New “Free the iPhone” campaign pressures FCC over exclusive deals
By David Cassel
As controversy continues, the iPhone’s exclusive carrier deal with AT&T may fuel a revolt against all exclusive cellphone contracts. And joining the fight is a new web site: Free the iPhone.org.
The domain was registered Monday, but it’s already in full-swing, offering stern criticism and a petition pressuring the FCC. “Bad policies allow companies like AT&T and Verizon to shackle great gadgets to their closed networks,” the petition states. It urges choices for consumers — for their networks, the devices they use on them, and the content they can access. The site is pushing for unlocked access for the entire wireless market, saying their fight is over the future — “not just the iPhone but whatever comes next.”
“We need Wireless Freedom — and our elected officials are the only ones who can give it to us.”
But their argument has a powerful friend in Congress. Two days ago an iPhone was hoisted over the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications. “Just over a week ago, people stood in line,”announced committee chairman Ed Markey– “slept overnight, so they could get one of these: an iPhone.” Markey said Apple’s new device highlighted “both the promise and the problems of the wireless industry today.”
“But at the same time the advent of the iPhone raises questions about the fact that a consumer can’t use this phone with other wireless carriers. And that consumers in some areas of the country where AT&T doesn’t provide service can’t use it in some neighborhoods at all.”
Ultimately the iPhone’s popularity is being used as a hook for a critical public policy issue. The FCC is determining the rules which will govern a newly-released section of the public airwaves — and the fight is being watched nervously by bloggers like Matt Stoller. “The deadline is next week,” he writes, adding that the outcome “will determine how our media develops for the next thirty years.”
Everyone’s realized that the wildly popular iPhone provides the best-known example of an exclusive carrier deal. Now it’s also giving congressmen and activists what may be their best chance for dramatically changing the rules for all cellphones to come.
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Stumble It!
July 14th, 2007
I would not even bother purchasing such an overpriced, proprietary device such as the Iphone. Although some people believe in being ripped off, others know that it doesn’t pay to be suckered into buying a device that manufactured in such a hurry, that the quality is considerably compromised. Secondly, AT&T has exclusive rights to commit all Iphones to their network. When someone purchases a computer, they are not forced to only use that computer with one internet provider, why is it different with cellular phones? People are too busy jumping on the bandwagon to see that they are being taken advantage of.