Posts Tagged ‘tmobile’

David Pogue launches all-out war on canned voicemail messages

Thursday, July 30th, 2009

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You know, we love fighting the good fight — especially if it means calling out corporations on their untoward business practices. Today we’re joining David Pogue of the New York Times in calling foul on cellphone carriers’ insistence that users be forced to listen to those maddening, pointless 15-second canned carrier messages. In case you’ve held off on owning a cellphone or calling anyone who has one, they go a little something like this:

At the tone, please record your message. When you have finished recording, you may hang up, or press 1 for more options. To leave a callback number, press 5. (Beep)

Not only is Pogue mad-as-hell-and-not-going-to-take-it about the ridiculous idea that we still need to be told how to use voicemail, it turns out those additional messages are actually costing you cold, hard cash. He estimates that Verizon, for instance, is netting around $620 million a year thanks to these little annoyances. So what’s to be done? Well Pogue wants the citizens of the internet to take up virtual arms… and complain like nobody’s business. He’s wrangled together all the best contact points for the four largest carriers in the US (included for your convenience after the break). Let them know you know don’t want to pay for voicemail instructions. And hey, while you’re at it, tell them the price-gouging on text messages needs to go, too.

Continue reading David Pogue launches all-out war on canned voicemail messages

David Pogue launches all-out war on canned voicemail messages originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Thu, 30 Jul 2009 13:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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David Pogue launches all-out war on canned voicemail messages

Thursday, July 30th, 2009

Filed under: , , , ,

You know, we love fighting the good fight — especially if it means calling out corporations on their untoward business practices. Today we’re joining David Pogue of the New York Times in calling foul on cellphone carriers’ insistence that users be forced to listen to those maddening, pointless 15-second canned carrier messages. In case you’ve held off on owning a cellphone or calling anyone who has one, they go a little something like this:

At the tone, please record your message. When you have finished recording, you may hang up, or press 1 for more options. To leave a callback number, press 5. (Beep)

Not only is Pogue mad-as-hell-and-not-going-to-take-it about the ridiculous idea that we still need to be told how to use voicemail, it turns out those additional messages are actually costing you cold, hard cash. He estimates that Verizon, for instance, is netting around $620 million a year thanks to these little annoyances. So what’s to be done? Well Pogue wants the citizens of the internet to take up virtual arms… and complain like nobody’s business. He’s wrangled together all the best contact points for the four largest carriers in the US (included for your convenience after the break). Let them know you know don’t want to pay for voicemail instructions. And hey, while you’re at it, tell them the price-gouging on text messages needs to go, too.

Continue reading David Pogue launches all-out war on canned voicemail messages

David Pogue launches all-out war on canned voicemail messages originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Thu, 30 Jul 2009 13:04:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Motorola’s first Android phone to be the T-Mobile G1 v2?

Monday, May 11th, 2009

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Okay, so T-Mobile confirmed on Saturday that it’s launching “multiple” Android devices from “three partners” later this year, and since most people assume the HTC Magic / Sapphire / myTouch / whatever and the Samsung I7500 are pretty much locked in, speculation has generally centered around that mysterious G1 v2 and the identity of the third partner — and it looks like it’s going to be Motorola. Not only did commenter Someperson notice that the button labels on the alleged G1 v2 are basically identical to those on other recently-launched Moto phones, Boy Genius Report says today that they can “more or less confirm” the v2 will be Schaumburg’s first Android set — a development that lines up perfectly with last month’s rumors of a slider QWERTY piece. Yep, it all fits together nicely, except for the fact that HTC is oddly out of the loop on the sequel to the G1 — but since T-Mobile owns that particular trademark, it can do whatever it wants, you know? Hopefully we’ll find out more soon — if that sketchy leaked roadmap is correct, we’ll be seeing this guy in the fall.

Update: Or… the G1 v2 could really be the Samsung Bigfoot. It’s a mystery for now, we’ll let you know.

Motorola’s first Android phone to be the T-Mobile G1 v2? originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Mon, 11 May 2009 18:07:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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