UPDATE: Sprint Says Treo 650 WILL Support Bluetooth Dialup
"In an earlier post this week, I railed against Sprint for disabling the use of Bluetooth on the new Treo 650 for laptop Internet access. Jeff Shafer from Sprint Business Solutions Public Relations contacted me and said the following:It is important to note that the characterization [in your post] is inaccurate.
Due to some development deadlines, the phone has been launched as described, without the DUN [dial-up networking] capability. However, as part of a scheduled maintenance release of software (timing pending some testing), the DUN capabilities will be supported. We also support the functionality in the just released PPC-6601 (Pocket PC device). In no way is Sprint suppressing the functionality as you describe or with the motivations you assert.
My thoughts: Skepticism. Let me tell you a story, right when Sprint rolled out the 3G, almost two years ago, I was told by several Sprint employees that I would be able get 3G data over my phone with my laptop, but just prior to the rollout Sprint pulled all the data cables to connect the phones to laptops. I was told once again by multiple sprint emplyees over the phone and in Sprint Stores that they had cancelled the offering of data through phone because they had no way to track it and they would roll it out when they could track it. Well, it's nearly two years later, and
Sprint is still in denial that people are buying data cables through third parties and using them to access the internet via Sprint.
Well if you looked at Sprint's arsenal of phone you would notice that they have been avoiding carrying any phones with bluetooth because they have in 2 years done nothing and been in denial over the fact that people want and can get highspeed data through their laptop. Bluetooth would allow customers to get that highspeed data on their laptop wether they had a cable or not. So Sprint withheld all bluetooth phones from the market. Meanwhile bluetooth has become ubiquitous. Untill finally they had to deal with the problem with the Treo 650.
The shit finally has hit fan with Sprint carrying the Treo 650. They obviously thought they could just ignore the problem by disabling the the bluetooth and crippling a primary feature on the phone, but they were obviously wrong because the majority of people will not buy a very expensive PDA phone that has been obnoxiously crippled so it cannot even sync with their laptop. There is after all no point to many in having a PDA if they can not sync their address book, contacts, calendar, and what not. This was pretty obviously foolish on Sprint's part.
All that said Sprint very well be working on developing some way to track the amount of data a customer is using on their phone, but come on it's been two years, people are
obviously using Sprint's 3G data via cell phone in widespread fashion but Sprint has taken no initiative to offering it as a legitimate service. Sprint has instead waited until the problem came and bit them in the ass with the Treo 650.
So when Sprint says they are being "charaterized inaccurately". I say bullshit. Sprint has had their head buried in the sand for so long on this one that no amount of back peddling and excuse making is going to make it OK to disable the bluetooth connectivity on a PDA. Sprint is going to have to figure this one out, and I'm betting based on the fact that it's been two years already that they're not going to roll out this service anytime soon. I'll be patiently anticipating it Sprint, just as I have been for almost 2 years, with my handy USB cable that is.
Don't take my word for it though, read some of the comments on the bottom of the O'reilly post and do a quick search through the blogosphere with technoratti, blogdex or bloglines. Sprint is in full PR spin mode pretending like they didn't just sit on a much needed funcitonality while rolling out dumb ass services services like voice activated calling and purchaseable ringtones and screensaves, and I despise them for it.
UPDATE: Sprint Says Treo 650 WILL Support Bluetooth Dialup
Chicago, IL
