And welcome to our Thursday column, Worst of the Week. There’s a lot of nutty stuff that goes on in this industry, so this column is a chance for us at RCR Wireless News to rant and rave about whatever rubs us the wrong way, which as we grow older appears to be most things. We hope you enjoy it!
Unlike many people who head home for the holidays, I took the opportunity over the long Thanksgiving weekend to hit the road and get away from the usual family-oriented frivolity that inevitably turns into another edition of “Most embarrassing family get-togethers.”
Unlike past trips when me and the boys went to Knoxville in search of the world’s fair, this year we packed our bags and headed for Moab, Utah. A mere five-hour drive from the Denver-metro area and an outdoor lover’s paradise. Open lands, clean air and state-run liquor stores. What is there not to love?
Now, since I am a card-carrying member of nerd-nation-president: Mike Dano-I took along enough demo cell phones to cook a turkey. All in the name of science of course. You see, there is no better place to test carrier coverage and handset reception like the middle of nowhere. And Utah has a lot of that. Phones in on the trip included a couple of Sprint EV-DO digital-only handsets-a personal Samsung and Sprint-supplied Sanyo; a voice-only Sprint/Sanyo phone with analog; a Verizon Wireless/Moto Q EV-DO digital-only phone; a Nextel iDEN phone; and a T-Mobile Blackberry.
Once in Moab, I made a quick scan of the surroundings and found only two visible cell sites, and since there was not much obstructing the views, I assumed they were the only two sites in town. A quick check of the phones showed all picking up a signal in one form or another. The Verizon Wireless/Moto Q, T-Mobile/RIM and Nextel phone all showed native coverage, i.e. no sign on the handset screen of any roaming. The Sprint phones showed digital roaming. A quick call to *611 on the Sprint phones showed I was roaming on Alltel’s network, which I assumed was also providing CDMA service for Verizon and GSM service for T-Mobile.
Understandably, EV-DO service was not available in the area. Nonetheless, I attempted to stream my SlingBox service over the Moto Q using 1x with unwatchable results. The Blackberry was able to send and receive e-mails just fine. The Sprint phones provided mixed data results. The Sanyo from Sprint had an updated PRL (preferred roaming list) that allowed for data roaming using Alltel’s 1x network. My personal Samsung had an old PRL, thus no data. And since I was not on a native network, I was not able to update the PRL.
Fast forward a few days and I am back in the Denver area and decide to go ahead with the PRL update on my phone. Now, I have done these in the past with very little trouble, so did not expect an issue this time.
First call: After navigating the always-maddening automated voice service that I think is designed to weed out callers, I was put through to a customer service person who was less-than-fluent in English and seemed unable to understand what I was asking for. I politely hung up and decided to call back.
Second call: Same maddening automated voice tango to a pleasant fellow who, after a brief explanation, understood what I was looking for. I was put on hold for a few minutes. He checked back to make sure I was still there and said it would be a few more minutes. This happened a couple more times before the line went dead. Sweet.
Third call: Another round of automated voice bingo followed by a person who understood less English than the first.
Fourth call: I was a bit surprised the automated voice program, which I had now dubbed Pima (Pain In My A**), did not recognize me since we had spent so much quality time together. Oh well. I did eventually get a sweet lady who, like the second person, seemed to understand what I was talking about with a little bit of explanation. She also put me through the same procedure of being put on hold for several minutes punctuated with the occasional check to see if I was still there and that it would take a few more minutes. But, unlike the second person, she came back and told me that all was done on her end and that I would need to call right back, tell Pima that I needed a PRL update and that it would magically be sent my way. Sweet.
Fifth call: This time instead of attempting to converse with Pima to find out what her dreams were as a child, I simple said: “PRL update.” Silence. Again: “PRL update.” I was getting nervous. Pima then sputtered out something about not understanding what I was requesting and forwarded me to a real person-no offense Pima. Again, a quick explanation of what I wanted was followed by more of the put on hold/check back occasionally/saying it would be a few more minutes routine. I was almost starting to enjoy it. Finally the guy comes back on and said he sent the PRL update to me while I was on hold. Awesome. I hang up, check the phone and by golly, a new PRL.
Total time: 47 minutes.
Now, I’m in no way trying to tell Sprint how to run its business, but it would seem to me that updating a customer’s PRL would be something that a carrier would want to do and would make it as easy as possible to accomplish. A little digging around on the Web showed that Verizon Wireless allows customers to dial a specific number and have the latest PRL sent to their phone automatically. What a novel idea.
OK! Enough of that. Thanks for checking out this Worst of the Week column. Wanna check out other Worst of the Week entries? Click here for past columns. And now, some extras:
Motorola announced that snowboarding superstar Shaun White has been tapped as the newest “ambassador” for Motorola’s Moto Red product line that contributes a portion of proceeds to fight AIDS in Africa. Awesome cause and an awesome person for the job. For those who haven’t Googled White yet or saw his cover pic on Rolling Stone several months ago, he owns a mop-top of red hair that has garnered him the nickname “The Flying Tomato.”
Opera Software ASA released an upgraded version of its totally awesome Mini browser. The update, unfortunately dubbed Mini 3.0, adds enhanced support for mobile social networking abilities-lame; RSS feed readers-totally lame; secure connections-not lame; and content folding-probably lame, if I knew or cared what it meant. The best part.Opera Mini is still free. If you don’t have it on your phone, get it.
Apparently desperate online cellphone retailer YouNeverCall said it has started offering virtual cellphones to “residents” of the virtual Second Life “world.” That’s right. An online retailer put out a press release touting its offering of fake phones to computer nerds who have so much time on their hands that they can live two lives. YouNeverCall added that its virtual kiosk is located at “coordinates 95, 58, 22, right near a Lindex ATM.” Now I am just a trip to Tijuana away from saying I have seen it all.
An actual press release headline courtesy of Dublin, Ireland-based Research and Markets and further proof that Qualcomm gets no love from Euros: “Qualcomm is One of the Leading Manufacturers in Code Division Multiple Access Technology.”
I know many of the people in Verizon Wireless’ press department, and they are good people. But a press release posted the day after Thanksgiving touting the Motorola Krzr’s help in the mythical battle of the bulge is a bit much. The release claims the Krzr is the “ultimate device for exercise enthusiasts.” What the heck is an exercise enthusiast? Since I am often forced to walk from my couch to my refrigerator to fetch another Duff, can I be a walking enthusiast? Or how about my habit of staring out the window while pretending to work? A staring enthusiast?
