I retired from personal blogging in July 2008.
But you can find me over at http://blog.xero.com.
Posted by Rod in Communications at 10:28 am on Friday, 13 June 2008
I’m sure there is non-iPhone stuff going on somewhere in the world. This will be my last iPost for the week, I promise.
Chatting to one of the 2500+ iPhone users in NZ this morning - who was not a technical user.
He just got got a bill for $900.
Ouch!
I showed him how to turn on wifi.
blog
Sorry this one went right over my head … bill for $900 … turned wifi on? Now if you showed him how to turn wifi off … then I might be getting it?
Wifi on = no/less browsing over Vodafone network
My guess is the guy used $900 in data based on Vodafones very expensive rates. If he did most of his “online” time while at home which had wifi, that data would be going through the guys braodband plan (and therefore essentially free).
Come this $900 bill to the US $35 all you can eat data plan for the 3G iPhone. Will be interesting to see what VNZ offers us considering US$35 would only buy about 200mb at their current rates!
WiFi is free, so turning it on, would root data over wifi network (if present) and not via the phone.
More to the point, turn off EDGE (really GPRS here) all the time except when you explicitly decide you want to use it (if ever, at current prices).
“Boss Prefs” is the only reliable way I know to do that with the current firmware version.
While I’m here …. Vodafone’s recent press release flip-flops make me think that they’re primarily aiming the iPhone at people who want a *phone*, use one a lot, and it’s worth them paying a lot a month for a lot of “minutes”.
I think they’re dead wrong.
For a great many people I know who actually have one, the iPhone is only incidentally something you can make voice calls on, and they rarely do so. Mostly it’s a an internet device, an iPod, a keeper of appointments and contacts, an eBook reader, a casual game device.
It’s also a fabulous SMS platform, and that is what makes it worth having an iPhone instead of an iPod Touch in NZ today. It’s worth paying a few hundred more for the hardware in order to get that.
It’s *not* worth paying five hundred or a thousand dollars a year in fixed monthly charges for phone minutes that you’re not going to use.
If vodafone are serious about aiming the iPhone only at people who are big users of phones as phones then I think they’re going to be sorely disappointed. They just don’t Get It.
Worse, the people who buy them primarily as phones may well be disappointed also.
Well looks like Vodafone NZ are beginning to declare their hand…just posted on their website a page for those wishing to Register and Interest in obtaining a 3G iPhone…interesting choice of words they use about the ‘On Account’ plan:
….Register your details here so you can be one of the first to get all the latest updates on when and how you can get it on a great On Account plan…
http://www.vodafone.co.nz/iphone/index.jsp?search=iphone
Geer: that page has been there since yesterday morning at least.
There is no doubt it will be an “on account plan” only. The question is will be be “great” for the consumer or “great” for their bottom line!
@CJ Vodafone’s data plans are not the expensive black hole you seem to think they are.
The top end plan, 3GB/month, costs $79.95/month with no contract term. Add $10 to that and you get another 3GB, making a total of 6GB/month for $89.95.
Telecom’s fixed line 6GB plan costs more than this without the mobility. Sure, you get free local calling with that, but seriously, mobile broadband that’s on a par with fixed-line pricing is NOT a “very expensive rate”.
Now, is it comparable to wifi? No, because wifi is free or very very cheap. The reason for that is you don’t need a radio licence to operate wifi service and there’s no quality of service assurance from the operators. That’s different from broadband on Vodafone, Telecom or Woosh’s networks where we have to buy licences from the government and guarantee certain levels of service.
Find out more here: http://www.vodafone.co.nz/mobile-data/3g-broadband-plans.jsp
Cheers
Paul
Paul, it’s nice to see you here, but please stop beating the dead horse of XTRA’s ridiculous pricing. I’m sure no one posting here uses them.
You can get 20 GB for $49.95 a month on TelstraClear cable, no phone line or TV or anything else required. I understand there are similar prices from DSL providers such as XNET.
Also I don’t *want* 6 GB on my iPhone for $90. That looks a reasonable deal for people who need that much mobile data, but it’s nowhere near cheap enough to make me dump my cable modem for home use.
I’d be much more interested in a tenth of that: 600 MB for $9. That’s a better deal than the $6000 that 600 MB would cost me on pre-pay GPRS at the moment.
Paul: $40 for 200mb or $90 for 6gb. Big users get a good deal but small users get screwed.
Unless you can teather the iphone (I dont think it can natively but an app might allow it) then it is unlikely you will do 6gb on a phone. So this puts users at the lower, more expensive end of the spectrum. So if on the odd occasion we use a lot, we get hammered.
You’re missing the point Bruce. The post said our data prices were “very expensive” whereas I would disagree. They’re not about to replace your home line with mobile broadband either… that’s just not feasible when you consider the needs of a family (say four people) versus one mobile individual.
What you’re after is something else entirely. I’m not talking about data on a smartphone with this service - I’m talking about mobile broadband (data to a laptop or similar device).
Data for a smartphone can afford to be far smaller in size than 6GB because the phones themselves don’t need that much of a download. Mauricio from Geekzone was talking somewhere (can’t find it now) about being happy with a couple of hundred meg a month for his email/surfing needs on a Windows device. Mauricio, are you receiving me, over?
As for 600MB for $9… well, good luck with that business model. After you’ve invested hundreds of millions in a network to cover the three main centres, hundreds of millions more for the thousands of New Zealanders who are not living in the three main centres and tens of millions in spectrum licenses, you might get away with charging $9/month but I imagine your shareholders might have a few things to say about it.
Cheers
Paul
Bruce, you must be a journalist because you seem to want to not let the facts get in the way of a good story. Not everyone can get get a Telstra cable connection. I use Xtra; I am sure there are others who visit this website who do as well. So how far does your Telstra cable stretch? When you walk down to the shops do you drag it behind you?
Are we becoming a nation of moaners because we cannot get x amount of data on any service for nothing? If you don’t want to use Vodafone for your iPhone 3G connection, use Telecoms.
Paul,
What difference does it make to your expensive network infrastructure and spectrum licenses in the following two scenarios?
1) nine users are on prepay, doing their SMS via GPRS, and holding their data usage down to a few KB per month. Plus a tenth customer uses 6 GB on a $89.95 plan.
2) ten users each use 600 MB, and pay $9, for a total of 6 GB of traffic and $90 of revenue.
Note that in both cases you’ve got ten users wandering around with equipment turned on, switching from site to site, updating HLRs and all the rest of it. And in both cases your network is supporting 6 GB of data transfer.
I agree with Mauricio that “a few hundred MB” is about what I’d want on my phone each month. And I’d pay $5 - $10 for that — as I suggested above, 600 MB for $9. Hell even 300 MB for that would be OK, even though it’s 20 times more than I pay on cable at home.
No way am I going to pay your current $40 for 200 MB. That is just pure rip-off.
Paul, thanks for starting some dialogue again. Vodafones silence re the iPhone has been deafening so far.
Yes, without doubt, Vodafone’s current plans are very attractive for what you get. The price compared to worldwide is not that bad,
but, as others have alluded above, the iPhone really is a whole different kettle of fish to most of the other smartphones/smartphone platforms that are on the market.
Vodafone have an decision to make here, and hopefully the braver one will be made.
Option 1. Ignore iPhone users undeniable appetite to actually use mobile data and price things as is, basically making it a toy for those with disposable income or a flash replacement for the business persons Blackberry.
or Option 2.
Go for gold (read marketshare) with similar entry purchase price points to those suggested by Steve Jobs last week, 24 month contracts and have an iPhone exclusive data plan that entices people in and get thousands and thousands of new smartphone/mobile data users that simply wouldn’t buy in at current data prices.
eg.
iPhone data plan Addon
1GB 19.95
3GB 29.95
5GB 39.95
You’ve already shown us with the $10 “insurance” that the data cost isn’t where the money is for you guys.
So, what’ll it be?
A couple of thousand iPhone users paying current prices with their toy…
or
10’s and 10’s of thousands of new users of mobile data that previously you’d never have got on board…..
Dermott, it was Paul who decided to compare mobile pricing against fixed pricing, by taking the worst deal he could find.
Of course not everyone can get TelstraClear cable, but I prefer to base my claims on facts rather than hearsay. It is my understanding (as I said in the previous post) that similar rates are available on DSL if you avoid XTRA.
A moaner? I don’t want something for nothing. I also — in particular — do not want a “flat rate” connection. What I is to be able to pay for what I actually use at a rate that is fair to everyone, and in particular a rate that allows the provider to expand capacity as usage increases, not moan that customers are “abusing” the system by using it.
There are plenty of fine companies around NZ who offer exactly that. TelstraClear cable is such as example. So is Paul’s own Vodafone for pre-pay voice and SMS.
However Vodafone fall down badly at the moment for customers who would like to use smallish amounts of data. They seem to be stuck in a mentality of “no one uses data, except for those who use gobs of it, so we’re going to accept that we have very few customers and charge them each a lot for it”. Breaking out of that model is a very difficult chicken and egg problem. Most people don’t use data because it’s too expensive, data is expensive because no one uses it. The introduction of the iPhone is a golden opportunity to transition to a model where almost everyone uses data and it’s affordable, and total revenues are are many times larger than now.
So far I’m seeing no signs of Vodafone (NZ) understanding this, especially with the announced locking out of 75% of their customers from the iPhone.
@Bruce, none of what I said was “hearsay” either, which my dictionary defines as a kind of lie…
I’m not suggesting the TelstraClear comparison isn’t fair. But you are suggesting my Telecom comparison isn’t fair. The vast majority of NZ’s broadband customers are on Telecom’s network and goodly proportion of them are on Xtra. Hence my use of Xtra’s pricing.
Cheers
Paul
Paul, “hearsay” wasn’t in reference to you. It would be what I would be guilty of if I repeated DSL prices I had been told of, rather than cable prices that I know for sure because I pay the bills myself. I know the facts of TelstraClear cable quite well, I know very little of DSL pricing because I don’t use it. Suffice it to say that if all DSL pricing is as you quote for XTRA then I am very sorry for those who can only obtain broadband that way.
Fair enough, Bruce.
Hopefully we can meet somewhere in the middle one of these days. Not too far away I hope!
Cheers
Paul
and of course hearsay means second hand or passed on… sigh. I’d blame the sugar rush from the fairy cakes I’ve been ingesting.
So given that you have come out to play Paul, any thoughts on how long we will have to wait for news on pricing on the iPhone here in little old NZ..
Stuck my head into a Digital Mobile store today and they quoted me $350 - $600 depending on plan, also that the phone would be available via Pre Paid!!!
That is my fondest wish. Preferably within the next four weeks! ;-)
But here’s my final bit of take-away advice for Vodafone. Yes, I’m sure there are some big-spending contract customers who will get iPhone. But the vast majority of people who are potentially interested in them are people who, if you overprice it, will instead get an iPod Touch and a cheap prepay phone. They’ll happily pay an unsubsidised hardware cost that is a couple of hundred more than the equivalent iPod Touch just to get the convenience and integration of not having to carry two devices around, and they want to be able to make calls and afford to use data, but they will NEVER use a lot of either.
@Paul, so much discussion about pricing and GB per plan. That is only part of the equation. We are on the cusp of a new world where the internet is ubiquitous and data cost per unit is negligble (ie read next to no cost)..sure you have some capex to amortise, but you need volume to reduce the unit cost.
What about the added-value from Vodafone with apps that really make the iPhone a fantastic productivity device…..I sure hope that Vodafone isnt just going to play the ISP on this and just offer access and no added-value service that will really make the iPhone a category killer for you..talking about email and other apps.
Here’s hoping!
@Bruce, and another comment - let hope we all get to be able to ‘actually’ take delivery of a 3G iPhone thru Vodafone NZ sometime in the next few months….chances are that NZ will be getting only a few hundred given that Apple has to spread them all round the world.
note this article from Australia:
http://www.zdnet.com.au/blogs/traffic/soa/-Line-up-for-an-iPhone-Are-you-serious-/0,2001084676,339289834,00.htm
The Vodafone online rego page gives no info on availability and certainty!
Vodafone don’t understand data. Period. Data should be the focus of revenue growth as voice is only going to depreciate in value (and importance) over time. Charging an On Account Customer $11.25 for 3MB of data is also a joke. Charging casual users $10 per MB for data is just a joke, and with the start of the “unwalling of the garden” allowing browing beyond the walls of Live! with a WAP proxy - who can really afford to do this when 75% of users will be stung $10 per MB for the luxury?
First Apple screwed over the music companies, now they are going to do the same to the mobile industry. Rather than the traditional model of mobile operators dictating to the handset manufacturers what specifications a mobile should have Apple have turned this on it’s head. They have developed a product and told you how they want it sold. They have smart. Very smart.
When I first started using the internet ~1990 I paid around $10 per MB for data. Imagine how lame the internet would be if that was still the case..
got a phone call from Vodaphone telemarketer the other day (”is this a good time?” I’m sitting on the can “um, I guess so”) trying to get me to sign to a new plan, my current one has run out
I asked her about iPhones, and told her I was waiting to see what Vodaphone and Telecom were offering, she had no clue what one was ….
(Paul are you listening) the most important things to me are: 1) the ability to program my own phone 2) an unlocked phone so I can use my slowly growing collection of overseas SIM cards 3) seamless VOIP so my home VOIP phone can ring anywhere in the world - some smart scripting so when I dial it will check which SIM card I have in, and whether I have a connection to the home Asterisk/VOIP server (wifi or 3g) to decide how best to make a call (and I get to decide because I know what’s best for me)
If necessary if I have 1) and can make 3) happen
@Paul Loud and clear.
I have a Windows Mobile device, with push email turned on. I browe lightly with the built-in browser, and the occasional replies on Geekzone. My usage over the last few years have averaged about 100 - 150 MB a month on my mobile device. And it includes some RSS reading and some remote access to the Geekzone server too.
@m Freitas: If GPS used google maps, that might also use a lot of data.