cell phone contracts are dumb.

My phone just died a couple weeks back. After about a year and a half of Samsung, I guess it was time to upgrade. I had about 2 more months in my contract before I had to renew, and I was really hoping to get into that new G1 for T-mobile. Here is a picture of the new Google G1 for T-mobile.

The more I looked into it the more I hated it. The thing looks like a brick from 1984, can’t record video and since this is the first release I was a little skeptical. I would like to see it out on the market for a little while before I buy it (bugs, etc). Since the G1 was out of the question I started looking at T-mobile’s other touch phones. I really wanted something that would be comparable (or slightly comparable to the Iphone). The more I started looking the more I started noticing that cellphones are way over priced, and T-mobiles selection of those extremely overpriced cell phones sucked.

I have never had a problem with T-Mobile and would never see the need to switch over to another carrier. But, I gotta tell ya. T-mobiles touch phone selection is way under par with Sprint, Verizon and At&t. Since I only had about two more months with T-Mobile I was thinking of just switching over to At&t to get an Iphone. But then I would have to drop my contract with T-mobile early which means an omega fee. The more I think about it the more I see how contracts with cellphones is a bunch of bull shit. I am paying these guys over 50 bucks a month so I can be stuck with them for 2 years? On top of that, if my phone dies early and I have to get a new one I have to pay full price for a crappy ass phone! The whole systems is messed up.

If you could get an Ipod touch for like 200 bucks retail, why would you pay over 600 for an Iphone (retail).  Is the technology to make calls really that much more expensive? I was looking at all of the retail prices on cell phones on T-mobile and they are the same way. If I wanted to pay full price for a phone (which I would have to if my phone suddenly died) I would have to pay like 200 bucks for this Nokia, oh wait, it comes with a free Bluetooth headset (sarcasm).

I also feel that the touch phones out right now are not perfect yet. I guess I will wait another 2 years for T-mobile to release something decent. Then I will upgrade. Or switch to Verizon or At&t (I already had some bad experiences with Sprint and I wouldn’t go down that road again)

My other options would have been to sign with Cricket which is month to month, you get a crap phone and the service is sucky. In the end, I stuck with T-Mobile. I went to about 4 different kiosks and they all told me different things. One guy said I could keep my contract with T-Mobile for a those 2 months start another contract with another carrier. Then after those 2 months are over they would switch my old number over to the new carrier. I really didn’t want to take this route because my phone number is like an extension of my last name. It hasn’t changed since High School (neither has my last name).

Another guy told me just to call up T-Mobile and complain and they would give me a good deal. And another dude told me that I was pretty much screwed, I would have to pay full price. I finally found one that told me I could get a rebate on my new phone which would bring the price down to 20 bucks after the 50 dollar mail in rebate. I said alright and signed my life away to another 2 years of T-mobile. Check out this this rebate. Its like the hardest thing I have ever filled out. Sorry, my camera is my scanner.

So in the end, these things need to be fixed in the cell phone industry.

  • Get the retail price of cell phones down to where they should be (down at least  in the 300$ mark).
  • Get a little consistency with your people at separate kiosks.
  • T-mobile, get awesome-er phones. Pst- yours kinda suck right now.

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