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Cellular forums Home > Archive > Cingular cell phone service > March 2007 > Re: Steven's Myth of Verizon AMPS coverage in the San Francisco Bay
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| Author |
Re: Steven's Myth of Verizon AMPS coverage in the San Francisco Bay
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|
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| Elmo P. Shagnasty wrote:
> In article < pt4vs2leubcod0vpkvvf
0khd4qkg4m0715@4ax.com>,
> John Navas < spamfilter1@navasgro
up.com> wrote:
>
>
> And John Navas never trolls, does he.
>
> Nice editorializing, there. Nice high road you've taken.
Oh jeez, what did he say now? I kill-filed him to resist the temptation
to reply, but you don't have to snip everything he wrote!
I could easily list 20 places in the SF Bay Area where there is only
AMPS coverage, not even including San Benito County. My wife's company
just dumped 200 Nextel accounts and went to Verizon with the V325i, and
one of the reasons was the AMPS coverage (the other was Verizon's GPS
system, which is more accurate than the TDOA system that the U.S. GSM
carriers use, and they needed the increased accuracy (though I don't
like the reason they need it!)).
There's a reason why Verizon beat the other carries by a significant
margin in the latest Consumer Reports survey. Part of it was due to
their better digital network, but part was due to the AMPS coverage
provided out of the urban core. It was huge sample size, and the results
are indisputable. However I would concede that the socio-economic
make-up of Consumer Reports readers make it more likely that they would
travel to areas outside the urban core. Their readers tend to be higher
income, more highly educated, and more liberal, all of which contributes
to more travel into non-urban areas than lower income, less educated,
and more conservative users. This would translate to higher
dissatisfaction with the carriers that don't provide coverage in these
areas.
| |
| Notan 2007-02-11, 10:33 pm |
| John Navas wrote:
> On Sun, 11 Feb 2007 18:39:28 -0800, SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com>
> wrote in < 45cfd361$0$27239$742
ec2ed@news.sonic.net>:
>
>
> Except they don't exist according to Verizon.
>
>
> No evidence at all of that.
>
>
> On the contrary -- Consumer Reports suffers from a self-selected sample
> of a non-representative universe. It also suffers from serious
> screwups, like the recent car seat debacle. And it just rated McDonalds
> coffee as better than Starbucks -- LOL!
> <http://www.amonline.com/article/art...tion=1&id=18130>
Have you ever tasted Starbuck's coffee?
It *does* taste burnt!
--
Notan
| |
|
| Notan wrote:
> It *does* taste burnt!
Definitely does taste burnt. I don't go there except when there's
nothing else around. I haven't tried McDonald's coffee in years, it used
to be horrid.
To Starbucks, their regular coffee is not their main business, it's the
espresso drinks, and the sickly sweet cold drinks. I think the reason
for the burnt taste is that it's often old by the time they serve it.
I prefer Peet's Coffee, or my own brewed coffee. Peet's is very
conscientious about not serving coffee that's old. They'll brew it fresh
for you. Once they apologized for me having to wait, and gave me the
coffee free. The coffee from the locally owned coffee place at our
library is also excellent. Our city council meetings have free coffee
from the local place. Free wireless, free coffee, and free entertainment
from the bozos on the city council. It's better than the movies.
| |
|
| james g. keegan jr. wrote:
> In article < v8nvs2pj1bbhvnsm60p4
6baevp0amljbfg@4ax.com>,
> John Navas < spamfilter1@navasgro
up.com> wrote:
>
>
> don't you wish you hadn't made a fool of yourself again by posting
> this?
LOL, I think a lot of us often wonder why he intentionally makes a fool
out of himself. Lack of self-respect is the best guess.
| |
| Notan 2007-02-12, 10:33 am |
| John Navas wrote:
> On Sun, 11 Feb 2007 20:50:42 -0700, Notan < notan@ddressthatcanb
espammed>
> wrote in < S8idnQDxVe2OeVLYnZ2d
nUVZ_oninZ2d@giganew
s.com>:
>
>
>
> Some does; some doesn't -- depends on the varietal or blend. But it's
> all better than McDonalds coffee as actually served at the average
> franchise. Or haven't you actually tasted McDonalds coffee? ;)
"But it's all better" is purely objective.
You'd be more accurate with an "in my opinion" preface.
And, yes, I've tasted McDonald's. Not bad!
Also, IN MY OPINION, 7-11 makes a great cup of coffee.
--
Notan
| |
|
| clifto wrote:
> SMS wrote:
>
> I was beginning to think I was the only one who thought so.
>
> They do have a good coffeemaker descaler product, though.
What's in it? I use vinegar, but it takes like eight runs of fresh water
through the machine afterward to get rid of the vinegar smell.
| |
|
| Don Udel (ETC) wrote:
> "John Navas" < spamfilter1@navasgro
up.com> wrote in message > On the
> contrary -- Consumer Reports suffers from a self-selected sample
>
> And once again CR is right. IMHO, Starbucks does taste burnt and it's not a
> very good value for the dollar. Given a choice between the two, I'd take
> McDonalds every time for coffee.
Besides often sitting too long, Starbucks tends to usually use very dark
roasts for their house coffee. To make it palatable, you have to add
sugar and ½ & ½. The Consumer Reports test was explicitly for black
coffee. Dark roast Starbucks coffee, that's been sitting for even 30
minutes, without sugar and ½ & ½, tastes terrible. At 30 minutes you've
also lost a lot of the health benefits of coffee, since the
anti-oxidants will be gone.
In any case, the coffee article was vastly different than the cellular
article. The coffee test was done by their staff. The cellular survey
was based on nearly 50,000 respondents, which is a extremely large
sample size with an extremely small margin of error, even when you
divide by metro area, and divide again by carrier. Remember, this was
not Consumer Reports asking "which carrier do you think is the best?" it
was a survey of subscriber's experiences. So unless someone believes
that a Verizon subscriber is likely to cut their carrier more slack than
a Cingular subscriber, you can't dispute the results on the basis of who
responded.
The only real fault with the CR survey, and in reality it's a benefit,
is that CR subscribers tend to be higher income individuals, with higher
education levels, and are more liberal. Hence they are much more likely
to travel, and even more likely to travel outside urban areas with their
phones. This gives Verizon an advantage because their network is much
more extensive than any of the other carriers.
A survey of individuals that never leave the urban area might have had
results that were less starkly different.
| |
|
| Larry wrote:
> "Dean" <dean173@yahoo.com> wrote in news:JcTzh.77$0O1.73@newsfe12.lga:
>
>
> A friend of mine in Honolulu sends me care packages of Kona from Lion
> Coffee Company (800-338-8353 or fax 800-972-0777) www.lioncoffee.com. I'm
> in love with a Kona blend coffee from Chef Mavro's in Honolulu
> http://www.chefmavro.com/
> Lion makes it for Chef Mavro. (Check out Chef Mavro's video cooking on
> Wakiki Beach....(c;
For the bay area, try the coffee from
"http://www. mokshacoffeeroasting
.com/index.html"
It's in a couple of stores and cafes, but he mainly does mail order.
One of the biggest problems with Starbucks is that they mainly do very
dark Italian or French roasts, rather than doing a medium roast, where
you taste the coffee rather than "the burned." They've equated "strong"
with "dark." The owner of this company uses Cingular, so John can feel
good about buying this coffee.
| |
|
| Notan wrote:
> And, yes, I've tasted McDonald's. Not bad!
>
> Also, IN MY OPINION, 7-11 makes a great cup of coffee.
Omig-d, I have a friend that just loves 7-11 coffee. There's one next to
the Starbucks over near Google in Mountain View. She'll go into
Starbucks to buy a scone, carrying her 7-11 coffee. I guess maybe I
should stop teasing her, and try the 7-11 coffee. However she uses
Sprint, so how good could her judgment be?
| |
|
| Tinman wrote:
> "SMS" <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote in message
> news:45d0b5aa$0$2716
5$742ec2ed@news.sonic.net...
>
> I don't think all 7-11 coffee is the same. Back east I liked it. Can't stand
> it in the 7-11s out west. YMMV.
>
> I'd take any of it, though, compared to the sludge sold at Starbucks if
> ordering "just" coffee (which they don't seem to make).
I would think that 7-11's coffee would be pretty consistent from place to place,
as it's prepackaged and all comes from the same manufacturer/distributor.
Maybe not!
--
Notan
| |
|
| Todd Allcock wrote:
> For those of us who enjoy a more traditional, and admittedly more plebian
> "cuppa Joe," there are a bunch of coffees I prefer to Starbucks
> (including McDonalds!) but the king of coffees remains Dunkin' Donuts, as
> any self-respecting "Nor'easter" will attest to!
Last time I tried Dunkin' Donuts coffee was in Korea. It was horrible.
This was a time I would have gone to Starbucks, but the one by my hotel
opened very late, about 9:00 a.m.. I needed to be on a train every day
at 8:00 a.m. to go to LG, and couldn't hang around waiting for Starbucks
to open. I gave up on morning coffee for that trip, on the next trip I
brought my own coffee and brewing apparatus, and a stainless steel
commuter mug.
During lunch, the waiters at LG's guest restaurant took orders for
coffee or tea, and when it came we couldn't tell which was which. The
coffee was very weak, and the tea was strong. The LG people were very
amused at the Abraham Lincoln coffee/tea joke, "Waiter, if this is
coffee, then bring me tea. But if this is tea, then bring me coffee."
From "What is American Culture"
"Burnt coffee at exorbitant prices. The most popular cafe chain, whose
name decent people do not pronounce, burns its coffee beans to produce
what Americans mistakenly believe is an authentic European taste. Proper
coffee, by which of course I mean Italian coffee, is bittersweet, not
burned. Americans evidently hate the wretched stuff because they drown
its flavor in a flood of milk, in the so-called "latte", something I
never have observed an Italian request during many years of travel in
that country. By contrast, Italians drink cappuccino, mixing a small
amount of milk into the coffee and leaving a cap of foam. If Americans
do not like it, why do they buy it at exorbitant prices? They do so
precisely because the high price makes it a luxury, but an affordable
one for secretaries and shopgirls."
I was very glad to be able to use a CDMA phone in Korea, on the train
ride to LG, though it was cheaper to rent a phone than to roam on
Verizon, so that's what I did. There is no GSM service in Korea, though
you can rent a CDMA phone that has a SIM card slot for your GSM SIM, so
you can roam, but it's expensive, and it may only work with European
carriers. They did this for the 2002 FIFA World Cup, and I presume that
they kept the system in place.
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| |
|
| Notan wrote:
> I would think that 7-11's coffee would be pretty consistent from place
> to place,
> as it's prepackaged and all comes from the same manufacturer/distributor.
>
> Maybe not!
I think that they grind it in the store now. 7-11's are franchises, so
maybe if the store owner wants to sell good coffee he is allowed to do
so. I see teachers and employees of the school my son goes to drinking
7-11 coffee in the morning. Maybe it's actually okay.
The prepaid phones sold at 7-11 do not support AMPS. They are on the
Cingular GSM network.
| |
|
| Tinman wrote:
> "Notan" < notan@ddressthatcanb
espammed> wrote in message
> news:1a2dneJN68isJU3
YnZ2dnUVZ_o_inZ2d@gi
ganews.com...
>
> Without question it was (haven't compared it since 2003) noticeably
> different. Even the coffee-area setups were different. Also, most 7-11s I
> see out west are also gas stations. Most, if not all, of the 7-11s I used to
> stop at back in NY are still stand-alone stores.
>
> If I had to describe the stuff out in the western 7-11s it would be, in a
> word, "weak." Not that the NY stuff was *anywhere* near Starbucks' level,
> but it at least tasted like coffee and not tea. YMMV.
If you have the opportunity, try their "French Roast."
--
Notan
| |
|
| Don Udel (ETC) wrote:
> "John Navas" < spamfilter1@navasgro
up.com> wrote in message > On the
> contrary -- Consumer Reports suffers from a self-selected sample
>
> And once again CR is right.
Coffee is pretty subjective though, more than even some other food items
such as ice cream, where the poorer ice creams pump a lot of air in, and
use artificial flavors and thickeners, and may use corn syrup rather
than sugar.
That said, according to one article I read, McDonalds started using 100%
Arabica beans about a year ago. If that's the case, they may really be
better than Starbucks for regular coffee, since McDonald's sells a lot
of regular coffee and makes it fresh every few minutes, while at
Starbucks it can often sit around for an hour while customers buy
lattes, and frappacinos (sp?). There's nothing special about the beans
that Starbucks uses versus the coffee that McDonald's uses.
Where CR is most useful is in their surveys of various sorts, such as
vehicle reliability, and wireless coverage. They aren't asking people
what they like best, they're asking people for their own experiences, so
any bias is eliminated. They also use extremely large sample sizes which
gives their surveys a very small margin of error.
Some people complain that Consumer Reports subscribers aren't
representative of the population at large, but in reality this cancels
out when they do their surveys. I don't think that anyone claims that
with such a huge sample size that the results would be much different if
they surveyed non-subscribers, though as I pointed out, there might be a
small difference based on the socio-economic differences between CR
subscribers and the general population. For many of the metro areas in
the last survey, including the San Francisco Bay Area, the differences
between the carriers were quite large. In some areas they were not very
large.
Oh, and In 'N Out has good iced tea!
[Copied to alt.cellular.attws. Please post all alt.cellular.cingular
posts to alt.cellular.attws as well. The Cingular name is going away,
and alt.cellular.attws is the proper venue for posts regarding AT&T's
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| |
|
| John Navas wrote:
> On Mon, 12 Feb 2007 12:09:23 -0700, Notan < notan@ddressthatcanb
espammed>
> wrote in < qsOdnf40c4L5Jk3YnZ2d
nUVZ_uninZ2d@giganew
s.com>:
>
>
>
> Been there; done that. Mediocre.
>
> If you have the opportunity, compare a dark roast aged Sumatra at a good
> micro-roastery.
I'm not saying 7-11 has *the* best coffee, although IN MY OPINION it's
pretty good, but for the price and convenience, it's not a bad choice.
--
Notan
| |
|
| John Navas wrote:
> On Mon, 12 Feb 2007 13:31:32 -0600, clifto <clifto@gmail.com> wrote in
> <ktr6a4-sd7.ln1@remote.clifto.com>:
>
>
> In your opinion. Opinions vary. And your insults only serve to
> diminish the persuasiveness of your argument.
>
> I consider myself a discriminating person; I do frequent places that
> make excellent (not just good) coffee; and my own opinions are that
> tastes vary, that Starbucks has quite different coffees, that some (not
> all) Starbucks coffees are pretty good, and that what you're calling
> "burnt" is just over-roasted to your particular taste.
Have you ever considered the possibility that *you* might be wrong?
--
Notan
| |
|
| clifto wrote:
> One of the nice things about working the Hispanofest in Melrose Park IL
> was that on break time there was a nice privately owned coffee shop
> just a couple of blocks off the beaten path. They pulled a mean espresso
> and made delicious coffee. And Starbucks tastes burnt to discriminating
> people who frequent places that make good coffee.
The problem is that non-coffee people often equate burnt with strong.
Apparently they have never had a cup of strong, medium roast coffee,
which is understandable since you can't get such a thing at Starbucks,
unless a store happens to do a medium roast as the "coffee of the day,"
and that's pretty rare, in my experience.
There are smaller, specialty coffee houses that do medium roast brewed
coffee, but you have to search them out. Or you can buy medium roast
coffee and do it yourself. The advantage is you can drink such coffee
black without drowning it with milk and sugar. It's like drinking good
whiskey straight, rather than mixing it with something sweet like soda
or orange juice to hide the taste. Plain coffee is much less profitable
than $3-4 espresso drinks, so understandably Starbucks doesn't want to
push plain coffee.
You often stumble across good coffee in places that you don't expect. If
it's a cafe or store owned by Pakistani's or Indian's, often the coffee
is good, Chinese, usually not so good, though judging from the number of
coffee houses in Taiwan, it should be better than it is.
See "http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page/EK18Aa01.html"
What is American Culture
"2. Burnt coffee at exorbitant prices. The most popular cafe chain,
whose name decent people do not pronounce, burns its coffee beans to
produce what Americans mistakenly believe is an authentic European
taste. Proper coffee, by which of course I mean Italian coffee, is
bittersweet, not burned. Americans evidently hate the wretched stuff
because they drown its flavor in a flood of milk, in the so-called
"latte", something I never have observed an Italian request during many
years of travel in that country. By contrast, Italians drink cappuccino,
mixing a small amount of milk into the coffee and leaving a cap of foam.
If Americans do not like it, why do they buy it at exorbitant prices?
They do so precisely because the high price makes it a luxury, but an
affordable one for secretaries and shopgirls."
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| |
|
| John Navas wrote:
> On Mon, 12 Feb 2007 13:18:39 -0700, Notan < notan@ddressthatcanb
espammed>
> wrote in < 57idnSs4y98CVk3YnZ2d
nUVZ_qDinZ2d@giganew
s.com>:
>
>
> Sure. And you?
All the time.
But you frequently have a hard time discerning between fact and your opinion.
--
Notan
| |
|
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John Navas wrote:
> On Mon, 12 Feb 2007 13:39:27 -0700, Notan < notan@ddressthatcanb
espammed>
> wrote in < _rSdnfal7MgcTU3YnZ2d
nUVZ_s2vnZ2d@giganew
s.com>:
>
>
> To repeat what I said earlier:
>
> In your opinion. Opinions vary. And your insults only serve to
> diminish the persuasiveness of your argument.
It's my opinion.
--
Notan
| |
| Notan 2007-02-12, 10:33 pm |
| John Navas wrote:
<snip>
> A panel of "trained testers" took their brew black -- no cream, milk
> or sugar -- and visited two locations of each company.
>
> Two locations! Not just one? Wow!
> For "trained testers" read CR staffers.
> LOL!
And, once again, you come across as snob, who think that people value
his opinion(s) above all others.
--
Notan
| |
| Notan 2007-02-12, 10:33 pm |
| John Navas wrote:
> On Mon, 12 Feb 2007 14:33:33 -0700, Notan < notan@ddressthatcanb
espammed>
> wrote in <2tGdnScjYN- xQE3YnZ2dnUVZ_ojinZ2
d@giganews.com>:
>
>
> And, once again, you come across as a mean-spirited and immature person
> who thinks attacking the man will somehow advance his point of view.
It's different when you're on the receiving end, isn't it?
--
Notan
| |
| Notan 2007-02-12, 10:33 pm |
| John Navas wrote:
> On Mon, 12 Feb 2007 15:03:50 -0700, Notan < notan@ddressthatcanb
espammed>
> wrote in < Y_6dnRKaw6fbeU3YnZ2d
nUVZ_sTinZ2d@giganew
s.com>:
>
>
> You tell me.
If answering a question with a question is your idea of mature, I guess
you win.
Goodnight, John.
--
Notan
| |
|
| Notan wrote:
> John Navas wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
>
> And, once again, you come across as snob, who think that people value
> his opinion(s) above all others.
Actually for Starbucks, where all the U.S. stores are company owned and
operated, two stores should be sufficient because there isn't a lot of
variability. For McDonald's, where there a lot of franchises, as well as
a lot of company owned stores, you'd expect more variability on some
menu items.
The burnt taste that they complained about is not some huge secret, it's
how Starbucks roasts and brews their regular coffee.
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| |
|
| Todd Allcock wrote:
> For example, if the survey was a question like "do you get your news from
> TV, radio, internet or magazines?" asking a group comprised entirely of
> magazine subscribers would obviously skew the results.
I guess that John is trying to convince people that if somehow you could
get a sample size of 50,000 respondents, and it was all random, that the
results would be different. Of course this is ridiculous, the sample of
CR subscribers that are Verizon subscribers, are not going to be biased
for or against Verizon, any more than the Sprint, Cingular or T-Mobile
subscribers are going to be biased against their own carriers. I think
what he doesn't understand, is that the survey isn't asking 50,000
people "which carrier is best in your city?," it's asking for an
evaluation of your own carrier.
Now if you surveyed only long distance truck drivers, and trucking
firms, of course Verizon is going to have a huge advantage, because they
have much wider coverage than Cingular in non-urban areas due to AMPS.
The commercial carriers still use AMPS in areas where there is no CDMA
coverage (see "http://www.etrucker.com/apps/news/article.asp?id=51944").
> But asking "cable TV subscribers," "Ford automobile owners," or
> "bricklayers" objective questions about cellular service should tend to
> get the same results if the sample sizes are large enough. (Unless, for
> example, cell companies discriminate against bricklayers...)
Yes, that's the whole point.
Of course Navas is just extremely upset that for yet another year,
Cingular fared extremely poorly in the Consumer Reports survey AND the
J.D. Power surveys. That's why he feels compelled to make up ridiculous
stories to try and defend them, part of which is trying to attack the
companies doing the surveys.
> Perhaps, but that old "standard deviation" equation tends to insure work
> things out. ;-)
The margin of error is still extremely small, even when broken down by
region and then by carrier. Additionally, in some regions, such as the
San Francisco Bay Area, there is such a large difference, that even with
the maximum amount of error applied, Cingular still does extremely
poorly, and Verizon does extremely well.
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and alt.cellular.attws is the proper venue for posts regarding AT&T's
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| |
|
| Scott wrote:
> John Navas < spamfilter1@navasgro
up.com> wrote in
> news:5kh1t2d0jh5t78i
47627dsgrhkthnlbl15@
4ax.com:
>
>
>
>
> And based on the many opinions you have posted over the years, you would be
> alone in that view.
He discriminates against the truth and the facts on a daily basis.
| |
|
| Todd Allcock wrote:
> A bias that would most likely be even distributed among all carriers- for
> example, if self-selection is, say, 20% more likely to generate replies
> from people unhappy with their service, then all carriers will be skewed
> negatively by presumably the same amount.
That's really the key point. It's not as if the CR subscribers are
somehow biased towards one carrier or another. It's not like surveying a
group of long-distance truck drivers that would necessarily have
coverage requirements that are different from the average person.
> Given the lack of a completely "blind" random survey, the CR one holds up
> pretty well. In the real world, the ideal sample population is difficult
> to find, so you do the best you can with as unbiased a sampling as you can.
It's funny to see people latch onto the lack of a double-blind random
survey every time a survey presents results that they disagree with,
while at the same time not being able to present and reasons why the
survey is not credible. Yet in most cases it's not possible to conduct
such a survey. The CR survey was very well designed, since any bias
cancels out since it would be equal among all carriers. Combine that
with the huge sample size, even larger than the J.D. Power surveys, and
you have results that everyone agrees are the best you can hope for.
> Put another way, other than Cingular's "secret" least-dropped-calls
> study, has any consumer group or independent research firm (i.e. J.D.
> Powers) ever rated Cingular with the best network?
Not only that, but Cingular has steadfastly refused to release the
specifics of that study, which is highly suspect. Sprint is still suing
them, AFAIK, and Cingular countersued claiming that Sprint doesn't have
"the most powerful network" whatever that means.
> My experience over the last few years tends to support the CR study-
> whenever, in my travels, I find myself in an area where some people can't
> get service and some can, the ones who can have more often than not been
> Verizon users. (Because I always ask, out of curiosity.)
Yeah, in my area (SF Bay Area) it's almost always the Verizon users that
have coverage when no one else does. My daughter is constantly letting
her friends and teammates use her phone when their Sprint, T-Mobile, and
Cingular phones don't work. I do have to say that Cingular is improving
quite a bit out here, and I notice a difference over the past year in
terms of improved coverage.
> Certainly that's not scientific, and certainly is not a "representative
> sample" but it is generally the case in my experience.
>
> Having said that, I still wouldn't use Verizon's service- between the
> crippled phones, and high prices, I'm just not interested, but that
> doesn't mean they haven't got the network right.
The crippled phones are an annoyance, though they are often hackable.
Their prices are no higher than Sprint or Cingular, and often are less
due to corporate discounts.
[Copied to alt.cellular.attws. Please post all alt.cellular.cingular
posts to alt.cellular.attws as well. The Cingular name is going away,
and alt.cellular.attws is the proper venue for posts regarding AT&T's
Wireless Service.]
| |
|
| james g. keegan jr. wrote:
> In article < gp02t2tgdjbk6bh3a2ll
p06c2v92a7uv8l@4ax.com>,
> John Navas < spamfilter1@navasgro
up.com> wrote:
> [...]
>
> i hope this doesn't wound you too deeply john, but i suspect that
> most sane readers would accept consumer reports statistics over your
> biased commentary.
Yeah, but he's got the insane reader base locked up.
| |
| kevinkeithweaver@sbcglobal.net 2007-02-13, 4:33 am |
| At Starbucks the house coffee sits only for 40 mins. Then It is dumped
out and re-brewed. If you notice on each pot they have electronic egg
times set to go off. Once it does, It's time for a fresh batch.
SMS wrote:
> Don Udel (ETC) wrote:
>
> Coffee is pretty subjective though, more than even some other food items
> such as ice cream, where the poorer ice creams pump a lot of air in, and
> use artificial flavors and thickeners, and may use corn syrup rather
> than sugar.
>
> That said, according to one article I read, McDonalds started using 100%
> Arabica beans about a year ago. If that's the case, they may really be
> better than Starbucks for regular coffee, since McDonald's sells a lot
> of regular coffee and makes it fresh every few minutes, while at
> Starbucks it can often sit around for an hour while customers buy
> lattes, and frappacinos (sp?). There's nothing special about the beans
> that Starbucks uses versus the coffee that McDonald's uses.
>
> Where CR is most useful is in their surveys of various sorts, such as
> vehicle reliability, and wireless coverage. They aren't asking people
> what they like best, they're asking people for their own experiences, so
> any bias is eliminated. They also use extremely large sample sizes which
> gives their surveys a very small margin of error.
>
> Some people complain that Consumer Reports subscribers aren't
> representative of the population at large, but in reality this cancels
> out when they do their surveys. I don't think that anyone claims that
> with such a huge sample size that the results would be much different if
> they surveyed non-subscribers, though as I pointed out, there might be a
> small difference based on the socio-economic differences between CR
> subscribers and the general population. For many of the metro areas in
> the last survey, including the San Francisco Bay Area, the differences
> between the carriers were quite large. In some areas they were not very
> large.
>
> Oh, and In 'N Out has good iced tea!
>
> [Copied to alt.cellular.attws. Please post all alt.cellular.cingular
> posts to alt.cellular.attws as well. The Cingular name is going away,
> and alt.cellular.attws is the proper venue for posts regarding AT&T's
> Wireless Service.]
| |
|
| kevinkeithweaver@sbc
global.net wrote:
> At Starbucks the house coffee sits only for 40 mins. Then It is dumped
> out and re-brewed. If you notice on each pot they have electronic egg
> times set to go off. Once it does, It's time for a fresh batch.
Not good enough. 20 minutes is the limit to receive the all the
antioxidant benefit.
Coffee has to be ground, brewed and drunk within 20 minutes, otherwise
it became a pro-oxidant.
"Maximum antioxidant activity was observed for the medium-roasted
coffee; the dark coffee had a lower antioxidant activity despite the
increase in color."
From Effect of roasting on the antioxidant activity of coffee brews.
del Castillo MD, Ames JM, Gordon MH. J Agric Food Chem. 2002 Jun
19;50(13):3698-703. School of Food Biosciences, The University of
Reading, Whiteknights, Reading, UK
One more reason to go to a coffee house that uses a medium roast, rather
than going to Starbucks.
| |
|
| Todd Allcock wrote:
> Same with the CR study- as non-random as the sample might have been,
> there seems to be no good reason to believe why it would not be
> representative.
You could probably find a group of people that was non-representative of
the population as a whole, i.e., heavy urban users such as real estate
agents, highly mobile users with a lot of non-urban use such as
truckers, highly mobile users with mainly urban use such as airline
pilots and flight attendants, etc. It might actually be a useful metric
to know which carriers these groups favor and why.
However nothing suggests that CR subscribers are not representative of
the population as a whole. They are generally higher income, and of
higher education level, which means that they travel more, but this
makes the CR survey even more valuable, for those that are interested in
the best coverage.
I think that we all understand that it's all a sour grapes issue by
Navas. On the plus side, the digression into coffee was very interesting.
| |
|
| Todd Allcock wrote:
> At 13 Feb 2007 02:20:31 -0800 SMS wrote:
>
>
> To be fair, I think that as few of us coffee drinkers are doing it for
> the antioxidants as red wine drinkers are! ;-)
The proven health benefits of coffee go way beyond the anti-oxidants.
It's beneficial in the prevention of Alzheimer's, Asthma, Apnea, Colon
and Rectal Cancer, Type 2 Diabetes, Gallstones, Impotence, Headache,
Kidney Stones, Obesity, Parkinson's, Radiation Poisoning, Skin Cancer,
and Suicide.
I just don't like to see some ill-informed health food nuts getting
their panties in a bunch over the fact that coffee has caffeine. An
article that was at PlanetRX.com (now defunct) stated: "Most people
don't think of coffee as a medicinal herb, but it is. The beans are
actually seeds of the coffee shrub, therefore an herbal product. And the
caffeine coffee contains is clearly a drug."
| |
| Notan 2007-02-13, 12:33 pm |
| SMS wrote:
> Todd Allcock wrote:
>
> The proven health benefits of coffee go way beyond the anti-oxidants.
>
> It's beneficial in the prevention of Alzheimer's, Asthma, Apnea, Colon
> and Rectal Cancer, Type 2 Diabetes, Gallstones, Impotence, Headache,
> Kidney Stones, Obesity, Parkinson's, Radiation Poisoning, Skin Cancer,
> and Suicide.
>
> I just don't like to see some ill-informed health food nuts getting
> their panties in a bunch over the fact that coffee has caffeine. An
> article that was at PlanetRX.com (now defunct) stated: "Most people
> don't think of coffee as a medicinal herb, but it is. The beans are
> actually seeds of the coffee shrub, therefore an herbal product. And the
> caffeine coffee contains is clearly a drug."
Coffee has saved my life, more than once.
Before my wife's morning cup, she's downright homicidal! <g>
--
Notan
| |
|
| Notan wrote:
> Coffee has saved my life, more than once.
My daughter was premature, so I dealt with all the Newborn ICU stuff for
two months. One of the drugs they use to prevent apnea, a common problem
in preemies, is caffeine. We also drank a lot of coffee during that
period. Fortunately there were many coffee houses near the hospital.
| |
|
| B. Wright wrote:
> Either that or the fact that you had to p*ss so badly it kept
> you awake. :) That factor supplements the caffeine effect on long road
> trips. Cheap service station coffee usually has more caffeine too since
> it's usually mostly the crappy robusta coffee (with 2x the caffeine over
> arabica, but not so nice on the tastebuds).
>
> As far as the McD's coffee, I tried it once, only because they
> were marketing how much better they had made it now and sent a free
> coupon. The only thing that made me happy about it was that I hadn't
> paid for such crap coffee, I dumped it out.
I recycled my coupon. I did read that they are now using arabica coffee
at McDonald's, but I guess there can be bad arabica too.
| |
|
| Larry wrote:
> SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote in news:45d081c8$0$2724
9
> $742ec2ed@news.sonic.net:
>
>
> Sulfamic Acid, H3NSO3. I buy "Kenmore Distiller Cleaner", cat number 42-
> 34543, from Sears in a 12 oz bottle of crystals. Works great on coffee
> pots as well as my water distiller. It simply eats elemental calcium
> depots off stainless steel or aluminum. DON'T GET ANY ON YOU or you'll be
> sorry!
Amazingly, I was able to actually locate this item at my local Sears.
Yes, it does work well. Thanks.
| |
|
| Todd Allcock wrote:
> At 13 Feb 2007 02:20:31 -0800 SMS wrote:
>
>
> To be fair, I think that as few of us coffee drinkers are doing it for
> the antioxidants as red wine drinkers are! ;-)
Without claiming to be "discriminating," I have to admit that I'm a
coffee snob, though I have some colleagues that are far more snobbish
(one has done tests on every available brand of ½ and ½ to see which
foams the best). I think that all the studies on the health benefits of
coffee have had an effect on increasing the consumption, as coffee
drinking is no longer viewed as some sort of a vice.
It would be nice if more "discriminating" people learned that you don't
have to burn the hell out of the beans, like Starbucks does, and that
the result is a better tasting cup that doesn't need to be frozenated,
sugared, flavored, or milked. In time, this may come to pass, and we all
can enjoy a healthy future with delicious coffee, free wireless
Internet, and ubiquitous cellular coverage on every carrier.
| |
|
| SMS wrote:
> Todd Allcock wrote:
>
> Without claiming to be "discriminating," I have to admit that I'm a
> coffee snob, though I have some colleagues that are far more snobbish
> (one has done tests on every available brand of ½ and ½ to see which
> foams the best). I think that all the studies on the health benefits of
> coffee have had an effect on increasing the consumption, as coffee
> drinking is no longer viewed as some sort of a vice.
>
> It would be nice if more "discriminating" people learned that you don't
> have to burn the hell out of the beans, like Starbucks does, and that
> the result is a better tasting cup that doesn't need to be frozenated,
> sugared, flavored, or milked. In time, this may come to pass, and we all
> can enjoy a healthy future with delicious coffee, free wireless
> Internet, and ubiquitous cellular coverage on every carrier.
Don't forget "two chickens in every garage."
--
Notan
| |
|
| Notan wrote:
> SMS wrote:
>
> Don't forget "two chickens in every garage."
And "pot in every car."
| |
|
| clifto wrote:
> From here on, everyone please specify the way you drink your coffee,
> so we can see if additives have any effect on tolerance of Starbucks.
When I drink Starbucks (on the road in an unfamiliar place), I will
usually get a latte. When I've gotten their regular coffee, it takes
sugar and/or ½ & ½ to make it palatable. It's too bad that they can't
offer one medium roast house coffee for snobs, and one burnt roast for
"discriminating" people. I remember a place in Santa Cruz that had a row
of Melitta one-cup filter cones, and brewed each cup to order. It was a
production line, so the wait was minimal, maybe two minutes after you
paid, but it was worth it, IMVAIO.
Thank g-d I began drinking good coffee around 1985, prior to Starbuck's
arrival in this area. I might have never known what non-burnt arabica
coffee was like. With wireless, I was on Cellular One/AT&T TDMA/AMPS so
I knew what good cellular was, so when I switched to Cingular GSM I
immediately noticed the difference, and switched to Verizon CDMA/AMPS as
soon as possible. Had I never had Cellular One/AT&T, I might have
thought that Cingular was how cellular was supposed to be (dropped
calls, system busy, poor coverage).
| |
|
| Todd Allcock wrote:
> Secondly, I realize Cingular had coverage problems out west on 1900MHz
> (the old PacTel network that T-Mo has inherited.) But post merger, now
> that Cingular has the old AT&T Wireless network (that apparently you were
> a former customer of) isn't it nearly as good as the old ATTWS used to be
> (other than the lack of analog?).
Yes, it's much better now. But they are still working on filling in a
surprisingly large number of gaps, especially in new developments where
farmland, ranches, and orchards are being converted to housing.
I do a lot of hiking and XC skiing, and this is where the AMPS coverage
is extremely helpful, even not far from the urban area. If Verizon turns
off AMPS in 2008, I think that it will make Cingular and Verizon pretty
close in coverage in the Bay Area, since Cingular is working on catching
up in digital coverage.
> As a funny aside, due to Cingular's extreme laziness in updating their
> IRDBs (the TDMA equivalent of a PRL), my wife and I, both Cingular
> customers with tri-mode phones, simultaneously roamed on different
> carriers on a trip to San Diego- she on Verizon (in analog), and I on
> AT&T TDMA. I'd have preferred the other way around, given the choice-
> she had a cute little red Nokia 8260 that could barely do ten hours
> standby in analog, while I had a 5165 with a far sportier battery life.
Conversely, I was roaming on Cingular's analog network in Florida, in an
area where there was no digital coverage, CDMA or GSM, and likely never
will be. Ditto for Alaska, where I was on AT&T Wireless's AMPS network
(now Cellular One I believe) outside of the cities and towns.
In 2008, that Forida analog coverage will almost certainly be gone
unless the FCC changes their policy to only allow AMPS to be turned off
in areas where there is digital coverage. In Alaska, they'll keep AMPS
on for a long time, until they come up with a viable alternative, such
as what Australia is doing with W-CDMA in the outback.
| |
|
| Todd Allcock wrote:
> I realize your main requirement is coverage, and I can understand that.
> But as a long time cell user, on a pure sound-quality basis only, all
> else being equal, what's your preference? I used TDMA long before I used
> GSM, and was pleasantly surprised how much better GSM calls sounded, and
> I never thought CDMA sounded very good based on very infrequent use of
> friends' handsets.
Sound quality depends on several factors. CDMA can degrade each channel
in order to cram more calls onto one tower, so GSM will be more
consistent during a call. OTOH, GSM is much more likely to drop the
call. Cingular's advertising claims not-withstanding, you get a lot more
dropped calls on Cingular than on Verizon or Sprint.
Sound quality has always varied more by phone than by technology. A lot
depends on the CoDec being used in the handset. Voice quality keeps
declining as the encoding rate goes down. If you use an SMV Codec (CDMA)
at the same bit rate as an AMR Codec (GSM), the CDMA phone will sound
better than the GSM phone. However it's up to the operator to decide
what bit rate will be used, and an AMR equipped phone could sound better
than a SMV equipped phone, if the the AMR bit rate is much higher.
All of the recent tests done on sound quality show CDMA to have better
sound, but these were laboratory tests, with the SMV decoder for CDMA
and the the AMR decoder for GSM, and with the bit rate not degraded due
to network congestion.
I have both Cingular GSM service (on a prepaid MVNO) and Verizon
CDMA/AMPS, and I don't notice any difference in sound quality.
| |
|
| SMS wrote:
> Todd Allcock wrote:
>
>
> Sound quality depends on several factors. CDMA can degrade each channel
> in order to cram more calls onto one tower, so GSM will be more
> consistent during a call. OTOH, GSM is much more likely to drop the
> call. Cingular's advertising claims not-withstanding, you get a lot more
> dropped calls on Cingular than on Verizon or Sprint.
>
> Sound quality has always varied more by phone than by technology. A lot
> depends on the CoDec being used in the handset. Voice quality keeps
> declining as the encoding rate goes down. If you use an SMV Codec (CDMA)
> at the same bit rate as an AMR Codec (GSM), the CDMA phone will sound
> better than the GSM phone. However it's up to the operator to decide
> what bit rate will be used, and an AMR equipped phone could sound better
> than a SMV equipped phone, if the the AMR bit rate is much higher.
>
> All of the recent tests done on sound quality show CDMA to have better
> sound, but these were laboratory tests, with the SMV decoder for CDMA
> and the the AMR decoder for GSM, and with the bit rate not degraded due
> to network congestion.
>
> I have both Cingular GSM service (on a prepaid MVNO) and Verizon
> CDMA/AMPS, and I don't notice any difference in sound quality.
Don't forget, there's still an "age related" factor, when it comes
to sound quality...
Typically, as one gets older, one tends to have a certain degree of high
frequency hearing loss... To this group, the "tinny" sounding earpieces
(to those without any hearing loss) may actually sound better than those
with full-range fidelity.
--
Notan
| |
|
| Notan wrote:
> Don't forget, there's still an "age related" factor, when it comes
> to sound quality...
>
> Typically, as one gets older, one tends to have a certain degree of high
> frequency hearing loss... To this group, the "tinny" sounding earpieces
> (to those without any hearing loss) may actually sound better than those
> with full-range fidelity.
Coffee helps prevent hearing loss.
| |
|
| Steven J. Sobol wrote:
> In article < 45d4b7d3$0$27226$742
ec2ed@news.sonic.net>, SMS wrote:
>
>
> Is it really necessary to re-start the coffee thread?
IMVAIO, that was the most interesting part of the thread. Navas making
up stories about Extended GSM, his baseless attacks on Consumer Reports,
and his endless shilling for Cingular have gotten pretty old, and no one
pays much attention anymore.
It's much more interesting to discuss the relative merits of different
coffees. In fact, I think that future posts should include the type of
coffee maker, coffee grinder, and mug that the poster uses.
Coffee Maker: Zojirushi EC-BD15
"http://nordicgroup.us/bikecoff/bcimages/EK_EC-BD15BA.jpg"
Coffee Grinder: Bodum Antigua Burr
"http://nordicgroup.us/bikecoff/bcimages/bodumant.jpeg"
Mug: Contigo Extreme Vacuum Insulated Leakproof
"http://nordicgroup.us/bikecoff/bcimages/ contigoextremewithha
ndle.jpg"
Sorry, I'm getting ready to go out of the country on Saturday, and I've
been up all night working on a presentation, so I've been drinking a lot
of coffee.
| |
|
| Todd Allcock wrote:
> So that begs the question is the CR subscribers' demographic more likely
> or less likely to have good service or bad service? I can't personally
> envision a scenario that would cause CR subscribers to have vastly
> different cell service than non-subscribers.
Even though there are certainly some demographic differences between CR
subscribers and the general public, none of these would materially
affect the results of one carrier more than another carrier. The
demographics of Consumer Reports readers versus the general population
include higher education level, higher income, more moderate
politically, and middle-age to older age. On the one hand, these
demographics would tend to make people more critical of products and
services, but on the other hand, these demographics may understand the
limitations of cellular communications better than uneducated people, so
they may cut the carriers more slack.
> I'll agree that's a bigger problem, assuming that unhappy customers might
> be more likely to "grumble" about service than happy ones are to gush.
> But again, that would drag everyone's scores down- not one carrier's, so
> the relative results wouldn't be much different.
I read a funny article about that in SmartMoney magazine yesterday. It
seems that there is very little middle ground in most reviews by
individuals of products and services. They either hate something or love
it. I.e. a five star review for a stapler at Amazon, "This stapler is
great. It works very well and staples many papers together."
What makes the CR survey so valuable is that they don't just ask "how's
your service?" they go into great detail with questions on specific
aspects of the service. But as you stated, even if the people that
choose to respond are more or less critical of a service, this will
extend across all the carriers, and will cancel out.
In earlier years, Navas complained that the reason Cingular was rated so
poorly was that their TDMA subscribers were dragging down their scores
(though in reality the TDMA/AMPS subscribers were probably dragging the
scores up). Now that the TDMA subscribers are an insignificant portion
of the total, he's come up with a new excuse, apparently he believes
that the Cingular subscribers that choose to respond to the survey are
somehow more critical of their service than the Verizon subscribers that
choose to respond. Certainly if there were any evidence that CR's
subscribers demographics somehow benefit one carrier over another, he'd
have presented that evidence, or at least a theory of that evidence. As
you pointed out "non-random and non-representative are not the same thing."
> I suppose the easiest way to make the study accurate for me, would be
> simply to subscribe to CR, then the results would apply to me, since I
> would be part of the represented universe.
>
> I'll let you all know how my subscription to CR affects my cellphone
> reception... ;-)
I read it at the library, so I guess I'm not represented in the survey
either.
| |
|
| Scott wrote:
> Bullshit. Unless you can prove that CR subscribers have a skewed view
> of service and coverage, it is a very real-world sample.
Not only that CR subscribers have a skewed view of service and coverage,
but that they only have a skewed view of service and coverage when it
comes to one carrier and not another.
You gotta love "there's simply no way of knowing which of them might be
at work." I guess he assume that there simply must be some biases at
work that affect only Cingular, because it just isn't possible that the
results are valid. It's a tough road to hoe when you're a shill for
Cingular, and every survey by every entity shows results that you don't
like.
> You keep talking about "other factors"- there are none. Either they
> have the same view of service or they don't. Period.
I'd like to see his theory of "other factors" as well. I tried hard to
imagine what these could possibly be, in a way that doesn't affect all
the carriers equally, but I couldn't think of any. It will take the
creative mind of Navas to invent some of these factors, but I have no
doubt that he's furiously working on it.
> All surveys are self-selected. No survey is done where the respondent
> is required to answer questions.
Bingo!
Geez, even if CR mailed out surveys at random to the entire country, the
respondees would still be self-selected, they'd just be more random.
Even so, there's no evidence at all that the non-randomness has affected
the results for one carrier and not another. As Todd pointed out
"non-random and non-representative are not the same thing."
It's like the Consumer Reports survey of vehicle reliability. It's
self-selected and non-random, but I don't think that anyone believes
that a CR subscriber is more or less likely to report what problems they
had with their vehicle than a non-subscriber, or that they're more
likely to report problems on a Toyota than a Honda or a Chevy.
| |
|
| John Navas wrote:
> There's simply no way of knowing that without real data, which doesn't
> exist, so that's just your own unsupported speculation.
VERY GOOD REPLY!...I'll use it next time you bring up Extended GSM.
| |
|
| Scott wrote:
> I'm sorry, Mr. Novice- stating that the source of their data is "experience
> with national carriers" (which is the small print now used in their ads)
> hardly qualifies as a respected third party. A respected third party that
> believed the claim to be valid would most certainly allow the use of their
> name. And the fact that they are spinning it this way makes the data far
> less credible than a comapny stating that they are using their own data.
Actually, if Verizon's claims hadn't been validated by the results of
every independent survey ever done, it'd be reasonable to question it.
Cingular's claim is based on data that they won't release, from a
company that they paid to do the "survey," and all independent surveys
have come to the opposite conclusion. When you make a claim, but won't
provide any evidence to back it up, your claim is highly suspect. Navas
and Cingular are actually a lot alike in this regard.
| |
|
| Scott wrote:
> Bullshit. Unless you can prove that CR subscribers have a skewed view
> of service and coverage, it is a very real-world sample.
According to The Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 4, No. 4 (Mar.,
1978), pp. 247-251, "The Consumer Reports subscriber is found to be
richer, better educated, and more likely to own a fairly wide range of
durable goods."
Given the demographics, it'd be interesting to know whether the CR
subscriber base, which is better educated and more affluent than the
general public, is more or less critical of goods and services.
In any case, any difference cancels out because it would be present no
matter which carrier the subscriber was reviewing. CR surveys are
designed to eliminate this sort of bias, so any differences between the
CR subscriber base and the general population cancel out.
| |
|
| clifto wrote:
> John Navas wrote:
>
> He's not wrong on all counts. If he is, please point me to the released
> copy of the Cingular survey.
"http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2006/05/14/ for_bjs_ignoring_ite
m_pricing_is_a_barga
in/?page=2"
"Telephia sent a letter this month to officials at all four major
wireless companies, saying it didn't know how Cingular concluded that it
drops the fewest calls. The San Francisco research firm also said it
couldn't say whether Cingular's advertising is fair, legal, or responsible.
"While we can't evaluate the specific analysis Cingular uses as the
basis of its nationwide claim, Telephia can confirm that Cingular does
have a statistically significant lower dropped-call rate than the
competition across some market/time period groupings," said Sid Gorham,
Telephia's chief executive, in the letter."
Wow! And in some market/time period groupings the other carriers have
fewer dropped calls. Not to mention calls that weren't dropped because
they couldn't be made in the first place! Cingular built a whole
national advertising campaign on data that the survey company says
doesn't back up the claims in the ads. I guess Telephia is more than a
bit worried about their reputation after what Cingular pulled, and
needed to issue that statement.
What happened is that Cingular was desperate to find some data, some
survey, anywhere, that they could point to, after taking a beating in
respectable, statistically sound, surveys from Yankee Group, J.D. Power,
Consumer Reports, and others. The fact that the best they could do is to
make up conclusions that the data doesn't support, is pretty telling.
Note to Cingular. Follow Sprint's lead. Make up some metric that can't
be measured, such as "most powerful," and you won't get so much bad
publicity. "Cingular has the Most Potent Network in the U.S."
| |
|
| John Navas wrote:
[color=darkred]
>
> Wrong on all counts.
Not so, he is correct. Like we're still waiting on credible of the kind YOU
demand, of Extended GSM by U.S. carriers.
| |
|
| Todd Allcock wrote:
> In many ways, a limited population
> survey is MORE useful. For example, I would prefer a survey of "best
> luggage" to be comprised only of, say, frequent business travelers, or
> airline pilots, over one culled from the "general population," many of
> whom don't travel or travel infrequently.
Looking at CR subscribers demographics, that limited population is a
benefit in a lot of surveys. For example, a more highly educated person
with higher income is much more likely to be more frequent traveler.
This is valuable when evaluating a service such as cellular.
Understandably, this could work against some carriers.
For example, when I was in Alaska few years ago, there were a lot of
very unhappy Cingular GSM subscribers because at the time there was no
GSM service (and I ran into one Nextel subscriber that was equally
unhappy, and I advised him to go to Wal-Mart and buy a Tracfone).
Is it unfair or not that these Cingular and Nextel subscribers would
almost certainly have given poor marks to Cingular and Nextel in terms
of coverage? Is it unfair that Cingular TDMA/AMPS subscribers, and
Verizon & Sprint CDMA/AMPS subscribers would have given their carriers
good marks in terms of coverage? If the survey were not limited to CR
subscribers, you'd have had less of a percentage of higher income
respondents that traveled to places where GSM coverage hasn't yet caught
up to CDMA. It's why I always advise people to not just look at the
coverage where they live and work, but to look at the coverage in places
that they are likely to travel to, or travel through.
| |
|
| james g. keegan jr. wrote:
> don't you just love it when they walk into openings like that?
When they advertise like Cingular did with their "fewest dropped calls"
claim, they are actually hurting themselves more than they realize. Even
if Cingular's claim had turned out to be true, to the part of the
audience that has learned to pick apart advertising claims they've just
admitted that their network is worse than the competition in the metrics
that actually matter.
| |
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| Dennis Ferguson wrote:
> Look at the area around 94020 on the Sprint Coverage map, or on the
> Verizon map showing coverage for the old America's Choice plan. Notice
> the latter calls this "Roaming or No Service". There is AMPS coverage
> all through there, I've even seen a cell tower on a hill in one of the
> parks off of Pescadero Creek Road.
Or 95043.
Yes, I've also found that the "Roaming or No Service" areas are AMPs
areas, while if there is really no service it is a "No Service" area,
though you can often pick up AMPS for quite a ways into the "No Service
Area." I found the same thing down in San Benito County earlier this week.
It's not just that though, it's that in areas with both AMPS and
digital, of course they show the area as digital, even though you get an
AMPS signal further from the tower than a digital signal. This is where
Navas is most confused, he thinks that the presence of digital coverage
means the absence of AMPS, without understanding that AMPS is a superset
of digital, that usually will have wider range of coverage. Of course he
actually does understand all this, he just pretends to not understand
because the lack of AMPS on Cingular's GSM is one reason why their
coverage in this area is so much poorer than Cingular's coverage.
| |
|
| David Arnstein wrote:
> In article < 1d4b03dq4pv5nkt9jkfo
5o5t3rv4s30au7@4ax.com>,
> John Navas < spamfilter0@navasgro
up.com> wrote:
>
> I still get value from Verizon AMPS. Very frequently, I'll be inside a
> building and getting a weak signal. My handset will
> 1. fail to begin a digital call
> 2. automatically switch to analog mode
> 3. begin the call in analog mode.
Yes, this is true. My sister-in-law hadn't realized how much she was
even using AMPS until she mistakenly bought a handset that didn't
support it. She works in an area of SF that is in a valley, and is
inside a hospital. The digital coverage is marginal deep inside the
hospital on all systems, and the hospital doesn't want repeaters inside.
With an AMPS capable phone she could usually make or receive calls, with
digital only, forget it.
| |
| Kevin Weaver 2007-03-25, 4:33 am |
| Extended GMS Would work. :) (Navas quote)
Or just any phone from cingular would also work. (Another Navas quote)
How would he know these things ? Google is his friend. hahahaha
SMS wrote:
> David Arnstein wrote:
>
> Yes, this is true. My sister-in-law hadn't realized how much she was
> even using AMPS until she mistakenly bought a handset that didn't
> support it. She works in an area of SF that is in a valley, and is
> inside a hospital. The digital coverage is marginal deep inside the
> hospital on all systems, and the hospital doesn't want repeaters
> inside. With an AMPS capable phone she could usually make or receive
> calls, with digital only, forget it.
| |
|
| Kevin Weaver wrote:
> Extended GMS Would work. :) (Navas quote)
>
> Or just any phone from cingular would also work. (Another Navas quote)
>
> How would he know these things ? Google is his friend. hahahaha
It may have been funny at first, but his fabrications have gotten old
and un-funny.
I want AMPS to go away, but only when digital is available every place
that AMPS is available. This isn't going to happen any time soon.
Fortunately, the AMPS sunset date is when carriers are permitted to turn
off AMPS, not required to turn it off. Most of the carriers have
indicated that they will keep AMPS on in the areas where it provides the
only available coverage.
| |
| Kevin Weaver 2007-03-25, 10:33 pm |
|
John Navas wrote:
> On Sun, 25 Mar 2007 08:21:44 GMT, Kevin Weaver
> < kevinkeithweaver@sbc
global.net> wrote in
> <siqNh.18562$uo3.15987@newssvr14.news.prodigy.net>:
>
>
>
> Unnecessary.
>
>
>
> No, but a better one (e.g., V3xx) might.
>
>
>
> Actually personal experience.
>
>
>
> Off your meds again I see.
>
>
Wow, What a come back. I was expecting better.
>
> Unreliable sample of one. [yawn]
>
>
| |
|
| Scott wrote:
> John Navas < spamfilter0@navasgro
up.com> wrote in
> news:29be0391dl1ud8e
9tbkahvss6ra2gkt129@
4ax.com:
>
> Sure it is- he backed it up just like you do. He typed it- on Navas World
> that constitutes unrefutable fact.
Amen
| |
|
| Scott wrote:
> Sure it is- he backed it up just like you do. He typed it- on Navas World
> that constitutes unrefutable fact.
Actually the citation is statements from the carriers to some of their
corporate customers that rely on AMPS coverage in some areas.
For instance, at my wife's company, part of the decision to change from
Nextel to Verizon was the commitment that coverage would not decrease,
by whatever means necessary, including keeping older technology
operating until newer technology replaces it.
They were going crazy with Nextel coverage in the remote parts of the
Bay Area that they serve, and no one was using PTT anyway. The employees
were all carrying personal Verizon or Sprint tri-band phones with them,
and complaining about having to pay for a service that the company
should be paying for. They needed the AMPS coverage, which is still all
you get in many rural parts of the Bay Area that they serve. So they're
all getting V325i phones. Sprint, while it provided similar capability,
could not make any promises about coverage, since they don't have their
own AMPS network.
The other part of the reason for the change was Verizon's GPS
capability, which Cingular and T-Mobile lack at this time (though they
will likely deploy this at some time in the future, as GSM carriers in
Europe are deploying it even though it is not legally required). There
are many applications for this technology.
We'll see what happens with AMPS in 2008. Hopefully wiser heads will
prevail at the FCC, and the sunset date will be extended.
| |
| Kevin Weaver 2007-03-27, 4:33 am |
| <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<meta content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1" http-equiv="Content-Type">
<title></title>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000">
Is this another one of those top post vs don't top post ?<br>
Show me a law where it says no html.. Thought so.<br>
<br>
<br>
John Navas wrote:
<blockquote cite=" midci7h039t8mfe180vg
o6ifcn8oa5ie64s10@4a
x.com"
type="cite">
<pre wrap="">On Mon, 26 Mar 2007 03:26:16 GMT, Kevin Weaver
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href=" mailto:kevinkeithwea
ver@sbcglobal.net">& lt;kevinkeithweaver@
sbcglobal.net></a> wrote in
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:s3HNh.1829$YL5.1742@newssvr29.news.prodigy.net"><s3HNh.1829$YL5.1742@newssvr29.news.prodigy.net></a>:
</pre>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre wrap="">[SNIP]
</pre>
</blockquote>
<pre wrap=""><!---->
Please turn off HTML when posting to Usenet. Thanks.
</pre>
</blockquote>
</body>
</html>
| |
| Kevin Weaver 2007-03-27, 3:33 pm |
| <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<meta content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1" http-equiv="Content-Type">
<title></title>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000">
Thanks for the plonk!<br>
<br>
clifto wrote:
<blockquote cite="mid4rund4-g3o.ln1@remote.clifto.com" type="cite">
<pre wrap="">Kevin Weaver wrote:
</pre>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre wrap="">[!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"]
[html]
[head]
[meta content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1" http-equiv="Content-Type"]
[title][/title]
[/head]
[body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000"]
Is this another one of those top post vs don't top post ?[br]
Show me a law where it says no html.. Thought so.[br]
[br]
[br]
John Navas wrote:
[blockquote cite=<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href=" mailto:midci7h039t8m
fe180vgo6ifcn8oa5ie6
4s10@4ax.com">" midci7h039t8mfe180vg
o6ifcn8oa5ie64s10@4a
x.com"</a>
type="cite"]
[pre wrap=""]On Mon, 26 Mar 2007 03:26:16 GMT, Kevin Weaver
[a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href=<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href=" mailto:kevinkeithwea
ver@sbcglobal.net">" mailto:kevinkeithwea
ver@sbcglobal.net"</a<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:]& lt;kevinkeithweaver@
sbcglobal.net>[/a]wrotein[
aclass=">"]& amp;lt;kevinkeithwea
ver@sbcglobal.net>[/a] wrote in
[a class="</a>moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href=<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:s3HNh.1829$YL5.1742@newssvr29.news.prodigy.net">"mailto:s3HNh.1829$YL5.1742@newssvr29.news.prodigy.net"</a<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:]<s3HNh.1829
$YL5.1742@newssvr29.news.prodigy.net>[/a]:[/pre][blockquotetype=">"]<s3HNh.1829$YL5.1742@newssvr29.news.prodigy.net>[/a]:
[/pre]
[blockquote type="</a>cite"]
[pre wrap=""][SNIP]
[/pre]
[/blockquote]
[pre wrap=""][!----]
Please turn off HTML when posting to Usenet. Thanks.
[/pre]
[/blockquote]
[/body]
[/html]
</pre>
</blockquote>
<pre wrap=""><!---->
Here's what your article looked like before I plonked you. XXXXXXX.
</pre>
</blockquote>
</body>
</html>
| |
|
| Kevin Weaver wrote:
> Is this another one of those top post vs don't top post ?
> Show me a law where it says no html.. Thought so.
<snip>
Someone asks you, nicely ("Please turn off HTML when posting
to Usenet. Thanks."), to make it easier for everyone to read
your posts, and you come back with some childish response.
You define the word, "XXXXXXX."
--
Notan
| |
|
| clifto wrote:
> Kevin Weaver wrote:
>
> Here's what your article looked like before I plonked you. XXXXXXX.
>
What newsreader are you using?
With Thunderbird, the only indication that someone is posting using HTML
is that the font looks a little different, and the ASCII emoticons turn
to a little picture of a face. I never get any all of the source displayed.
True, it's better to not post in HTML, but I don't think that it's all
that big a deal.
| |
| Kevin Weaver 2007-03-27, 3:33 pm |
| Thanks, I did that just to piss off Navas.
Other then that. I do use Thunderbird and can switch HTML On or off on
the fly.
I don't ever post in HTML, but when Navas brought it up, I just forgot
to turn it off. :)
Now, If everyone else wants to chime in. Let the love flow.
SMS wrote:
> clifto wrote:
>
> What newsreader are you using?
>
> With Thunderbird, the only indication that someone is posting using
> HTML is that the font looks a little different, and the ASCII
> emoticons turn to a little picture of a face. I never get any all of
> the source displayed.
>
> True, it's better to not post in HTML, but I don't think that it's all
> that big a deal.
| |
|
| Kevin Weaver wrote:
> Thanks, I did that just to piss off Navas.
<snip>
In the future, if you want to piss him off, just point out
the inaccuracies of his posts, or ask him to back them up
with facts (not opinions).
Sorry for the "XXXXXXX" comment!
--
Notan
| |
| Kevin Weaver 2007-03-27, 10:33 pm |
| No problem dude.
Notan wrote:
> Kevin Weaver wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
> In the future, if you want to piss him off, just point out
> the inaccuracies of his posts, or ask him to back them up
> with facts (not opinions).
>
> Sorry for the "XXXXXXX" comment!
>
| |
|
| Notan wrote:
> Kevin Weaver wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
> In the future, if you want to piss him off, just point out
> the inaccuracies of his posts, or ask him to back them up
> with facts (not opinions).
You could spend your entire life pointing out his inaccuracies. Asking
for him to back up his statements with facts has been tried by many
posters, to no avail of course because there are never any facts
available to back up his statements. This thread alone is ample proof of
that!
The best solution is to kill-file him. He thrives on the attention and
responses that his fabrications and spamming provoke. Deny him the
attention and he might change his ways. There are people like him on
virtually every unmoderated Usenet group, they exist to be disruptive
and annoying. You learn to work around these people using filters.
Kill-filing helps to resist the temptation to respond to every lie that
he posts.
[Copied to alt.cellular.attws. Please post all alt.cellular.cingular
posts to alt.cellular.attws as well. The Cingular name is going away,
and alt.cellular.attws is the proper venue for posts regarding AT&T's
Wireless Service.]
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