Every once in a while I will feel the need to applaud a company. Wireless phone providers in the United States have a history of not being consumer friendly. AT&T (formerly Cingular) managed to grab a contract with Apple to sell the iPhone for 5 years. This means no price war between carriers to bring the cost of the device down. You are also forced to sign up for a data contract that can add hundreds of dollars to your bill every year.
Verizon Wireless is famous for limiting feature on their phones. Mobile phones often come loaded with features that are shut off. Verizon would do this in order to force the consumer to use their services, which of course are not free. Their devices are usually terrible too.
Wireless providers do not just hurt us on the front end, they get you from behind too. When Hurricane Katrina struck in 2006, power was knocked out throughout the entire region. Cell towers use the traditional power grid and they went silent. Having cell phone availability at the time could have saved lives and made the first few weeks a little bit easier down there. The FCC seems to agree with this statement.
They have passed new rules requiring all cell towers have battery backups in the case of grid power outages like what Katrina caused. The wireless companies of course do not want this to be a requirement due to the incredible costs involved. Read the article as they make some excellent points on why this should not be a requirement in its current form. I started to agree on the side of the wireless providers, until I read the last paragraph.
Not all carriers have joined the fight. Verizon Wireless is not a party to the appeal and has a history of installing backup generators and batteries to its cell sites. Most famously, during a 2003 blackout that kept much of the Northeast in the dark for hours, Verizon customers could still communicate.
Kudos to Verizon. If they can remain profitable and still provide this backup service, so should the other carriers.
AP Via JournalNow.com
 By The Weakonomist |
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