Are you looking for an open-source smartphone that is free with a two-year contract? Read on to find it.
It seems like TechCrunch is getting the hang of link bait, and today the tech blog whines about not getting smartphones for free. According to the blog, Google's CEO envisioned free smartphones back in 2006.
Well, we can tell you that he wasn't alone about envisioning that. A couple of years ago, we predicted that Symbian smartphones would be free with a contract right about now. So, what happened? Enter 2010 and AT&T hands out free Nokia E71x units when signing up for a new two-year contract. They've been doing so for quite some time.
Of course, in TechCrunch's world, there's only two mobile platforms out there. It's probably too hard to keep track of three. And yes, Symbian as well as MeeGo are open-source platforms. We'll give TechCrunch a little bit of slack and presume they ignored this fact to get their link bait right.
One can naturally also question our own prediction, as free Symbian smartphones aren't the norm yet. Google's CEO, however, has been far more accurate than us. Courtesy of Verizon Wireless BOGO deals, for instance, truck loads of high-end Android phones are handed out for free every week.
That said, one can always debate whether the service should be free too. Hundreds of thousands of people lost their jobs in the mobile industry alone in 2009 though, so it sounds unrealistic to expect such a move anytime yet. Of course, we could always have blamed Google's CEO for not predicting the financial crisis, but come on, that would just make us sound like TechCrunch.
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