Tim Bray suggests metered billing for mobile data is the way to go. Me, I think it is a terrible idea for psychological reasons, and it would be a serious threat to companies like Google that thrive on people freely using online resources. It'd push people to block ads, use local apps over on-line services and generally limit how much they do online.
For psychological reasons it's better to go with pre-paid data rather than metered, and to make sure that going over the limit does not incur extra, unexpected charges. Here is my Google+ post with much more detail: Metered Data and Prepaid Data
This leads to a separate question: What am I to do with posts like the one I have on Google+? On one hand, it's pretty long so it fits better here on the blog. On the other, the people that have circled me on Google+ are much more likely to be interested in this sort of thing than you here. It feels kind of wasteful to double-post the same text on both places.
For now I'll try doing thing like this: post longer bits either here or on Google+, then give a short summary and a link on the other place. If anyone have better suggestions I'm all ears.
I'm now on my uncle's laptop and he uses one of those mobile internet contracts. 10 gb and metered, but I remember 5 years ago having just 512mb available for a month and that we had to browse carefully.
ReplyDeleteI second that prepaid is better on first hand; should you pass the limit, it gets blocked. If metered, after passing the limit, works (slower) and hasn't to be paid extra, it's ok. But paying per MB after passing a limit is a no-no for me. Maybe the bill will bring a surprise.
As of posting on G+ and the blog; I'm not on G+ and here it's a much more direct and faster place to get. Posting a summary with link should be fine. I'm not particularly inspired lately so no ideas about this.
Thanks. It works OK for you to follow the link to G+ though? I don't want to link to stuff that people can't read without having to join something.
ReplyDeleteYes, it's fine. I'm able to read everything except I can't post a comment there. No problem as it can fit here too.
ReplyDeleteFor a G+ outsider, it's much easier to find the material through the blog. I wouldn't know how to find your posts there without the blog and it's linking.
I might join G+ later this year.