19200.00USD data roaming bill to update PC game

[Lee]

On the pre-conference interview with Brough Turner back at the start
of last February we spoke somewhat about mobile Internet data roaming
costs in Europe. There is not much point repeating what I had said as
the transcript is here http://ecommmedia.com/blog/2008/02/brough-turner-on-mobile-commun.html

A point I'd highlight though is that I said I had a T-Mobile
Web'n'Walk UK SIM but owing to the fact that most of the time I am in
Vienna, Austria I don't dare touch it (the SIM is sold as unlimited
data usage unless roaming and in Europe roaming is defined as stepping
from one small European country to the next, something which greatly
annoys many and hinders the mobile Internet).

Anyhow today when I was on a call someone said that someone they knew
about had the same unlimited UK mobile data deal (T-Mobile WNW) and
they used it to update their PC game when on holiday in Austria and
the bill came to over 9700GBP (19200.00USD).

Thinking this was plain exaggeration, I did a quick Google and it's
true, see:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/consumer/tv_and_radio/watchdog/reports/services/services_20080331.shtml

Now I know a few people personally who received a bill for a couple of
thousand by daring to use data roaming (hell I even got hit once with
3000USD bill for one week of calls back from China) but nobody who got
close to throwing away 20K USD to update their game!

[Bob Frankston]

It's not so long ago that travelers had to worry about highwaymen. As the Wikipedia entry notes, they were done in by the railroads. In the US the owners became the robber barons. Today the Telcos are simply respecting traditional in preying upon all who pass.

 

I did notice that simply using Google (and Microsoft) maps was about $100/hr when I visiting the UK  a few months ago - don't remember seeing a warning messages (T-Mobile/US).

 

To add a degree of absurdity -- if I subscribe to an unlimited data plan with gigabytes per month of usage then why do I pay so much for SMS bits?