I did a quick lookup on the cost of mobile data from the 3 current carriers in Ireland and the table below lays out the range of costs I found for downloading a 33MB file. I was prompted to look at this as USA podcatchers are listening to podcasts on GSM via ‘all you can eat’ tariffs that have no upper limits at a fixed cost.
OK so Europe is more GMS covered and has a 80%+ user base and the USA has a much smaller base but when listening to one show on your phone exceeds the cost of purchasing your phone something is wrong. And if Europe and Ireland in particular is so mobile busy, surely that would make the cost drop, competition drives down cost (my arse). While GPRS is not good enough to stream a 56Kbit audio cast, it is good enough to download a show of any bit rate or size if your have the time, and in Ireland, you have the wallet.
gprs meteor 33MB €165
gprs 02 33MB € 50 up to €495
gprs vodafone 33MB € 20 up to €176
3G vodafone 33MB € 20 up to € 48
prices show upper & lower range of bundles available to business users where available. Cost rounded up to nearest euro and are based on unit costs once the bundle amount has been used.
Future Mathematics Exam question for Leaving Certificate
Using the table provided, Earning minimum wage (€7.65 @ 39 hours) you download data on your pay as you go mobile phone, after how many minutes and seconds are you broke.
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