My apologies for the extended server outage on January 11th!
We now continue with the previously scheduled extended rant.

F the Magic. My previous post details the beginning of what is turning into a minor saga now.

I gave up twice. While Android will continue to advance and hopefully do glorious things, I’m unlikely to see that happen on Rogers. Since the phone is mostly a gift from my parents — they got pretty fed up with the fact that my present phone is very picky about when it felt like being a phone by actually ringing/vibrating when people called — they expressed their strong concern that I was going to run into the same brick wall with the HTC Magic that I already hit with the HTC Dream. “Ok, so let’s say Rogers actually comes through with their promise, this time, and you do get the Magic on 2.1 sometime around your birthday*. Then what? How far ahead will the Android OS be and how much more cool stuff will you be locked out of? Yes, we know you can root your phone and probably get around this but it’d be nice to keep this one intact and unmodified.” They strongly suspect that my jailbroken launch US iPhone with a disabled data plan (so I could rely solely on wifi and save on fees) doesn’t work anymore because of the modifications I made. They feel that the fact that Dream worked the instant it was supposed to further supports this assertion. The fact that this model came out in the middle of 2007 and had an owner before me and both of us pushed it as far as it would go was inconsequential :)

It was lovely, for that one week, to have a phone with a data plan and a keyboard and it was pretty. It was surprisingly heavy for its size but, hey, I don’t keep it in my pocket anyway and I was more than willing to ignore that in exchange for e-mail and video. Yes, video. With Darren showing off his phone at every opportunity I was very excited to be able to videoblog with ease. Now Rogers has decided through throw more roadblocks in my way. They are claiming that unless my Dream gets back to them and processed before the end of my 15 days (which somehow included stat. holidays) then I’ll be outside of the window. They also note that the fact I cancelled on the weekend has no effect on the policy. HahaNO. It WILL get there tomorrow and I’ll be able to prove it with a tracking number, but I have absolutely no way of knowing how (purposefully?) slow their processing procedure is. It is likely wrong to assume malice on their part but there has been only a single person we’ve dealt with that has been willing to help as opposed to “There’s nothing I can do. Call back later.” This will get fought tooth and nail since I know I have done nothing wrong and followed their policies to the letter.

The absolute worst part of this is that they get my money at the end of the day.
And I still need a phone.

The Nexus One is way outta my price range but seems to solve all my problems and meet my goals. Updates will come straight from Google, no meddling by any forces in the middle. Rogers will only get paid for signals used. I’m sure it will be awesome but there’s no timeline on when we can officially get them in Canada. I’m seriously not sure I can afford that anyway. I’ve never ever spend that kind of money on something I couldn’t drive or play games on before. Fine, the Nexus can play games but it’s still not the same as a PS3. It does more *rimshot*.

Argh! Why does this have to be so hard?! My other option, which will still cost me a bundle unless I tie in for another few years — which I supposedly might have done already even though I’m giving back the damn phone — is to get one of the 3GS iPhones. I have no idea what to do. I’d leave Rogers entirely but I dislike Bell more and Telus is meh. I’m more than happy to check out other options. If Wind ends up not sucking and getting the phone, I might have to consider it. Here’s an article that talks about why Wind is the only one up in my neck of the words that could offer the Nexus One. Should I stick with Rogers my best alternative would be a 3GS iPhone. Which will still cost me a bundle. There is the LG Eve but I refuse to deal with the inevitable slow-to-not-happening updates. At least Apple can push Rogers around on that front, even if we have to pay for updates in the future.

To have Rogers people tell me on the phone that my Dream works fine, as a phone, and the updates are unnecessary completely misses the point of the phone in the first place. Of course the phone works as a phone. However, not a single person bought this phone just to send and receive calls. We bought the feature set which included, minimum, the 1.6 feature update that we were promised at the time of purchase. I am stunned at the resistance to returning a phone when, at the beginning, I was super eager to merely swap it for another. Their attitude towards me on the phone is condescending as they treat me, and my mother, as though we are the uninformed ones. I certainly do not expect every tech to know every little detail about all these new and very technical phones. I do expect to be treated as a customer and not an adversary and to cede that maybe, just maybe, I have a point. One fact that continues to echo in my head is how all my beefs are actually irrelevant. I’m under the 30 minutes of airtime used and within the 15 days even with the stat. holidays counted. That’s all I need to return the phone, as per their own policies! I wish I had the paper here beside me right now so that I could scan it and show how clearly these details were laid out. When I first called the number listed on the sheet to kick off the return process they didn’t even know what I was talking about and bounced the call around repeatedly, as if no one had ever asked for a swap before.

… How am I even talking about this?!! I could finally replace my grinding 360 with this kind of cash. I could afford to travel and visit my friends in my beloved Maritimes! I could build a set! Buy an HD camera and lights! Thoughts are welcome. I’m just so frustrated that now concern about the shipment of a phone back to Rogers has to be tops on my mind. Maybe I should find some cheap little phone that just, you know, just phones and and txts. Gah.

*July 31st, for those keeping track. Rogers has not put a date on the Magic upgrade outside of ‘mid-year’. Also known as ‘Christmas’ ;)