Summary
Price increasing
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Innocent Until Proven Guilty - Or Not.
Article by Christian Dippon1
Introduction On 9 September 2008, US Senator Herb Kohl (D-WI), chairman of the Senate Antitrust Subcommittee, sent a letter to the CEOs of Verizon Wireless, AT&T Mobility, Sprint Nextel, and T-Mobile (the four largest US mobile carriers) demanding an explanation for recent price increases for text messaging. Text messaging is a rather broad term that means sending messages from one device to another using a wireless technology and includes services such as short message service (often called SMS), email, instant messaging, Internet access, voice SMS (where the text is converted to voice), text-to-landline SMS (where the text is also converted to voice), and the sending of content (e.g., pictures or video messaging). Senator Kohl appears to be questioning only the prices of SMS, which is just one form of text messaging. This distinction is crucial as there is a significant difference in the use of SMS and other forms of messaging such as emails, Internet access, and voice SMS. Senator Kohl's letter asks the carriers to "justify" what "some industry experts contend ..." are price increases that "do not appear to be justified by any increases in the costs associated with text messaging services." Specifically, Senator Kohl asks for: An explanation of why text messaging rates have dramatically increased in recent years. Cost, technical, or other factors "that justify a 100% increase in the cost of text messaging from 2005 to 2008. Data on the utilization of text messaging during this time period. Comparison of prices charged today as opposed to 2005 fo...See the full content of this document
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