I know I'm sucker. I've owned (or been the child of someone who owned) a Mac since 1985. I've suffered through all of Apple's crappy customer service, their "Genius Bars," their insanely high prices and most of all, their finicky computers for two decades. I'm on my second iPod, too, and not afraid to buy a third when the time is right.
I'm also on year 10 of my relationship with Verizon Wireless. That's much more of a marriage of convenience. And frankly, I may look for a wireless divorce when the new iPhone becomes available in June from Cingular.
Only problem is this insanely long contract I'm locked in with from Verizon. Is it time to bite the bullet and make a switch?
First, a very quick back story on my Verizon situation. Before I co-founded OnMilwaukee.com, I (along with my original two business partners) was a contractor for PrimeCo (now Verizon). Back in 1997, we built out their Wisconsin network and they locked me in with free service and a free phone (which, of course, stopped being free when I stopped working for them). Through the years, I've stuck with them, mostly for the convenience factor, but also because Verizon's coverage area has been pretty good to me.
Like other Verizon customers, I've found the company to be slow in releasing new and interesting phones. But like other "early adopters," I've been fairly content with my Blackberry 7130e. In short, I've had no good reason to switch carriers.
But this dysfunctional relationship with Apple goes back much farther, has cost me much more money, and maybe even makes less sense. As a "creative guy," I find the Mac platform to be far superior to that of the PC. But "computer-wise," I've felt like a square peg in a round hole since I was 11 years old.
Don't believe me? Mac "enthusiasts" like myself will sympathize with this long list of computers I've owned since the first one my parents bought the family back in '85:
- Mac 512Ke
- Mac LCII
- PowerCenter 150 (yes, a Mac clone that was made obsolete when Apple bought Power Computing and shut them down)
- G3 Powerbook 233 MHz
- G3 iBook 700 MHz
- G4 500 MHz
- G5 1.8 GHz
I know that's geek talk, but that list should demonstrate the sorry state of my Apple addiction. Maybe I need AA (Appleholics Anonymous).
The new iPhone, however, may change things. It comes as close to anything I've seen resembling the futuristic vision of 2007 I expected by now. If we can't have flying cars yet, then we certainly deserve a bitchin' phone, PDA, music player, camera and wireless Web browser -- all rolled into one very stylish and skinny touch-screen case. It's a little early to tell, but it looks extremely cool.
But it's exclusive to Cingular. For now.
And I really want one.
Can anyone tell me how to get out of my Verizon contract?
Andy is the president, publisher and founder of OnMilwaukee. He returned to Milwaukee in 1996 after living on the East Coast for nine years, where he wrote for The Dallas Morning News Washington Bureau and worked in the White House Office of Communications. He was also Associate Editor of The GW Hatchet, his college newspaper at The George Washington University.
Before launching OnMilwaukee.com in 1998 at age 23, he worked in public relations for two Milwaukee firms, most of the time daydreaming about starting his own publication.
Hobbies include running when he finds the time, fixing the rust on his '75 MGB, mowing the lawn at his cottage in the Northwoods, and making an annual pilgrimage to Phoenix for Brewers Spring Training.
