Last call for unlimited iPhone data plan...

[GomJabbar]

AT&T said it would no longer offer an unlimited data plan to new users of iPhones and other smartphones. The decision, industry analysts said, could signal a shift away from an era in which American wireless carriers sought to attract customers with simple, all-you-can-eat pricing plans for data.

The trouble for AT&T was that a fraction of users — fewer than 2 percent — made such heavy use of the network that they slowed it down for everyone else.

Starting on Monday, AT&T will offer tiered pricing. People will pay based on what they use, which the company says is fairer to everyone.

Instead of paying $30 a month for unlimited data, new customers will be given the option of paying $15 a month for 200 megabytes, or $25 for 2 gigabytes, with added charges for greater use. AT&T estimates that the more expensive plan will cover 1,000 minutes of video, 400 song downloads or a million one-page e-mail messages. Those who want to keep their existing unlimited plans can do so.

Analysts said AT&T’s move could have ripple effects on other wireless carriers and, eventually, a growing segment of the population that has begun gorging on data using their phones.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/03/techn ... tml?src=mv

[AIX]

2 gigabytes should be enough for everyone.

[yak]

"Unlimited" data plans of most providers here in Germany will only let you transfer a couple of gigs per month (at most) after which they slow down to GPRS speeds (8-20 KB/s) which I suppose prevents people from blocking all the bandwidth all the time.

[AIX]

yak, same thing in Romania too, you have a few gigabytes (0.5-50 GB, depending on provider& data plan, of course) at full-speed (from 1.8 to 21.6Mbps, depending on provider& data plan) and after that, they limit your speed to 128kbps/64kbps (anyway, this is above GPRS speed) download/upload 'till the end of the month; for some plans there is possible to choose to remain at full speed after reaching data plan's traffic limit but you have to pay for this additional traffic - and this is a little expensive. They use to call this type of abo "unlimited".


For example:
- € 9, 1.8Mbps, 1GB
- € 16, 3.6Mbps, 4GB
- € 39, 21.6Mbps, 16GB
- € 9, 3.6Mbps, 0.5GB
- € 14, 14.4Mbps, 6GB
- € 58, 14.4Mbps, 50GB