“AT&T’s elimination of T-Mobile as an independent, low- priced rival would remove a significant competitive force from the market,” the U.S. said in its filing.
That is an obvious need. There's too little real competition in the wireless space as it is. We don't need to be down to a single nationwide GSM provider.
Cricket's apparently smaller than US Cellular and MetroPCS, neither of whom I even knew existed anymore.
Boost is an MVNO. I'm not sure if they really count in this discussion since they don't own their own network. They're really at the mercy of whomever they lease their capacity from.
I feel like this is kind of like making a case against the DOJ/Microsoft lawsuit in the late 90s by saying, 'it's ok if Apple exits the computer market, because there are still competitors out there like Amiga and Compaq.'
They just resell Sprint and Verizon service with shittier phones. A reseller isn't really competition. Spring and Verizon can shut them down whenever they please.
Your argument doesn't fly - in the link you claim that wireless service is expensive because we're building multiple redundant networks when we really only need one.
It's a nice theory that works on paper, but doesn't stand up to scrutiny outside of the USA, where people do have incredibly affordable (and quality) cell service in an environment with many players.
Beefman's argument is of the "who you gonna believe me or your own eyes" variety supplemented by an appeal to authority via some link. It's not just an argument I disagree with but an unfortunate style of argument.
Meanwhile, the size of the U.S. may be a red herring. Most of the region between Boston and Washington is as densely populated as most of Europe and the UK. So is the California coast between San Francisco and San Diego. And so is the region of the Midwest centered on Chicago. Those areas are home to about a quarter of all Americans. In other words, we live in a big country, but a lot of it is relatively empty space.
Loop unbundling is perfectly consistent with my argument, and indeed, the FCC enacted a loop unbundling rule this past April.
The article makes several other oversights. First, the big US carriers do not have regional pricing, and so the population density of the entire country is relevant.
Second, it neglects to mention that CDMA deployment was forbidden by law in many EU countries.
Finally, it neglects to mention that NIMBYism is a major driver of cellular network cost in the US, and differences in the legal climate around tower deployment can account for large differences in costs.
How many European operators have regional pricing? There is certainly no regional pricing in Norway, where half the population lives in about 15% of the land area and the rest is pretty much empty space (a lot of empty space)
Norway (pop density 12.5), Sweden (20.6) & Finland (16), all have better wireless service and are all much less densely populated than the US (pop density 33.7).
When I joined, downvoting was not used as much, and wasn't used to show disagreement (and this was considered good reddiquette for a long time). The community here has changed a lot though, and I sincerely do feel new and want to learn how to best contribute.
There can be little "real competition" in wireless space given that every player in wireless space competes using a government-granted monopoly on the spectrum they're using.
Now, the government has (at least implicitly) chosen to attain a degree of price rationality through creating artificial competition in the wireless market via allowing multiple carriers to operate in single area. Whatever the pluses or minuses of this approach, lets not pretend that the Att merger would involve things attaining the "natural" condition of the wireless market - such a beast ipso facto doesn't exist given the whole arrangement is artificial (created hypothetically for "society's benefit" - which would normally presume is the consumer's benefit).
You are on purpose making a weak contrarian post when it is obvious that there are strong feelings in this thread. You then immediately start complaining when people react against it. Feels a little trolish.
I came here to have a discussion about wireless infrastructure policy. I didn't know I'd be downvoted for disagreeing with "strong feelings", but I did begin by asking a sincere question and tried to maintain a non-confrontational tone.
Your current posts are being downvoted because you're complaining about downvoting.
Your original post, i.e. "What is this obvious need?" is (IMHO correctly) perceived as a leading question. You want to make a point, but you're asking a disingenuous question instead. You're leading the other poster so you can tear him a new one - as evidenced by the fact that you seem to have a lot of stuff to say about this topic.
As a rule I (and much of HN, apparently) dislike questions that aren't genuine. Feigned ignorance as an argumentative crutch is pretty lame.
If you have a point, make it, this isn't some juvenile youth parliament or model UN, there are no victories here.
I wasn't asking a leading question. Nor am I being snarky, sarcastic, or disingenuous, despite that several responses here have been quite rude. Again, I came here to discuss infrastructure policy, not be embroiled in some kind of power struggle. If you read the entire thread, you'll see very immature behavior on the part of commenters here, as well as very pretentious canned one-liners like "looks good on paper but" from people who obviously have no idea what they're talking about.
Nor have I complained about being downvoted, though it does seem obvious that some moderators here are totally high on power.
Making posts to inquire about why one got downvoted seem to throw fuel on the fire, resulting in yet more downvotes. At least, this is what I've observed time and time again here.
The obvious need in my mind is that if we get down to a single national GSM provider, a lot of people are going to be stuck. The only alternative for T-Mo customers that don't want to use AT&T would be to sell their phone and get a new CDMA phone. The concern for me is mainly over a complete monopoly on national GSM; a duopoly is bad enough.
