Phone consultants condemn sophisticated handsets for empowering users

By Cory Doctorow at 3:33 am Tuesday, Jun 1

Mako Analysis is a consultancy that recently issued an hysterical report on SymbianOS phones, warning that giving telco customers devices that they can install software on created a "loophole" that allows "consumers" to avoid the extortionate tarrifs charged on things like information services and ringtones. The consultants advise carriers to provide less-capable phones to their customers as a way of protecting their rackets:

"The increasing sophistication of high-end mobile devices opens up a range of additional problems and will continue to undermine the data revenue streams of mobile operators at a time when they desperately need them to be increasing," a Mako spokesperson said...

"As with any new device feature," the spokesperson continued, "it will eventually infiltrate into medium and low-end terminals, in the case of practically every other advancement this would be welcomed. This historical approach has lead us to blindly encourage the addition of increasingly sophisticated devices throughout the range, in the case of open platform operating systems our approach surely has to be one of caution."

Link (Thanks, Matt!)