Field of Verizon Wireless Phones Increases with Introduction of Apple iPhone
July 29th, 2011 by
Verizon wireless phones range from classic candybar designs to clamshell form factors. With Apple’s recent foray into the Verizon catalog of handsets, however, customers of the wireless communications giant now have more chatting choices than ever before!
To be sure, the cellular handset is just a commodity now and consumer probably don’t think in terms of Verizon wireless phones as opposed to something from some other company. It’s almost like choosing laundry detergent, with everybody offering the same general feature-sets on their phones and the same general terms and conditions for their plans. That’s because the market has changed dramatically since ten or fifteen years back when a cell phone was a status symbol! But these days everyone has one, such that there’s hardly a street corner with a pay phone anymore.
That’s why many don’t care about something like Verizon wireless phones – they’re just looking for a handset, whatever the make or model! And so carriers have taken to “locking” up their phones (that should be “their” phones, really – more on this in a moment), recognizing that customers have no brand loyalty anymore. Correct: the phone is rendered inoperable when customers switch service providers! You would imagine that since the phone is bought and paid for, it belongs to you, and you can determine which service provider to use it with.
Think again! Carriers say that because they actually subsidize part of the cost of the phone, they reserve the right to lock those phones when someone is no longer a customer. Curiously, there has been no class-action lawsuit against such a potentially anti-competitive policy, one that’s long been adopted by all the carriers in the industry. Surely there are legal loopholes involved, though one wonders why tobacco companies can be successfully sued but not wireless service providers which purposely render people’s handsets useless!
But all hope’s not los; there’s a way around the onerous policies. In many cases, a phone can be unlocked by just entering a certain code into it!
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