My brother and I have an ongoing debate over which is better – iPhone or blackberry. I know the visitors here will support my side – blackberry, no question.

Well yesterday my brother may have started swaying to the blackberry side, he received a bill from ATT for 3,000! These were obscene iPhone data roaming charges, for a week he spent in Canada, basically $20/MB – ouch.

With the 8820 and GPS – blackberry all the way. I just hope ATT doesn’t screw with the bb data plans.

This is what we’ve “heard through the grape vine” (wink) in response to your question and Jibi’s post:

“It wasn’t a text file change. Thus was a software lock down. New device software was required.”

As a side point, no matter how involved the lock-down was (be it software, text-file, or physical clamp on the device), I think the heart of the story lay in the fact that RIM really didn’t want to do it, but they were forced to because of their relationship with AT&T and the carrier’s interest in protecting its investment in the iPhone and possibly also just in shaving a few more dollars off their customers.

Also, even if there was a work around, that leaves members of the Forums and BlackBerry Cool readers who would have the insight and technical capacity to get it done. What about the average BlackBerry user who has no idea what’s going on in the tech world, and is put in a position to pay his carrier more money because he isn’t aware of an alternative?

If its the case of a simple alx modification then i feel like a douche for getting angry over it when the story was first posted. I don’t really feel sorry for RIM if they were only pressured to change a text file. I’m sure RIM’s thoughts were as casual as “Yeah, yeah. We’ll change the freaking text file. You still going to give us our money? We’re cool then.”

Can you imagine if Verizon woke up and listened to its customer base, instead of being greedy.

In the end if AT&T continues to go the way its going and cleaning up things, such as firing the people with tude’s and improving there network and data network they would really give Verizon a serious run for there there money

!– For 8800 series, hide the icon for AT&T (102), Vodafone Germany (124), Vodafone Austria (137) and all Orange properties, including Amena (Orange Spain – 175). –

!– For non-8800 series, show the icon for all carriers except AT&T (102), Vodafone Germany (124), Vodafone Austria (137) and all Orange properties, including Amena (Orange Spain – 175). –

fileset SystemSize=”normal” Colour=”True” Java=”1.0″ _vendorID=”~102|124|137|119|162|142|183|147|217|175″ series=”~8800″

In all honesty, I think more was made of this than it should have been. Starting with the 8800 series devices, RIM and AT&T have done this. It’s a simple software lock that can easily be fixed by anyone. It had nothing to do with the release of the 8820 but rather the release of the 8800 and it’s GPS features. The only people this affected, which may actually be a large number, were those who thought TeleNav was their only option (due to a service book-enabled icon) or didn’t know how to download BlackBerry Maps or Google Maps from the web.

If the 8820 is relesed with the same ‘locked down’ LBS.alx, then AT&T nor RIM ‘neutered’ the device from GPS but rather did nothing at all. They would still live up to any misunderstandings that may have resulted from the original article concerning the neutering of GPS, which made it sound as if they were literally disabling it at the hardware/firmware level (like Verizon does)… that was simply NOT the case.

You’ve got to give it to BlackBerry Cool… When they leaked rumors that AT&T was going to lock down GPS in the BlackBerry 8820 internet collectively got ticked off and it would appear that AT&T has changed their tune.
Right now RI…

I’m not sure if that’s a diss or not, but I like the sound of it.

BlackBerry Cool: “RIM’s Internet PR”

We should really be scoring it as a win for Slashdot, however. Damn those guys carry some weight.

Good news for AT&T subscribers, though.