Sprint v.s. AT&T Wireless
I always try my best to support business competition, and I heard good words about Sprint's corporate culture, so I switched to Sprint - the undergod among the four major wireless phone service carriers - Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint.
Now I am switching to a Windows Phone 7 (WP7) phone, not because WP7 is the underdog among the major smartphone OS's - Android, iOS, Blackberry, Symbian and WP7, but for its unquestionable excellent quality and features, and more importantly, its support by all major phone manufacturers. The later gives large selection, though not as large as Android phones but much larger than iPhone which has only one choice. Selection brings competition. I fell in love with my WP7 smartphone - HTC HD7s - immediately.
Though I intended to stay with Sprint, unfortunately, this would give me a number of disadvantages compared with choosing another carrier: 1. Sprint has raised the monthly charge for the same smartphone service I have enjoyed by $10. 2. Sprint has only one WP7 phone - HTC Arrive which screen is smaller than I wish. 3. As always, Sprint's CDMA does not allow two phones sharing the same number. 4. The tether function which I have been using frequently will not be available anymore though it is the same case for other carriers. 5. HTC Arrive costs at least $100 vs. free smartphones from other carriers.
AT&T wireless has 4 WP7 phones to choose from. Its HTC HD7S has super LCD, is a very smart choice, and it can be obtained from Amazon wireless for $0.01 (essentially free). Their minimum smartphone package is $15 cheaper/month. AT&T offers rollover minutes which is very useful for people like me who try to avoid wasting time on the phone as much as possible, but once in a while, numerous and long phone calls have to be made to cope with certain issues. AT&T uses GSM hence SIM card which allows multiple phones sharing the same number by sharing the SIM card though not simultaneously. This will be very useful should I decide to explore Android phone app development.
The sprint smartphone package has two advantages: 1. Free voice-guided GPS. 2. Unlimited data. However, neither means too much to me. I try to minimize carbon footprint, the waste of time and gasoline caused by driving, and I probably has never used more than 1GB of data in a month because I do not waste time watching videos on phones.