Verizon Go90 Doesn’t Count in Your Data, but That’s Not Good News
Verizon customers can now stream videos – including live NBA games! – from the forgotten video of the go90 service, not counting their data limit! Sounds good, but it’s a trap. That’s why.
Verizon launched the go90 service back in October with very little fanfare . In fact, Verizon doesn’t have a lot of history when it comes to bloated software in general , so you’ll be forgiven for ignoring it completely. However, if you are a Verizon user and want to watch, say, The Daily Show, you have two options: watch it through Hulu, Comedy Central or the Internet and take into account the data limit, or use a special version of Verizon. go90 and stream to your heart’s content.
Last month, we talked about how sponsored data allows carriers to choose which services count towards your data limit, and why it’s bad for the web . At the time, the concern was hypothetical: What if the carrier decided they wanted to create their own service that would enjoy a special mode while everyone else had to compete on a different playing field?
OK it’s all over Now. Thanks to the magic of limited data – and remember, Verizon no longer offers unlimited data plans – go90 now has an edge over the competition. Verizon uses its carrier status to promote its own products over other services using a gateway that it controls. More importantly, go90 shares some content with other services, which means that Verizon can distract customers from competing services solely because of this advantage. After all, why watch a video on a service that counts towards your limit when you have a free one?
So this is not an apocalypse or anything like that. Go90 won’t crash the internet or even Netflix. In fact, it’s unlikely that the go90 will become a powerful video device at all thanks to this promotion. But this is one of the clearest examples we’ve ever seen of how carriers can use your data-limited plans to pick winners and losers online, while manipulating your choice as a consumer. This is probably not good.
Verizon Go90 Upgrade Lets Postpaid Customers Stream Live Without Using Their Data | Droid Life