Verizon Wireless is opening up!

Not that this helps me, since I made the switch to AT&T this past summer, but Verizon Wireless, formerly the cellular company that was the most restrictive of what devices and services could be used on their network, is finally opening up.

 

VZW was always the slowest to roll out cool phones. VZW allowed Bluetooth phones (later than everyone else), but only for Bluetooth headsets, not to transfer cell phone pics off their phones (so you’d have to pay their 25 cents per pic download fee). VZW had GPS phones, but the GPS functionality was locked to their own service that charged a monthly fee (as opposed to free Google Maps).

 

So why the big change? Could it be that devices like the iPhone and the Blackberry Curve are luring more customers away from VZW than they’d like to admit? Could it be that they’re afraid of Google’s plans to spend $5 billion to buy wireless spectrum that would allow them to start a competing open network?

 

Incidentally, Sprint PCS announced a similar move about a month ago, but since they’re Sprint PCS and nobody uses them anymore, it didn’t matter. Now, with VZW opening up, we’ll see changes coming to the cellular industry at a more rapid pace.

 

When I was a kid, Ma Bell (mother of Verizon today) would only allow people to use these clunky primitive phones on their network, for supposed fear of unauthorized devices breaking their phone lines. Maybe it really had something to do with being able to rent people these brick-phones for monthly fees? And here we are, twenty years later, again at the mercy of VZW/AT&T deciding what can or can’t be placed on their network (and how much we’ll pay for the privilege).

 

Thank you, Steve Jobs. Thank you, Google. And VZW? Oh how the mighty have fallen.