MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Silliness The "All my phone does is make calls and text" Support Group

CCDMan · 11-10-2010, 10:33 AM

Personally, I think that unless you REALLY need data (and I include text in this) or have to make a lot of calls or texts for real, actual, serious, reasons (real and serious not to include texting/twittering the latest gossip or the precise color of your most recent excretion), a prepaid and fairly simple phone is plenty. To have more is a HUGE waste of money. The cost of owning a smartphone is HUGE:

Cost of Smartphones Link

I recently went from a monthly plan to a T-Mobile prepaid. Since I make few calls and do not have data or text, my average cost works out to $26 per YEAR (five year average). That is right, PER YEAR. Smart phones cost over 50X that! Or to put it another way, that is over 3 Basic iPads per year difference. In fact, speaking of iPads, a monthly (3G) data plan for that is only $300/year, or less than 20% of the smartphone cost.

I am far from a Luddite. I take astro images with sophisticated equipment and build my own PCs. Our household has 7 PCs, 2 iPads, and 2 Kindles. I just refuse to pay for what I consider to be ripoff data plans.

Of course, the ideal is to have a smartphone someone else pays for (an attorney friend has one his firm pays for 100%). We are speaking of personal pay here, I would assume.

I do have small amounts of both Verizon and AT&T stock, however, which both pay nice dividends. I am more than happy to make money at the expense of other suckers!

11-10-2010, 10:33 AM	#256
CCDMan *** Posts: 335 Karma: 5759 Join Date: Mar 2006 Device: ***	Personally, I think that unless you REALLY need data (and I include text in this) or have to make a lot of calls or texts for real, actual, serious, reasons (real and serious not to include texting/twittering the latest gossip or the precise color of your most recent excretion), a prepaid and fairly simple phone is plenty. To have more is a HUGE waste of money. The cost of owning a smartphone is HUGE: Cost of Smartphones Link I recently went from a monthly plan to a T-Mobile prepaid. Since I make few calls and do not have data or text, my average cost works out to $26 per YEAR (five year average). That is right, PER YEAR. Smart phones cost over 50X that! Or to put it another way, that is over 3 Basic iPads per year difference. In fact, speaking of iPads, a monthly (3G) data plan for that is only $300/year, or less than 20% of the smartphone cost. I am far from a Luddite. I take astro images with sophisticated equipment and build my own PCs. Our household has 7 PCs, 2 iPads, and 2 Kindles. I just refuse to pay for what I consider to be ripoff data plans. Of course, the ideal is to have a smartphone someone else pays for (an attorney friend has one his firm pays for 100%). We are speaking of personal pay here, I would assume. I do have small amounts of both Verizon and AT&T stock, however, which both pay nice dividends. I am more than happy to make money at the expense of other suckers! Last edited by CCDMan; 11-10-2010 at 11:28 AM.