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A comment on AT&T to Acquire T-Mobile USA for $39 Billion. Parent comment

Re:AT&T to Acquire T-Mobile USA for $39 Billion by tesseract on Sunday March 20, 2011 @06:37PM (#2347630)
> people don't want to pay $500 up front for a phone, even though they're paying more down the line.

As far as I can tell, T-Mobile is (was?) the only major US carrier to even offer the option of buying a phone up front and then getting a month-to-month plan that costs less than the equivalent 2-year contract. That is what I use and all told it is going to save me about $200 over two years vs. a subsidy based plan. But if hypothetically my monthly rate were the same as what it would be on a 2-year contract, as it would be on AT&T, why wouldn't I take advantage of the subsidized phones (apart from lock-in)?

OK, there are prepaid plans, but the choice of phones (especially smartphones) is limited compared to what's available on postpaid.

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Re:AT&T to Acquire T-Mobile USA for $39 Billion by mrgordon on Monday March 21, 2011 @03:04AM (#2348786)
Prepaid plans don't necessarily restrict your choice of phone. I have an iPhone on T-mobile prepaid. That requires unlocking, of course, but most other smart phones wouldn't even require that (and would have 3G)
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