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As much as I know the word “unlimited” is really over-used in marketing and advertising, I really must admit that I do like the concept of not being tied down to fixed limits with services that I subscribe to. Of course, I understand that even with “unlimited” services there is always some sort of limit or cap to avoid abuse of a particular service, but when it comes down to it I simply enjoy the flexibility of being able to really use a service that I subscribe to without having to worry about incurring additional fees of overage charges. Especially in an economic climate such as the one we’re in now, “unlimited” services really are beautiful when it comes to budgeting.
But as I discussed just the other day, the concept of “unlimited” plans when it comes to cellular data really has been dwindling away over the last year despite the fact that unlimited mobile airtime and unlimited mobile text messaging has become more and more of a standard, and as it stands now there are only a couple of major carriers out there that still offer “unlimited” data plans. In my article yesterday, I questioned whether or not mobile carriers AT&T or Verizon – both of which having discontinued their unlimited mobile data plans somewhat recently – would bring back such plans down the road given the competition from Sprint, a carrier that has been seriously pushing unlimited data in recent months.
There’s no doubt that the mobile industry has been one of the busiest and most newsworthy industries in the last couple of months. It seems as if every time we blink our eyes we are flooded with new announcements, unveiling, rumors, and overall mobile innovations. With this level of innovation in the mobile industry and the great deal of profit that stands to be made as a direct result of it, it isn’t really a surprise that the mobile industry is one of the most competitive ventures to be in right now.
With today being the first day of availability for the Verizon iPhone and AT&T stepping up their game with inter-network unlimited mobile-to-mobile messaging, the spotlight is definitely on the mobile industry. However, with “larger” entities like Verizon and AT&T stealing the spotlight, one can easily understand how smaller franchises can easily be left in the dust. At the same time, there’s one word that always grabs our attention – no matter how much coverage an industry is getting. Free.
It seems as if every time we as consumers turn around, manufactures are releasing new and improved smartphones; more feature-rich and power-packed than the ones they released only a matter of days before. However, with the constant innovations that the smartphone industry is making it is sometimes easy to forget about the non-smart phones that are still sold day-in and day-out. Call them baseline, call them low-end, call them “dumbphones” or “plain old telephones”, but the fact of the matter is that they are still in high demand and are still widely used. You know the ones I’m talking about; the handsets that are given out for “free” with new contracts, or even the ones that you can purchase for around $20 with no contract at all.
My point is, despite all of the growth in the smartphone market, there are still quite a bit of baseline handsets out there that are manufactured, sold, and used each and every day. And even though these phones are a big market, many people in current-day society neglect to realize the huge market that baseline handsets are in the mobile industry. Facebook, however, announced yesterday plans to tap into this abandoned mobile market by introducing a mobile version of their website specifically for “baseline” mobile handsets.
When the craze for high-definition television programming first started to become mainstream, users were in search of a solution that would allow them to keep up to date with the latest must-have without shelling out a great deal of cash to do so. However, there was somewhat of a void in the television market for a company that produced lower-priced HD entertainment. This gap was ultimately filled by Vizio; a company that has become well-known for quality HDTV systems at prices that were once unheard of. Now, after penetrating the HD market, Vizio is looking to widen its horizons and venture into the newest emerging market out there: the mobile market.
In less than three weeks, Vizio is expected to debut a new line of mobile products at the Consumer Electronics Show. These Android-based products, which will include cell-phone and tablet-computer devices, would be a direct competition to the success already seen by Apple’s iPhone and iPad products. While Vizio is definitely not the only company looking to grasp onto the mobile industry, there are a few key components that could help the discount electronics company.
If you have watched television at all within the past month and a half chances are you have seen one of the Windows Phone 7 commercials from Microsoft. Windows Phone 7 is supposedly a phone that will save us from our phone. I understand what Microsoft is looking to accomplish with these commercials. I get it – I really do. The Windows Phone is supposed to allow users to quickly glance at their phone and get an idea of what is going on with their friends, work, etc through the use of the “Tiles” feature so you can get back to life.
In these commercials, Microsoft really makes their point. People have their face in their (smart)phones a lot. There is absolutely no denying that. However, there are a lot of people who actually enjoy using their phone. In fact, I would say that most people I know, whether it be friends from school or online, enjoy using their phone and do not see it as a nuisance.
One of the flagship phones for both Verizon Wireless and Motorola is the Droid X, a phone that you will not regret purchasing. The price tag is not the cheapest for an Android-based phone coming in at $199 on a two-year contract with Verizon, but you get quite a bit of bang for your buck. The Droid X has a 1 GHz Texas Instruments OMAP processor which handles Android 2.2 with the MotoBlur skin very well and it runs very snappy. There are some cons about the size of the device due to its massive 4.3″ (480 x 854) LCD screen, but that might be a blow you will gladly take to use this device.
I am going to start off with the cons of the Droid X, and there are a few cons with the hardware I have experienced. On my device, a pressure crack or soft spot has formed in the enter of my screen. It is not too noticeable and varies in size at times. It doesnt hinder the performance of the phone, but it is worth pointing out that this happened. I am relatively careful with my devices so just be aware of said problems. I have also had a problem with the phone not recognizing the charger a couple times, but all i did was reboot and it worked fine. Also, I had another problem with my calls being muted completely, so I was not able to hear a dial tone or any voices, but again a reboot did the trick. Those are some minor problems that did not really take away from the experience of the phone completely, but were definitely annoying when experienced.
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