Tag Archives: cellular

Dodging a brick…

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I’ve been vaguely aware that 2022 was the year 3G wireless service was going to be discontinued here in the US for a while now. Other than being aware, I really didn’t put much intellectual rigor into wanting to know more about it. That was true until I glanced at an article yesterday warning that some cellular-based home security systems among other “background” services could be impacted.

After a quick check, it turns out that my system is going to be one that dropped offline sooner rather than later. Turns out, thanks to AT&T taking their network offline later this month, I was about a week away to losing my system. 

I’m not mad at them. Technology marches on and needs to be upgraded from time to time. I’m am, however, pissed as hell that I didn’t even get a warning notice from the monitoring company I’ve been paying every month for the last seven years to keep any eye out for home intrusion, flood, and fire. 

They were quick to confirm that I was about to have a problem when I called last night. If I hadn’t noticed that article and then taken the initiative to call them, though, there’s no telling how many monthly fees I’d have paid for them to monitor dead air. In all likelihood, I’d have never known it until the point when an alarm should have triggered but didn’t. 

That’s aggravating on any number of levels. 

To their credit, the company in question was quick to offer me an upgraded base station at no cost (as long as I was willing to sign a new one-year contract). No big deal there, as I’ve been going month to month with them for at least the last four years and don’t have any interest in building a new system from the ground up. Aside from this one pretty glaring issue, their customer service and equipment has been just about flawless. 

I should be at least temporarily future proofed by the end of the week, but if you rely on cellular as a primary or backup link for your alarm system and it’s of a certain age, you might want to give your provider a call and make sure you’re not about to be bricked.

Things you miss when they’re not there…

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I learned two very important lessons today. The first is that I can spend eight hours at work and not have access to a computer and not feel like I’m missing all that much… Especially when the nice lady down the row prints off the important stuff and hand delivers it to me. I can’t say the same thing for working in a place that has some of the worst cell phone coverage in the industrialized world. Seriously. My phone went between one bar, searching, and no coverage randomly throughout the day. And when there was coverage, it wasn’t 3G. Yeah. That slow.

You don’t realize how much you rely on your cellie day-to-day, especially when you have a working computer to keep yourself distracted. When suddenly it’s the only commo you have and it’s not working with any reliability, you find yourself in for a long day. And no, the irony of a massive communication hub being smack dab in the middle of a dead zone isn’t lost on me in the least. That’s just Sam doing his thing.

AT&T… You fail. Again.

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Dear AT&T Mobility,

I just want to drop a brief note and let you know I’m thinking about you today. I’d like to thank you for doing your level best to cripple the wonderful new iPad 3G I bought less than a month ago with your new data usage plans. I was ok dealing with the idea that my “unlimited” data plan really meant that I had 5 GB of data available each month. But now, thanks to your apparent inability to expand your cellular network to meet consumer demand, you’ve thoughtfully dropped that limit to 2 GB. But hey, I’ll save $5 a month for getting 3/5 less capacity… unless of course I go over my 2 GB limit, in which case you’ll hit me with another $25 charge, in which case I’ll be paying an additional $20 for 1/5 less capacity. I’m not a fancy big city math major, but it seems to me that what you’re doing is charging almost twice the price, providing only 4/5 the service, and calling it a victory for cellular data users. You’re logical gymnastics are truly the stuff of legend. Very impressive.

Now the reality is that most months I won’t come close to using 5 GB of cellular data since I’m usually running over a wifi network, but during those times when I’m away from a hotspot, it was nice knowing that 3G could fill the gap and I would happily pay my $30 a month for having that capacity in my hip pocket when I needed it. All you’ve done with your new tiered pricing plan is reinforce the image of AT&T mobility as a somewhat fecklessly run operation whose network teeters on the brink of failure under its regular daily load. When you announced the $30 a month unlimited plan for iPad, I really had hoped that you’d finally gotten your act together. Apparently, not so much.

So, yeah, it’s good to know that the $100+ a month I’ve been paying you for more years than I care to remember has been going to do good works like building up network infrastructure and increasing bandwidth availability. You guys are really, really bad at this cellular stuff. The future of wireless is always going to be more data, not less. Trying to artificially hold down demand in the short term by raising rates may work in the short term, but your not going to change the nature of consumption. Each new evolution in technology is going to be more reliant on data, not less, and every month that passes is going to leave your network less able to meet demand.

Today you’re the only game in town, but those days are numbered. You’re on the wrong side of the argument and your customers know it.

Sincerely yours,

Jeff