Editor’s Note: RCR Wireless News has made many questionable decisions over the years. One of which is agreeing to let a long-time industry observer provide commentary on what is chapping his hide across the wireless industry. His name is Hunter Gates. We call him the Mobile Martyr. We also attempt to make this column suitable for most to read, but despite our best efforts, it still received a “PG-13” rating. You have been warned.
Back in the early days of the smartphone, mobile carriers became very concerned about becoming “dumb pipes.” And, like a bunch of petulant children, they looked around for someone to blame, and that someone was Google. Vodafone’s CEO Vittorio Colao even suggested that regulators should be pulled in to take a look at the situation: a pretty ballsy suggestion from an industry that is constantly bitching about the amount of regulation they face themselves. Feels a bit like blabbing to a teacher because the fight you started got out of hand.
The bitch-fest of that moment was pretty ridiculous: the carriers seemed to think that they should be in charge of determining which content the consumer should get, and how much money could stick to their hands for “helping.” Ho ho, yes, how they would “help” us get the right apps. Can you even begin to imagine just how screwed up the smartphone business would be if that had been allowed to happen?
And so they lost, thank the stars. The Internet streamed in its full glory to consumers one and all, and we rushed out to buy phones with bigger screens to better see the porn that an unfiltered Internet allowed us to access. Yea, porn was the killer app; under-aged kids finally had access to images of naked women without having to lie about their age (at least, not face-to-face). Subsequently, the sky didn’t fall and, surprise surprise, the carriers managed to eek out a healthy living after all.
Of course they did, because that dumb pipe became the Most Important pipe of our lives. And even a dumb brute knows that grabbing us by the family jewels is a pretty safe move to win our allegiance, if not our love and long term loyalty. We all needed a phone number and while we may not be making many calls these days, we replaced that with a ridiculous number of messages. And Bubba, if you don’t have my number, you ain’t texting me.
Except the phone number will be next against the wall in the revolution against brutish carriers. We are getting to the point where we don’t need it. Kids don’t “message” or “text” anymore: that’s for old people. They all use Snapchat and other such carrier-independent things. Their Snapchat login is far more valuable to them than some ancient ten-digit identity. Kids huh. Always rocking the boat. But they are truly onto something and we had better all catch up quickly. Take my Apple ID; anyone can send me messages to my phone, computer and so on if they know that address. They no longer need my phone number. So I can dump a phone service at will and keep on chatting. The day will come when “real” chatting can also happen that way. And when that day comes, the carrier will yearn for the glory days when it was a dumb pipe that we all cared about.
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