturer rebate. As far as I can tell, there seems to always be a $100 rebate on higher-end HTC phones. Again, nothing special there.
I mentioned the rebate in my findings, but still the current high-end phone still trumps that of an iPhone's price by an additional $50. The phone is slated as a competitor to the iPhone which still uses Win mobile 6.1 (maybe updated now to 6.5, I don't know) with less usability and functionality, thicker, heavier phone, and less included memory. I don't want a qwerty keyboard adding thickness, weight, and possible breaking points to the phone, but honestly is there even a decent virtual keyboard on a win mobile device?
The average consumer would have walked into an AT&T/Verizon/Sprint retail location with a sign on his chest that said "Please rape me because I have no idea what I'm trying to buy." We look down on those people when they buy their vomit box PCs, and we can look down on them for paying too much for their smartphones.
Isn't everything relative to your own personal budget? If you decide to buy a lesser phone and pay less, how is it you consider someone like myself being raped for buying a more expensive phone than you (but actually less than some of the competition) when the phone does more? I could have certainly bought a less expensive phone with rebates that does a bunch less and was less usable.
That still doesn't address the normal service costs that 98% of all people have access to. Given the region and my lack of interest in using Sprint (and even T-Mobile) here, there aren't a lot more options. If Sprint coverage was good, I'd have no problem considering them.
Vomit box comparison, Really? There is no relation here. I could certainly say I look down at people for spending too much on just about anything. I'm sure you're guilty of a few things, as aren't we all.
My total price for phone + two years of service was $800, and for that all I had to do was find an address @sprint.com.
Incidentally, I just found out that Verizon wants $30 a month to enable tethering on a Blackberry... on top of the $70 a month they want to have an internet-enabled Blackberry. This is a perfect example of the rape to which I am referring.
$30/month seems to be the norm for AT&T also (which I agree that is a perfect example of rape since both would already be paying for unlimited internet), but I have access to tethering without being charged on the iPhone so it isn't a big deal. Granted I would be limited to 5GB/month, but I rarely come close to it anyway. It only takes a little bit of using google to figure out how and implementing it is dead simple.
Outside of that example, just because everyone doesn't get the same deal as your fantastic SERO plan doesn't mean it's rape for everyone else.
Sprint's coverage where I live is substantially better than AT&T's. My internet connection is faster than AT&T's and my calls also sound better. I can't say I've ever had a dropped call from my end, but I talk to plenty of people with iphones whom I regularly have to call back two or three times just to have one conversation.
Verizon has everybody beat for coverage, but they're also the kings of cell phone rape and call quality on their network is only slightly better than AM radio.
I'll admit that coverage is a regional issue, but AT&T has done absolutely nothing to impress me in that regard.
I've worked from home many times and been on many 1-2 hour meetings and never dropped a call. I've had many hour+ long call conversations with my family in CT and also with my GF 20 miles away without dropped calls. There is one location on my commute home that does drop a call, but it also dropped with Verizon, so I'm assuming it's a dead zone for everyone. Clearly it's area-dependent and I guess your area gets the shaft from AT&T coverage.
The internet speed is actually pretty decent at least from where I live and also from where I work. The average is somewhere in the 1650KB/235KB in my area.
I drove all the way out to Ohio last year and throughout the whole trip my phone was used by three other people in the car with me and there were little to no issues with internet connectivity. There were occasional drops in performance, but that's to be expected over a 600 mile trip.
I'm certainly not raving about AT&T, but I also don't have any huge gripes with their service here in central Mass. They certainly have room to improve, but I'm not at all frustrated by having this phone.
