Bell Screws Over Customers With GPS Enabled BlackBerries
As if to prove that the new Bell is just a bunch of scumbags like the old Bell, comes this blog posting on the Wellington Financial Blog. Apparently if you’ve got a GPS enabled BlackBerry, Bell is going to screw you over like this:
Users of free GPS mapping applications (such as Google Maps or even the included Blackberry Maps application by RIM) will see the time required to establish a GPS lock increase to 2-10 minutes, up from the typical 15-20 seconds usually experienced. Additionally, there is some speculation that the resolution of GPS data will also be reduced to a 1-2.5km range as opposed to the existing 10-25m accuracy currently provided — not exactly useful when trying to find the location for your next meeting downtown in an unfamiliar city.
But of course, Bell can fix that for you if you use their mapping application and pay $10 a month to get a fast and accurate GPS fix. This would affect users of the BlackBerry 8830, 8130 Pearl and 8330 Curve among others.
Gee, I thought Bell was supposed to be better. I guess they’re really just greedier.
September 26, 2008 at 8:09 am
The GPS in my iPhone 3G provides access to my location in 15 seconds, so perhaps they use some other system. Its been very consistent from the first day I got it, July 11, and is as accurate as my Garmin dedicated GPS.
I recently wrote on my blog about the iPhone’s GPS, which surprised me with its abilities. Here’s the link if you’re interested. http://johnkendrick.wordpress.com/2008/08/30/iphone-does-gps/
September 26, 2008 at 11:27 am
This is so scandalous. Why do we have an FCC and FTC if companies can act this badly? Interfering with the signal on purpose. This is worse than Internet Traffic Shaping.