A Verizon spokesperson said in response to a petition by a Lakewood resident asking verizon to keep the 3G towers in Lakewood to accommodate those who abstain from using smartphones and still use the 3G services on their flip phones.
"We are actively working with our customers to help ensure any transition needs are addressed as early as possible. The best experience for customers is on a 4G device".Verizon said in a statement. NJ101.5 reports:
Verizon spokesman David Weissman said the networks that a phone can operate on is dependent on the cellular radios that are put in the phone when it is manufactured. If a phone is described as 3G, it likely doesn't also include a 4G radio. 4G is 10 times faster than 3G and that allows smartphones to run faster with more streaming capacity. When 4G was introduced to consumers, it maintained backward compatibility to 3G. But a 5G network won't have that same compatibility.
Weissman said that not upgrading the network would essentially turn their phones into walkie-talkies that couldn't be used outside of Lakewood as 3G networks are phased out.
See petition below
Verizon has announced that they will end 3G service in 2019, and will instead focus on maintaining 4G and developing 5G. They have already stopped fixing broken 3G towers, and 3G service is already spotty in many areas. Lakewood, NJ boasts a large demographic of Orthodox Jews. Many of them abstain from using smartphones, with the objective to avoid the immorality and culture that has become synonymous with the internet. Verizon has a large customer base in Lakewood that uses flip-phones, the vast majority of which utilize the 3G network.
It is perfectly understandable that Verizon wishes to advance technology and shed the extra expenses involved in servicing and maintaining the 3G cell towers. Nevertheless, we respectfully ask that you consider departing from that policy in order to accommodate your customers in Lakewood, and continue to upkeep their local 3G towers as long as it is feasible to do so.
Thank you.
I have a 4G phone that doesn't have a browser. doesn't that solve the problem?
ReplyDeletehttps://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/amended-complaint-yeshiva-yagdil-torah-07616/
ReplyDeleteQuite ridiculous to do such a petition, they should be focusing their efforts into petitioning the cellphone companies to manufacture simple 4G phones that can be filtered or have removed the smart features that make the phone a basic phone. From what I understand that there is already out there some basic 4G phones out there.
ReplyDeleteThey should not start these petitions without guidance of gedolim or people with seichel these self appointed askanim writing petitions does no good for the klal.
ReplyDeletewe are in galus
Verizon is delibarately creating overhype around all this whole turnover to 4g. The old 3g network is still mostly working and will until 2020. They just want everyone to panic and run buy new deviices. Its a marketing gimmick.
ReplyDelete