Free My Phone! Pro-Consumer Organization Launches Effort to End Mobile Phone Exclusivity, Enhance Customer Choice
Free Press, a national consumer advocacy group, has launched Free My Phone!, an effort to impress regulators with fed-up consumers tired of limited mobile phone freedom, exclusivity deals which lock customers into contracts with providers they’d rather not do business with, and allows the industry to cripple/limit phone features to maximize potential profits.
Just a year or so ago, wireless carriers promised Washington they would ease up on their closed network business practices, which keep customer-owned phones from moving from one mobile phone company to another, turned off phone features built-in to the phone, and stopped disabling certain other features to limit usage or extract higher revenues from “add on” services.
Cell phone companies know their business, because in the end it was a whole lot of talk, and not much action.
Now Free Press is working to organize consumers to tell the FCC and Congress that enough is enough.
Tell Washington: Free My Phone!
New “smart” phones have set the stage for the future of a mobile Internet. But companies like AT&T and Verizon are getting in the way by shackling open and innovative devices to closed networks. The FCC and Congress must step in to protect consumers and foster innovation. We demand:
- The freedom to choose any phone on any network.
- The freedom to choose among many carriers in a competitive, low-cost marketplace.
- The freedom to access any Web content, applications or services we want through our phones.
Free Press calls out the industry:
New mobile phones have been called “the Internet in your pocket,” but they’re not. Through exclusive deals for phones like the iPhone and BlackBerry Storm, wireless companies have curtailed innovation, crippled applications, and stuck users with the bill. We demand the freedom to use our phones as we choose — on wireless networks that offer true high-speed Internet and real consumer choice.
In addition to signing an online petition, feel free to contact your representatives in Congress directly and let them know that practices like AT&T’s iPhone agreement guarantees high prices and bad service for consumers.
