The changes in the phone industry have me excited. I've hade a serious distaste for phone, but they are starting to become things I can live with. For example, imagine having a local phone number attached to your cell phone for each of these countries and having the best international rates possible for every one of these countries and more.
Australia, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, China, Chile, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States
I've got my eye on a new pre-pay cell phone service called MaxRoam. They provide you with a sim card that you can slide into any unlocked cell phone. The SIM card can have up to 50 phone numbers (2 Euro/mo each) associated with it. You can make international calls at rates that are reasonable instead of highway robbery. In fact, one of their main goals in business is to be constantly be negotiating the lowest international rates that they can manage and they promise to pass them on to the customer as soon as they get them.
The implication for missionaries seems rather significant. Consider this quote from MaxRoam's Sean O Mahony on their blog:
So I don't get accused of anything untoward here. These are my assumptions: A US traveler with a mobile roaming into these countries and calling back to the US. The exchange rate I have used is .71 eurocents to the US dollar.
Bahamas
MAXroam: $0.41 per minute
T-Mobile: $2.99 per minute
AT&T: $2.29 per minuteGreece
MAXroam: $0.64 per minute
T-Mobile: $1.49 per minute
AT&T: $1.29 per minute...
There are so many ways that this will be disruptive to the cell phone industry. Just having a competitor with such low rates should help drop the rates elsewhere significantly, but forget the international stuff. They are also actually paying attention to their customers! When was the last time your cell company did that? It's been awhile for me. They are giving their customers flexibility that hasn't been imagined by many. If you travel much, it may be worth checking this out.
