[LINK] mobile carriers are evil

[Kim Holburn]

I was reading this article and some of the links:

<http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2007/10/10-reasons-to-h.html>
<http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/news/2004/06/63722>

and I got to thinking.  I remember when Telstra, or perhaps it was  
Telecom at the time, got really upset with people using modems and  
leaving them connected for a long time and tried to bring in timed  
local call rates and people got very upset.  Telstra didn't succeed  
in getting timed local call rates or perhaps they did really ...  Now  
while I can't think that they were smart enough to anticipate how  
important mobiles were to become they made sure, like all phone  
companies, that no-one was ever able to argue that they shouldn't  
bring in timed local calls again, certainly not in any of their new  
markets.

I thought it was ridiculous that the government allowed two separate  
cable roll-outs yet on thinking about it a very similar situation  
exists in mobile comms, only worse.  I always found it amazing that  
you got a lot better service when you were travelling in another  
country (except of course for the unbelievable cost) because when  
roaming you could use several networks and got a lot better coverage  
than the natives.  I always wondered why I couldn't get that in  
Australia.

Why is it we accept incompatible networks, bad coverage, non- 
interoperability, non-roaming, incredible charging systems, apparent  
cartels in the mobile market?  (I haven't even mentioned technical  
problems like dropped calls, garbled connections etc.)  In other  
words if mobile telephony is the way we're all going to go why can't  
we have some basic legislation to benefit us customers.  Something  
along the lines of: interoperability, anti-competitive, anti-cartel,  
ability to roam - use other companies services (and we do already  
when we ring someone on that network don't we?) some kind of  
transparency in charging systems and charging systems that are open  
to being compared, some way of being warned when the company is going  
to charge some horrendous amount, some way of telling when we phone  
how much a call is going to going to cost.  I could probably go on.

Is legislation the way to go here?  Nothing else seems to have worked.

Kim

--
Kim Holburn
IT Network & Security Consultant
Ph: +39 06 855 4294  M: +39 3494957443
mailto:kim at holburn.net  aim://kimholburn
skype://kholburn - PGP Public Key on request

Democracy imposed from without is the severest form of tyranny.
                           -- Lloyd Biggle, Jr. Analog, Apr 1961