I Jumped to Virgin Mobile!

Remember this ad I told you about before?

 

Well, I went ahead and joined the party. I got the new LG Optimus on sale for $99 at Best Buy, and bought their $45/month plan. When it came to the options, that was the best deal for me. That gives me unlimited texting, web, and data, plus 1200 minutes a month. The $35/month plan featured in the commercial gives unlimited text, data, and web as well, but only comes with 300 minutes a month. The only bummer is that VM doesn’t do free nights or weekends.

So far the coverage has been great too. I’ve been able to send texts from the bottom of the used bookstore I hang out in a lot, as well as a couple of other places that my T-Mobile coverage couldn’t reach. The phone call quality is just the same as it would be under contract, and Angry Birds plays just fine, btw. 🙂

Mrs. Linc is thinking about coming to VM now once she dumps T-Mobile, because she can’t seem to find a plan she likes on any contracts. I showed her that for $55/month, she can have unlimited everything. Text, web, data, and minutes.

Then I stopped and wondered why I didn’t spend the extra $10.

Oh well, I can do that next month if I want to. We’ll see just how many minutes I use.

If you’re curious, here’s the details about their Beyond Talk plan.

http://www.virginmobileusa.com/cell-phone-plans/beyond-talk-plans.jsp

 

Dems After President to Stop DOJ AT&T Lawsuit!

File under WTH??

Looks like fifteen DINOs (Democrats In Name Only) have asked the President to step in and stop the DOJ’s lawsuit against the AT&/T-Mobile merger. Apparently the merger should be allowed to go through, you know, if the President is REALLY serious about creating jobs for Americans.

Yeah. Because no one from T-Mobile is going to get fired if this happens. Because AT&T promises, you know:

“Owen Smith, AT&T’s regional vice president for Maine, said Tuesday that he couldn’t comment on T-Mobile’s business decisions because the two companies are still separate. However, he repeated the company promises. “More recently, we indicated that no wireless call center employee of either AT&T or T-Mobile on the payroll at the close of the merger would lose their job as a result of the merger,” Smith said.” (my emphasis)

They aren’t promising anything for people who work in the stores or anywhere else, of course. It looks like they don’t have to worry about much post merger firing. If you click the link above the quote, you’ll see that T-Mobile has already started firing employees!

And then there’s this quote from a CWA (Communication Workers of America) three pager about how they are going to protect job loss during and after the merger. Right from the mouths of the people inside, we learn:

“CWA is also working to return off-shored work before any U.S.-based workers lose their jobs. Current collective bargaining agreements stipulate establish the policy that “traditional wireless work will not be contracted out if it will currently and directly cause layoffs or part-timing of regular employees.” Thus, employees cannot be laid off while bargaining unit work has been outsourced. In recognition of this agreement, Randall Stephenson testified before the House Judiciary subcommittee that force reductions will take place first at outsourced sites before U.S. company sites.”

So it’s not that Americans within the merged companies won’t be fired. Even the union says it could happen. It’s just that workers in other countries will be fired FIRST.

I guess this article is titled right: Where It Pays to Deceive.

Virgin Mobile says forget AT&T, join the party!

OMG, I love this ad!! Virgin Mobile mocks the proposed merger, urging customers to come join the fun! The best part: the girl standing in for Carly has an awesome line at the very end while the creepy old guy representing AT&T is moving in on her. Be sure to hang in for it!

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Resistance Art: Anti AT&T Merger Ads

Ok, so after awhile news coverage of a merger can drag on. Which is why I let it fall off the blog. But then, thanks to the links I get from my Pulse News app, I found out that Save The Internet has a new outreach going on to help voice resistance to the merger.

I looked the site over, and they have some really excellent talking points, most of which are put together in easy to understand PDF’s. The site looks great. The commercials are awesome. Here’s one for your viewing pleasure:

 

 

If you want to check the site out, you can start at the page with all of the videos and vote for your favorite.