OmniLynx was just shut off

[etrippe1]

I was online and then all of a sudden, a Verizon screen came on my computer and said the jet back battery was charged and to unplug it. I did but nothing changed and I still couldn't access the internet. I called Verizon, gave them the hot spots number and the rep said it was shut off along with a whole lot of others, and she couldn't see why. I told her the why and she apologized for verizon. She was able to reactivate my old data card so I'm up and running.

 

Wonder what happened to make Verizon pull the plug early? And I wonder if any credits will come as we are paid thru the 25th.?

 

[Dutch_12078]

Yep, the same thing happened here a few minutes ago. Maybe it was my fault! I just posted in another thread that it was still working, although my data plan was supposed to expire on the 8th.

[chirakawa]

Yep, the same thing happened here a few minutes ago. Maybe it was my fault! I just posted in another thread that it was still working, although my data plan was supposed to expire on the 8th.

 

Yep, your fault. They're watching you.

[Dutch_12078]

 

Yep, your fault. They're watching you.

 

I thought so...

[Biker56]

The end of a too good to be true is coming to a END.

[Smitty77_7]

Has anyone been approached on sending back their Jetpacks? It's been way under the 12 month period until they were to become ours. But, I have not heard anything about how they want them returned, and also how they expect to pay for the shipping?

 

I wonder if they'll just abandoned them?

 

Smitty

[Smitty77_7]

Has anyone been approached on sending back their Jetpacks? It's been way under the 12 month period until they were to become ours. But, I have not heard anything about how they want them returned, and also how they expect to pay for the shipping?

 

I wonder if they'll just abandoned them?

 

Smitty

 

 

Just read in the other thread, that a former plan member was told to keep the Jetpack...

 

And yeah, reading the other thread, it appears they overstepped their agreement. So if this is accurate, I don't see Verizon shutting this down as being overhanded...

 

Two sides, but a contract is a contract - so someone is right, and someone is wrong.... Lawyers will have fun with this, if it mushrooms along:)!

 

Smitty

[Dutch_12078]

Jack Mayer and I have both received emails from OmniLynx saying that we can keep the Jetpack. I've already swapped the SIM from my Verizon direct plan's 4620L to the 6620L to get the newer performance and features.

[deecee]

 

And yeah, reading the other thread, it appears they overstepped their agreement. So if this is accurate, I don't see Verizon shutting this down as being overhanded...

 

Two sides, but a contract is a contract - so someone is right, and someone is wrong.... Lawyers will have fun with this, if it mushrooms along:)!

 

 

It won't mushroom too far between Verizon and HCS, I think.. Verizon caught HCS's scam, cancelled their complete "membership" in the old contract, and told them that they could get back in only by signing a new contract.

Huntsville's formal statement to the world makes it clear that they do not want that in any way.. Obviously they know, that any new contract will exclude both their making sales profit by selling to the general public, AND would likely also block the nutty "scrape profit off a government contract" patent they applied for.

 

Any mushrooming, story wise, will likely be when and if it gets public what these guys did, trying to save their not so successful Digital 1:1 implementation, started all the way back in 2012.

Switching to a 100% Digital Curriculum (22,000 tablets and laptops handed out all the way from Kindergarten to 12th grade), but forgetting completely that this area of Alabama don't have the infra-structure for such a transition yet.

The initial part of the "Huntsville Wi-Max" (later named OmniLynx) project was to save that.. Internet for poor kids and rural areas with no cable. But then HCS got very greedy and transitioned into wanting to make both sales profit and licensing fees from other school districts as well.

My guess is that Verizon will end up taking the loss from all the "missing" devices currently stuck on Huntsville's phone bill.

The School district certainly do not have that budget and their lowly tech support guy most likely made a SEVERE mistake by telling people (on Facebook and in email) that y'all can keep the devices.

They tried to fix it on Facebook.. He told people to keep the devices, when questioned on OmniLynx's FB page.. But that reply was later removed from the FB page. But its probably too late for them to fix now.

[Jack Mayer]

I received what appeared to be a broadcast email closing down the program and specifying we could keep the device. It was not an individual communication and it was not solicited by me. It was received blind. So as far as I'm concerned that is an official release of the device to me. End of story.

[etrippe1]

After being shutdown, I spoke w/ Jacob @ OmniLynx and he said that everybody should be receiving an email stating that they are currently working w/ a another provider trying to come up w/ a plan to offer to everybody. We should receive the email within a couple of weeks or very early in Dec. I thanked him for letting me be part of his group.

 

Here's hoping something good will be in the offering.

[Mtn.Mike]

I liked the quote about OmniLynx being "greedy". Has anyone seen last quarter profit for Verizon? If anyone is greedy it's Verizon.

[deecee]

I liked the quote about OmniLynx being "greedy". Has anyone seen last quarter profit for Verizon? If anyone is greedy it's Verizon.

 

Verizon is a business.. If someone don't want their product, or if the price is too high, people will simply stop buying from them. Life is really that easy. Verizon is not a monopoly..

And yes, I have seen both 10Q and 10K statements for Verizon. Their profit margins are no different from any other company. Actually lower than some, especially given the investments they have both recoup and make.

You can't look at base "dollar count". You have to look at relative numbers.

 

The greed of Huntsville Board of Education was, that they had a VERY good thing going, that might even have saved their own poor decisions on Digital 1:1 implementation, if they had kept it at the "Internet for poor kids" it was meant to be.

Instead, they chose to start violating the contract and agreements, plus in a very crappy decision apply for a "how to make money off government contracts" patent just to skim some extra bucks off both contracts and other school districts in the country. Something that will never be allowed. Pure stupidity.

I am really hoping you do not see that as a natural thing to do.. No matter the size of the company they are skimming from.

 

No company, Verizon, your's, mine would have let that stand without cutting them off.

[chirakawa]

I liked the quote about OmniLynx being "greedy". Has anyone seen last quarter profit for Verizon? If anyone is greedy it's Verizon.

 

I did a search for Verizon's third quarter profit. All I found was how much per share, which doesn't tell me anything since I'm not literate in such things.

 

However, I do know that Verizon was created to make money. They thrive in a competitive market. They make money for their investors.

 

Huntsville Schools was not created to make money. They were created to educate children. They obtained an attractive wireless data package on behalf of those children in the pursuit of education. Then, they saw an opportunity to make money off of this venture. They redirected their efforts toward making money, not only off of subscribers but off of other school districts which may want to start such a program in their area.

 

Who lost? The education system, the children of the district, the locals who relied on their school administrators to act in the best interest of the children.

[deecee]

 

 

Who lost? The education system, the children of the district, the locals who relied on their school administrators to act in the best interest of the children.

Yes, exactly..

 

BTW.. On Mnt.Mike's dislike for companies making money for investors.

Verizon's last was $1.02 in profit per share (each share worth $45.24, so around 2.25% per share).. Their profit is dropping year over year, and the stock/share price at time of reporting was down 3.3% year over year. Something investors (us all) dislike very much of course.

Twice as much down as the S&P's general 1.5% drop.

They are picking up more subscribers, but the average monthly bill of each subscriber is dropping as well to counter-act that..

 

The actions and price plan changes we keep seeing are there for a reason.. :-)

Verizon is owned by the stock-holders (many of them through a retirement plan/401K/mutual-funds for example), who wants to see return on investment on each share they own or heads must roll.

Giving services away to RVers (despite how much I would personally like that ) is actually clearly against every goal investors would want. :-)

[DuffMan]

 

The greed of Huntsville Board of Education was, that they had a VERY good thing going, that might even have saved their own poor decisions on Digital 1:1 implementation, if they had kept it at the "Internet for poor kids" it was meant to be.

 

Instead, they chose to start violating the contract and agreements, plus in a very crappy decision apply for a "how to make money off government contracts" patent just to skim some extra bucks off both contracts and other school districts in the country. Something that will never be allowed. Pure stupidity.

 

DeeCee - Has any of the local media taken up this cause celeb and and given them their well deserved crucifixion?

[deecee]

 

DeeCee - Has any of the local media taken up this cause celeb and and given them their well deserved crucifixion?

Local media started hearing (and reporting) only the Board of Educations story. Initially, when Verizon merely told reporters "we will work directly with Huntsville to resolve").

The most interested was the "human interest fluff" type reporters, as long as they could report that students would start failing, "wouldn't pass 9th grade without internet", ..., ... and it was all the evil corporation's fault.

But when Verizon got tired of getting blamed, they put out an official, politically correct statement pointing out that the contract was cancelled because Huntsville violated the contract. That they would be happy to work with Huntsville on providing Internet for the kids, but under a separate contract.

Huntsville did not like that obviously and made it very clear that they would not want a new contract with Verizon.

 

The local news was ALL over it when it was still claimed to be Verizon's fault (both on evening TV channels and web-news).. But as they figured out what Huntsville really did, the issue suddenly went pretty silent.

It is much less popular pointing out that their Digital 1:1 program has trouble educating children. (Also, the bad events in Paris happened and kind of took over the news for a while.)

The closest one headline got to reality was this: "Was Huntsville City Schools allowed to sell Verizon Internet services to the general public?"

 

From what they say its not over yet, and HCS claims that they have another internet provider ready to pick up the slack. Announcement end of Nov or in Dec, supposedly.. But we'll see.

I have a hard time seeing who would want to be in business with these people. At least not without some serious legal and contractual protection against Huntsville's ideas for making profit, rather than running schools.

 

Notice that there could be a very politically charged side-issue to this, because it is Alabama of course.. Huntsville has long had segregation issues and discussions.. Poor versus rich districts (racial of course by those lines as well).

Currently they started running a new program "Majority to Minority", where students/parents can apply to transfer away from their "majority" racial school to a school where they are in a racial minority.

 

As it states on HCS's site:

 

"To enhance desegregation, the Huntsville City school district permits a student to transfer from a school where his/her race is in a majority to a school where his/her race is in a minority if space is available. This is called a Majority to Minority transfer. "

 

The whole Internet access issue can potentially turn funky under the desegregation type discussion, because Huntsville willy-nilly implemented Digital 1:1 (all curriculum and books made digital, handed out 22,000 devices) almost overnight, without having made sure that the kids had Internet access at home and were able to study and do home-work. You can probably imagine the general direction of how the lines are drawn between the "have fast Internet at home" versus "have no internet"... Like one African-American kid interviewed stated on local TV: Without internet I can't study and now I probably will not graduate 9th grade.

Fighting renewed desegregation in education already, and then having drawn a whole new potential segregation-line in the Huntsville-Alabama sand? By a poorly implemented 100% Digital curriculum. A potentially touchy, touchy subject in Alabama news, which require a whole different type of reporting.

 

But it clearly points out why the original "internet for poor kids" project was started. A very wide and important local issue.

But instead of keeping the fancy new Internet restricted it to poor kids without access as it should have been, they suddenly took it public for profit instead.

Like cutting your own nose off to spite your face, if you ask me.

 

[deecee]

As if that School board did not have enough problems, just today it is getting reported that their school system is being linked through the Chicago school corruption scandal (Chicago schools CEO pleading guilty to taking bribes and kickback for pushing $23 Mill in business to SUPES).

Huntsville allegedly sending no-bid contracts to SUPES as well, plus at least one Huntsville educator paid $26,000 on the side as "consultant" to SUPES.

 

http://www.al.com/news/huntsville/index.ssf/2015/11/school_consulting_investigatio.html

[IRUNL8R]

 

Verizon is a business.. If someone don't want their product, or if the price is too high, people will simply stop buying from them. Life is really that easy. Verizon is not a monopoly..

And yes, I have seen both 10Q and 10K statements for Verizon. Their profit margins are no different from any other company. Actually lower than some, especially given the investments they have both recoup and make.

You can't look at base "dollar count". You have to look at relative numbers.

 

The greed of Huntsville Board of Education was, that they had a VERY good thing going, that might even have saved their own poor decisions on Digital 1:1 implementation, if they had kept it at the "Internet for poor kids" it was meant to be.

Instead, they chose to start violating the contract and agreements, plus in a very crappy decision apply for a "how to make money off government contracts" patent just to skim some extra bucks off both contracts and other school districts in the country. Something that will never be allowed. Pure stupidity.

I am really hoping you do not see that as a natural thing to do.. No matter the size of the company they are skimming from.

 

No company, Verizon, your's, mine would have let that stand without cutting them off.

DeeCee,

Do you work for Verizon or have major stock in them?? You don't have to answer that..But just reading through all the posts on this one subject you are Very Pro Verizon..LOL

Not saying or implying you are wrong or being disrespectful...But you sure have a lot of information on this one company...lol

[deecee]

DeeCee,

Do you work for Verizon or have major stock in them?? You don't have to answer that..But just reading through all the posts on this one subject you are Very Pro Verizon..LOL

Not saying or implying you are wrong or being disrespectful...But you sure have a lot of information on this one company...lol

I have absolutely no relationship with Verizon (other than being a standard customer). I have no information on Verizon what-so-ever... But I have found a lot of information on Huntsville.. (Verizon just happen to be on the other side).

If I own Verizon stock, I am not aware of it directly, although I might own some, though IRA owned mutual-funds or similar.. Like many others here might own Verizon stock through retirement funds.

 

I am not "pro-Verizon".. I am "con-scammers".. I used to hunt and track hackers/scammers/spammers and the like across the Internet, setting up honey-pots and other to catch them.

When this "offer" from Huntsville suddenly came out my hair started sticking right up in the air.. It was way too obvious that something was wrong.. So instead of buying from them, I started tracking them down to find out what was going on.

 

Thats it in a nutshell.

[IRUNL8R]

I have absolutely no relationship with Verizon (other than being a standard customer). I have no information on Verizon what-so-ever... But I have found a lot of information on Huntsville.. (Verizon just happen to be on the other side).

If I own Verizon stock, I am not aware of it directly, although I might own some, though IRA owned mutual-funds or similar.. Like many others here might own Verizon stock through retirement funds.

 

I am not "pro-Verizon".. I am "con-scammers".. I used to hunt and track hackers/scammers/spammers and the like across the Internet, setting up honey-pots and other to catch them.

When this "offer" from Huntsville suddenly came out my hair started sticking right up in the air.. It was way too obvious that something was wrong.. So instead of buying from them, I started tracking them down to find out what was going on.

 

Thats it in a nutshell.

I totally understand... I am against scammers as well. But always looking for a good deal that will offer affordable solutions (especially in telecom) for all. I have not read the contract between Huntsville and Verizon, nor do I wish to. I know that the Telecom industry doesn't have enough competitors to make it competitive for the consumer. Can you imagine if there was only 4 airlines, insurers, or the like??

I have plenty of competition in my business and in order to stay competitive, I have to make my pricing affordable and in line with competitors.

I do believe that the telecom industry is taking advantage of the consumer each and every way it can. So anytime I see it being stuck to them in one way or another I personally enjoy it. Most of us, meaning General Public want truly UNLIMITED DATA at a reasonable cost. They did have these plans then pulled them. Just watching how Verizon is desperately trying to keep UNLIMITED DATA at bay is deplorable in my opinion.

I am watching how this TMobile roll out goes with BINGE ON and hopefully it is reasonable and works. The ONLY way to hurt Verizon at this point is by losing subscribers ( ie hitting their wallet).

[deecee]

I totally understand... I am against scammers as well. But always looking for a good deal that will offer affordable solutions (especially in telecom) for all. I have not read the contract between Huntsville and Verizon, nor do I wish to. I know that the Telecom industry doesn't have enough competitors to make it competitive for the consumer. Can you imagine if there was only 4 airlines, insurers, or the like??

I have plenty of competition in my business and in order to stay competitive, I have to make my pricing affordable and in line with competitors.

I do believe that the telecom industry is taking advantage of the consumer each and every way it can. So anytime I see it being stuck to them in one way or another I personally enjoy it. Most of us, meaning General Public want truly UNLIMITED DATA at a reasonable cost. They did have these plans then pulled them. Just watching how Verizon is desperately trying to keep UNLIMITED DATA at bay is deplorable in my opinion.

I am watching how this TMobile roll out goes with BINGE ON and hopefully it is reasonable and works. The ONLY way to hurt Verizon at this point is by losing subscribers ( ie hitting their wallet).

 

If there was an actual legitimate offer for cheap Verizon Internet, I would grab at it as well. Of course. I use a lot of data..

I don't care one iota whether Verizon like that or not, as long as its not a scam.. I DO NOT accept scamming anyone as a legitimate way of doing things, no matter how "rich" the people at the other end of the scam may appear to be.

I do not drive my vehicles into the harbor just to collect insurance money from the "rich insurance company", or similar things either.

And claiming to like to hurt Verizon is just silly.. Because the largest owners of such companies are pension-plans and mutual funds in IRAs and the like.. So wanting Verizon's stock price to fall because of any large-scale "sticking it to them" program can, depending on someone's pension plan structure, cost many, many times more in lost investment/retirement value than just paying the darn phone bill in the first place. :-) One should not "stick it" to a company one owns stock in. Directly or indirectly.

 

 

Unlimited Data without SOMEONE paying will not happen.. There simply is no such thing.. At a minimum "Unlimited" will also mean "Unlimited congestion" and slowdown on that shared "highway".

"Unlimited" was a pure (and mistaken) marketing terminology, that existed only because back then they calculated the average use as fairly limited.. "Unlimited" was a marketing person's mistaken way of saying "we don't think you can over-run our capacity".. They were wrong.

 

So-called "Unlimited video (Binge-On) from HBO and Netflix" can happen only because T-Mobile is trying to take customers away from Verizon and AT&T and is willing to pay for it in the form of congestion and other limitations (such as its current low Binge video resolution 480p).

There is a reason that T-Mobile's new offer does not say "all video is Binge-On".. It merely says Binge-On for a specific set of zero-rated streaming vendors that applied to get in on the program. (Which is also why the FCC might get involved, as that zero-rating process produces a barrier of entry to new smaller vendors.. )

 

In the end, the customers should still pay for what they use, in a fair fashion.. Someone watching a constant Netflix Binge or saving many GBs/TBs in the cloud SHOULD pay a lot more than the people merely surfing a few web-sites.

 

Truly unlimited is physically not possible in a severely limited world. Its like claiming that one has invented a "perpetual energy source" or a "perpetual machine".

Wanting "Unlimited" data simply means "I want other, more limited internet users, to help pay MY internet bill.. By sharing my cost over to their bills."

 

As long as there is no such thing as "unlimited available investment money", "unlimited routing resources", and "unlimited bandwidth/capacity", a truly "unlimited wireless" will not exist either.

As more customers (and companies wanting to sell streaming video) sign up and suck out band-width, the congestion will eventually make it impossible for practical use.

 

There are simply too many fools out there that cannot handle the word "Unlimited".. Who thinks its OK to abuse an agreement, just "because I want to and I don't like paying for what I take"..

The proud "I just downloaded 200+ GB of old baseball playoffs" type people, like we saw on OmniLynx. Who absolutely must download the whole internet, just because the device allows "Unlimited"

 

All businesses are finally figuring that bad marketing strategy out. My MBA simply forbids me to see money flows and company investment needs any other way.. Without Unlimited money and Unlimited resources, there is no Unlimited Internet.

Its the same with "Unlimited storage" in the cloud.. Another poor, poor marketing decision.

 

Just see the many articles after Microsoft just killed the "Unlimited storage" in OneDrive.

 

http://venturebeat.com/2015/11/02/microsoft-kills-unlimited-onedrive-storage-will-downgrade-free-and-paid-plans-next-year/

 

As Microsoft stated:

"Since we started to roll out unlimited cloud storage to Office 365 consumer subscribers, a small number of users backed up numerous PCs and stored entire movie collections and DVR recordings. In some instances, this exceeded 75 TB per user or 14,000 times the average. Instead of focusing on extreme backup scenarios, we want to remain focused on delivering high-value productivity and collaboration experiences that benefit the majority of OneDrive users."

 

Notice, that these storage abusers are the same fools that need "Unlimited Internet" so they can send that 75 TB worth of crap up and down from OneDrive. So you there have two separate but connected marketing mistakes..

First someone gave these users "Unlimited Internet", which then allowed them to utilize an equally crazy "Unlimited Storage" offer.. Both miserable failures. In the Storage case, because hard-drives and storage units in the cloud are neither free nor unlimited.. Just like communications equipment. :-)

[HamRad]

I totally understand... I am against scammers as well. But always looking for a good deal that will offer affordable solutions (especially in telecom) for all. I have not read the contract between Huntsville and Verizon, nor do I wish to. I know that the Telecom industry doesn't have enough competitors to make it competitive for the consumer. Can you imagine if there was only 4 airlines, insurers, or the like??

I have plenty of competition in my business and in order to stay competitive, I have to make my pricing affordable and in line with competitors.

I do believe that the telecom industry is taking advantage of the consumer each and every way it can. So anytime I see it being stuck to them in one way or another I personally enjoy it. Most of us, meaning General Public want truly UNLIMITED DATA at a reasonable cost. They did have these plans then pulled them. Just watching how Verizon is desperately trying to keep UNLIMITED DATA at bay is deplorable in my opinion.

I am watching how this TMobile roll out goes with BINGE ON and hopefully it is reasonable and works. The ONLY way to hurt Verizon at this point is by losing subscribers ( ie hitting their wallet).

Kirk and Andi,

I totally agree with your statement. I, too, am watching the TMobile process.

[chirakawa]

I know that the Telecom industry doesn't have enough competitors to make it competitive for the consumer. Can you imagine if there was only 4 airlines, insurers, or the like??

 

Really? You know this?

 

Verizon Wireless didn't exist 16 years ago. You could have started up your own cellular company then to compete with them. Why didn't you?

 

I remember those days. Competition? There was plenty. Every area of the country had it's own little Mom and Pop cellular provider. Phones were as big as home phones, were expensive, we paid $.25 and up per minute for voice calls. Cellular cameras didn't exist. Cellular data and texting were fantasies. Everywhere you went you were roaming..........or worried about roaming at $1.00 per minute or more.

 

Data costs have continually come down over the past few years as technology and infrastructure catch up. What we paid for 500 mb will now buy 4-6 gb. The evolution of cellular data is fairly new, it takes time and money to grow it.

 

It is competition which drives these innovations and developments within the cellular industry. Is there room in the industry for more players? Perhaps, but if so then why haven't others stepped forward? Why haven't you? This industry, like all other commercial endeavors in this country, is driven by the desire to make money. It's what they do. In my opinion, it's working pretty well.

 

I don't work for Verizon, own no stock, have no personal interest other than being a customer since they began. However, I've seen my service from them grow exponentially over the years and I've seen the cost of those services go down or stabilize. I'm thrilled that I can go pretty much anywhere in this country and have cellular service, keeping me in contact with my loved ones and the rest of the world in general.

 

You think Huntsville Schools stuck it to Verizon? No, they stuck it to themselves.

[IRUNL8R]

 

Really? You know this?

 

Verizon Wireless didn't exist 16 years ago. You could have started up your own cellular company then to compete with them. Why didn't you?

 

I remember those days. Competition? There was plenty. Every area of the country had it's own little Mom and Pop cellular provider. Phones were as big as home phones, were expensive, we paid $.25 and up per minute for voice calls. Cellular cameras didn't exist. Cellular data and texting were fantasies. Everywhere you went you were roaming..........or worried about roaming at $1.00 per minute or more.

 

Data costs have continually come down over the past few years as technology and infrastructure catch up. What we paid for 500 mb will now buy 4-6 gb. The evolution of cellular data is fairly new, it takes time and money to grow it.

 

It is competition which drives these innovations and developments within the cellular industry. Is there room in the industry for more players? Perhaps, but if so then why haven't others stepped forward? Why haven't you? This industry, like all other commercial endeavors in this country, is driven by the desire to make money. It's what they do. In my opinion, it's working pretty well.

 

I don't work for Verizon, own no stock, have no personal interest other than being a customer since they began. However, I've seen my service from them grow exponentially over the years and I've seen the cost of those services go down or stabilize. I'm thrilled that I can go pretty much anywhere in this country and have cellular service, keeping me in contact with my loved ones and the rest of the world in general.

 

You think Huntsville Schools stuck it to Verizon? No, they stuck it to themselves.

I don't try to argue Huntsville situation as I did not read the contract and therfore have no idea who is in the right or wrong. That is for attorneys,courts, and juries to figure out,

I am glad you are a customer of Verizon and have been so for many years...I am sure you are one who has a "grandfathered" unlimited plan as well. Thing is most do not have a grandfathered plan and would like one at reasonable cost.

What I am saying is this....I am all for capitalism and for business to make a profit, but Verizon and other companies violate the spirit of fairness and take greed to sometimes top shelf priority. Sometimes you have to do what is right by the consumer/customer. Verizon/At&t/Sprint/Tmobile that is truly your MONOPOLY at work or Oligopoly if you will. Unfortunately they will ensure that NO ONE encroaches on their business set up. Those 4 control the wireless community for now. Like you said the industry will evolve and that takes time. As it evolves, the price will ultimately come down.

I am happy that you can keep in contact with your loved ones all the time, everywhere....Most ppl can keep in contact with loved ones on many different plans from the telecom 4. The issue isn't being able to stay in touch with loved ones ( which can be accomplished without using data ie text, or call) but instead being able to run a business while being mobile (internet based business), streaming videos or music, doing research for school, and the like which uses data. Even if you skyped your data usage for staying in touch with loved ones would still be minimal.

Verizon did exist more than 16 years ago as it was called Bell Atlantic and merged with GTE to make Verizon. SO actually the company existed just using different names. They changed names in 2000.

As you have the right to express your loyalty to Verizon or any other company/business you choose to do business with, I have the right to disagree with the business practices of companies, not utilize their services/products, and lastly, express that opinion.