Hey all:

I was reading Slashdot.org (/.) this morning and found this article from the Washington Post:

Wireless Firms Still Fight Portable Phone Numbers

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...-2003Apr8.html

All I can say is, "Why you whiney little bastards!" Can someone help me out with a little history here? Was there as much resistance when the telecos were forced/started to do this?

Enjoy... um, I mean, flame on!

Jägs

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You can get more with a kind word and a two-by-four than you can with just a kind word.

One of the main reasons a lot of people are not so enthusiastic about switching providers is that when you do, you lose your current phone number and have to advise people of your new one. If you are now allowed to take your current number with you, that would be one less thing to keep someone from switching to a new service provider. Mobile phone service providers want to keep their current customers, not lose them.

Makes sense, but it's a lame attempt to keep customers. It should be the good service that retains you, not the avoidance of the inconvenience of losing your number.

agree and disagree

Customers will be disloyal to a carrier after a period of time by activating with promos and incentives on a new service with a competitior becuase the existing carrier cannot afford to renew activation promos on a yearly basis. Taking a loss to gain a customer is standard fare, but now in order to retain them, it seems further loses will be required. The mobile number was a way to retain a customer if indirectly.

It would be nice to switch carriers and take your number with you, and convienent. sadly however this will increase the overal churn of all carriers, and possibly in the long run affect cellular pricing.

Dreaderus

It seems to me that the price changes that come from this will help out us that have cell phones already. Right now, those of us that stick with a cell phone company for years subsidize those that switch every year. If the cell companies just want to bring in the same amount of money and stop all of the promotions, we'll end up better off. If they increase the promotions to lure new customers, as long as we switch fairly often, then other people will be subsidizing us. It seems like as long as you are willing to call and switch, you'll end up ahead. (The same thing happens for long distance companies. If you call and threaten to switch, they often give you nice deals to stay, usually better than the company that was trying to lure you.)

David

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char *p="char *p=%c%s%c;main(){printf(p,34,p,34);}";main(){printf(p,34,p,34);}

Hmm. You got a point there. An exapmle of competition making life more complicated...

Churn can take other forms like users dropping one carrier because another carrier offers a desired phone. As one ages, a phone number can become just as much an identity as one's name, DL, SSN. 4.5 months after switching, my old number keeps popping up in places like contracts I signed years ago, on my checks, etc. Number portability should be for the user to decide, not the telco.

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David

Sadly though ownership of the phone number was never negotiated when the customer setup the acct, and at least in canada the carriers s/a reads "you do not own your number" Hopefully something can be worked out instead of a rather large and justifable fee if you join a company and want to "purchase" your phone number.

Some look at it like the telco holding customers hostage by their phone number, now reversing it will in the long run increase prices, which I guess for some customers will be ok, since they get to keep their number

Dreaderus