Thread: Your phone or theirs?

Yeah your title says as much insofar as hitting the nail on the head, is it your phone or the manufacturer's property? Some of it likely is covered under contract law given some of the way some companies (*cough* the ones beginning with the letter "V") operate, and they already have plenty of existing law to cover late payment / early break / absconding / flee breaches and or violations of contract without needing to tag along this but it is a better option that what they have coming down the pipe line of "locking down" all phones up to and inclusive of 24 month(s) of contract for such penalties.

However i do believe that it does now need to be worded in stone the phone is yours to do as you wish once the contract is up even though that is assumed anyway but the copyright and patent infringement arguments made in favor of restricting the unlocking of a phone are total BS. Eventually this will come to a head with contracts being sim / tariff only and people just being the phone outright if companies carry on like this and unless they can get super deals that only cost them like 10 to 15 bucks a month like i can they will just pay the few hundred buck mark up and the 20 to 25 a month for no phone, deal.

Originally Posted by Chloe

. . . (*cough* the ones beginning with the letter "V") operate, . . .

You mean Verizon? Oh no...saintly buggers who are always concerned with the consumer. What's already mostly redundant about this yet another new pro-mobile carrier ruling is that Big Red is a CDMA carrier and has its 'global' phones built to include only foreign GSM bands so you either can't use them or at least cannot use them at 3G-4G speeds on AT&T or T-Mobile in the US. It's therefore usually a waste of time to attempt using them on those competing networks. I don't have a problem with companies constructing phones that aren't designed to work on competitor networks...that's common sense and you know that when you buy them. This new 'crime' just goes to show, however, who the government really works for when you see how US mobile consumers are treated compared to others abroad where such referenced governments actually think and give a shit about fairness and the interests of the consumer too.

Right! For all the "They serve Wall Street" nonsense, nobody who has any beef with government should let the phone companies get away without blame. It is like Congress is scared to speak out against Verizon which runs the whole shtick, and again people who think the GOP are afraid to talk out against the NRA or Democrats are beholden to the abortion lobby etc, at least that is partisan one way or another. Cell phone and telecommunication companies lobby so well that they are pretty much fine with whichever candidate wins in every single race! I am still yet to see a single individual in Congress ever go up against Verizon.

I think the whole idea of having the CDMA incompatibility on faster 4G networks within the US is intentional ; then combine that with data caps and limits on Verizon now put on almost every single customer and the loss of unlimited plans and now everyone knows how it is Verizon plan to make money again at a very sharp rate now that the regulation on unfair roaming policies will kick in. The EU for once has got it right on unfair practices on charging you for receiving text messages for roaming but to be fair its not just because it may potentially SPAM you but there is no need to even connect to the carrier's own communication system once the message leaves a message command center from the other person. There is no justified reason to charge people for receiving texts. Or maybe that is just me sounding like i hate phone companies. You make the call lol.

In regards to stopping people from shafting phone copyrights and patents this is where the unseen damage of what Samsung did comes in ; instead of a Federal judge barring all sales of the Siii, no Apple went straight to the head regulatory agencies to get round the whole deal and now every single company is in likely to have to comply with such measures to prevent phone unlocking leading to the theft of copyrighted and protected data and patents.

I figure you both were trying to talk about that the other day and figure out whether it was the right way for you to go on your new phone ; please accept my apologies on how loud and noisy it was in the background, didn't mean to make the place sound like one big wild orgy.

I never liked the vendor lock of hardware.

I bought my current phone (Samsung Galaxy Note 2) at an electronics shop with no contract. Even then you get some crap from Samsung on it, but at least Samsung allows root acces so I control the device and I can put whatever software/OS I want on it.

I will never buy any vendor-locked device like a Windows RT machine or anything made by Apple or Sony.



I don't understand why we let companies get away with it. And sure as hell don't understand why our governements should be supporting this.



Also see this previous posts by me on this topic Sony removes "OtherOS" feature from PS3

I must admit this surprises me when I found out you can't unlock a phone. I'm not a phone kind of guy and have only had 3 including my beloved old Nokia 3310 but as far as I know I'm free to stick any sim card I like in them. I can maybe see a case for locking if you're on a contract but pay as you go the phone is yours to do with as you please.

While Condition
Wend

This conditional loop structure had been around since Fred Flintstone and guess who is still trying to patent it in order to put other software development companies out of business?
Microsoft, of course.
And somewhere there's a well paid-off jurist who will allow the case to go to trial.

Originally Posted by erikvv

I never liked the vendor lock of hardware.

I bought my current phone (Samsung Galaxy Note 2) at an electronics shop with no contract. Even then you get some crap from Samsung on it, but at least Samsung allows root acces so I control the device and I can put whatever software/OS I want on it.

I will never buy any vendor-locked device like a Windows RT machine or anything made by Apple or Sony.



I don't understand why we let companies get away with it. And sure as hell don't understand why our governements should be supporting this.



Also see this previous posts by me on this topic Sony removes "OtherOS" feature from PS3

The vast majority of consumers, by far, will never make use of the 'root' or 'other OS' features or other advanced features, much less the vast multitude of the other unlocked features the device offers. Some techies with the background or inclination will, so in reality this is a limitation that only applies to those few.

I can see where an unpopular carrier tries to grow their market share with special phones and pricing, only to have the techie around the corner crack the phone open for a nominal fee and have the carriers new subscriber flee to their competitor and lose their discounting expense without a mean for making that money back.

That being said, and being a bit of a techie myself, I find it objectionable that the device that I purchased, whether on on contract or outright doesn't matter, isn't 100% in my control, should I chose to exercise that control. I paid for the hardware, it's mine to do with as I see fit. I may not get support on the changes that I made, but I take on that responsibility when I make the changes.

The exception would be that a cell phone is on lease (or any other device for that matter), in which case, I really don't own the phone, but I am leasing it from the carrier, and therefore have limited control over the hardware, which isn't paid for and mine.

Originally Posted by USCitizen

While Condition
Wend

This conditional loop structure had been around since Fred Flintstone and guess who is still trying to patent it in order to put other software development companies out of business?
Microsoft, of course.
And somewhere there's a well paid-off jurist who will allow the case to go to trial.

Source?

Ofcourse you can write a while loop easily using GOTO. Or is that patented also?

Hey now...if you throw Iphone into the mix then you doubly don't own your phone.

I must be contrarian on this issue.

With the heavy subsidies the operating companies provide on these, the most expensive smart phones, you are, of all intents and purposes buying the phone on time... taking out a loan as it were.

And like many many things bought with a loan the borrower sets requirements as to what you can and cannot do with this property.

Car loans require that you do not modify car beyond 'manufacturers standards' Home loans have very similar requirements.

So... who owns your car?

Now go to the Apple Store, buy an iPhone outright, and yes, you should be able to do with it as you wish. And you can... because you didn't sign a contract otherwise. And spent 650.00 for it. Not 199.00 down and 24 months to pay it off.

Originally Posted by USCitizen

While Condition
Wend

This conditional loop structure had been around since Fred Flintstone and guess who is still trying to patent it in order to put other software development companies out of business?
Microsoft, of course.
And somewhere there's a well paid-off jurist who will allow the case to go to trial.

I wonder how long is the longest you have ever gone without mentioning Microsoft.

Originally Posted by tsquare

I must be contrarian on this issue.

With the heavy subsidies the operating companies provide on these, the most expensive smart phones, you are, of all intents and purposes buying the phone on time... taking out a loan as it were.

And like many many things bought with a loan the borrower sets requirements as to what you can and cannot do with this property.

Car loans require that you do not modify car beyond 'manufacturers standards' Home loans have very similar requirements.

So... who owns your car?

Now go to the Apple Store, buy an iPhone outright, and yes, you should be able to do with it as you wish. And you can... because you didn't sign a contract otherwise. And spent 650.00 for it. Not 199.00 down and 24 months to pay it off.

I don't disagree with you in principle but in practice cell phone carriers already cover this in their contracts.

I just don't see any real reason why the government has to add penalties on top of the contract's own; particularly when they're so punitive. $500,000 and jail time is absurd!

Originally Posted by tsquare

I must be contrarian on this issue.

With the heavy subsidies the operating companies provide on these, the most expensive smart phones, you are, of all intents and purposes buying the phone on time... taking out a loan as it were.

And like many many things bought with a loan the borrower sets requirements as to what you can and cannot do with this property.

Car loans require that you do not modify car beyond 'manufacturers standards' Home loans have very similar requirements.

So... who owns your car?

Now go to the Apple Store, buy an iPhone outright, and yes, you should be able to do with it as you wish. And you can... because you didn't sign a contract otherwise. And spent 650.00 for it. Not 199.00 down and 24 months to pay it off.

No, you don't own your Iphone, even if you buy it outright. Apple lets you use their product.