Todd Allcock wrote:

> Nationwide, Sprint's coverage tends to be better, IMHO, because they
> allow roaming on Verizon and smaller CDMA/AMPS carriers where necessary,
> while a Verizon customer's roaming abilities on currently-offered plans
> is more limited.

But Sprint doesn't allow roaming onto Verizon in Sprint dead spots, only
in markets where Sprint doesn't have a network, unless things have
changed recently.

I live in one of those markets with poor Sprint coverage. Sprint (and
T-Mobile) are constantly showing up at planning commission meetings
asking for permission for new towers, and most of their requests are
turned down. They try to explain that due to their later entry into the
market that they have a different system than Verizon and Cingular, one
that requires more towers, but the neighbors always prevail. There is no
upside to these planning commissioners, most of whom want to run for
higher office, upsetting potential voters. Most of these planning
commissioners are real estate people or developers, and they don't
understand the difference in range between 1900 MHz PCS, and 800 MHz
cellular.

> you to buy a bundle. A $10/day data access charge would similarly
> encourage some to buy the "bundle" (a monthly plan) and allow the carrier
> to still milk those customers who refuse to invest in a monthly plan.

That's what I would like to believe. Maybe they could offer pay per use
only to their cellular voice customers to at least try to gain some
market share out of the deal.

> It IS a DVR- what I said was it's more than just a tapeless _VCR_. The
> major difference they had to communicate to the consumer was a DVR's
> ability to manipulate live televison (pause for a potty break, replay the
> dialog you missed when the actor mumbled, make your own instant-replay or
> slo-mo in the big game, etc.) rather than sell it as a fancy tapeless VCR
> with easy-to-use menus and a difficult-to-justify monthly fee.

It still has a difficult to justify monthly fee, considering Myth TV's
lack of a monthly charge, plus its superior capabilities.