Jun 12
O2 fail on iPhone 3GS. Tips on how to make owning an iPhone more affordable.
AddI’ll admit it. I was excited about the new iPhone. OK, I was really excited about the new iPhone. WWDC2009 came and the keynote was posted. I was still excited. The new iPhone (dubbed 3GS) looked great, some of the new features were just what I was waiting for before dipping my toe in the iPhone ocean. Copy and paste, directional maps, WIFI tethering. I could resist no longer, I would brave the expensive O2 contracts here in the UK to own this gadget. Yes they would tie me in for 18 to 24 months on an inflated tariff, but it would be worth it.
I rationalised over and over again. After all having access to things like directional maps would allow me to dispense with the notion of a TomTom. I could just get the TomTom app. I could also dispense with the need for a mobile broadband dongle, I could tether my MacBook Pro straight to my phone using the unlimited data offered with the pricey mobile contract. Unfortunately my worst fears as to the business ethics of those that operate mobile telecommunications here in Britain were proved correct. Boy is it horrible to be so right.
I’ve had contracts before with most of the main protagonists, I’ve always had that weird feeling. It’s what I imagine exiting a particularly murky swamp to discover that you are covered in leeches must feel like. To extend the metaphor, O2, ill contented with syphoning the cash from their customers in the usual manner have decided that their current operational conceit is taking far too long and have endeavoured to suck the iPhone fan-base dry. I just can’t understand it. We’re talking about a demographic of technologically informed, enthusiastic and solvent users who have already been sold on the dream of an iPhone by the manufacturer. All that O2 need do is price their products sensibly, avoid public faux pas and play Santa to Apple geeks everywhere on June 19th. Only a moron, or collection of morons (mori?) could turn this unassailable position into a fail. I mean, none of their competitors have the product, it’s a home run by default. So what did the O2 management do? The unthinkable, they angered geekdom with their blatant profiteering. The first sin they committed was to anger existing iPhone customers with their upgrade policy. Never come between a geek and his latest bit of tech!
The molten lava that was spewed as the news of the O2 upgrade policy broke may have disfigured O2’s image permanently, at least with this demographic. Their “It’s not us it’s Apple” defence fell on deaf ears. This is hardly surprising, many Apple zealots would rather take an iMac to the head than entertain the idea that Apple had committed a transgression against them. The second of O2’s cataclysmic misjudgements was the decision to charge exorbitant fees for tethering. This one is irredeemable. Truly it feels like having that shiny mountain bike delivered on Christmas morning, only for stinky Timmy who lives down the road to break in and steal it while your attention is diverted making eggnog. (Don’t fret it’s not a true story.) Talk about deflated. What makes the tethering situation worse is that O2 won’t admit what they are doing. They are hiding behind the argument that tethering will overload their network in some way, and that they need to charge a ton of money to prepare for the deluge. This is absolute bunk. A megabyte is a megabyte, downloaded to an iPhone or a laptop. That megabyte is free through the phone but if I want the same information delivered to a different device I have to pay again? Please.
Imagine you’re in a pub. Being a gentleman of the ale, you buy a pint. After hanging around at the bar for a few minutes, you decide to take your pint out to the beer garden. It’s a nice day. But wait, as you approach the door you sense that something is not right. There is a sign by the door to the beer garden….. And a man. The man is taking money from people. As your proximity to the sign increases you can make out what it says: “Beer garden beer consumption £3.” “But I’ve already paid for my pint” you reason with the stony faced man that is taking the payments. “If you want to use your beer outside, you’ll have to pay for it again he exclaims.” You leave the pub feeling insulted and never come back. You tell everyone that will listen about how much of a rip off the pub is. They like being ripped off as much as you, and they don’t go there either.
But what if you really love that pub? What if you can’t live without it’s beer garden? (For those that are slow on the metaphorical uptake the pub is the iPhone and the beer garden is WIFI tethering.) Well I’ve done a little bit of research, and I’ve found out a couple of things that you might be interested in learning if you still want to brave the sharks of the O2 waters and buy that iPhone 3GS.
The first thing that you should know is that if you want to use tethering, but don’t want to pay O2 a minimum of £15 a month extra for the privilege you can. In order to achieve this feet you need to step over the line. You need to Jailbreak your iPhone. With the phone Jailbroken a myriad of tethering options surface, the most notable being PdaNet. Tethering for free accomplished. Of course there are risks to going the unofficial route, I recommend researching the subject thoroughly before making the decision for yourself.
The second thing you can do (At least if you are a new customer) to reduce the cost of purchasing an iPhone on contract with O2 is to use an internet cashback service such as TopCashback. For those unfamiliar with the concept, they work like this: You go to the cashback site. You register. You check to see if the product or brand that you want is available through the site (O2 and the Carphone Warehouse are available on TopCashback) You check to see how much money you will be entitled to and then if you are happy, click on the link to take you through to the relevant site and make your purchase as normal. Your transaction will be tracked by the cashback site, and you will receive a balance on that site for the transaction. Carphone warehouse looks like the best bet, offering up to £45 cashback on a mobile contract.
Lets hope that O2 see sense and rectify their barmy pricing policies for the iPhone soon (unlikely). Apple do not escape without some blame in my opinion, and I would like to see them open up the availability of the iPhone to at least one other mobile network provider in the near future. A little competition might keep both parties honest. Here’s hoping.
Posted by: Ian Alexander Wood