AN UPDATE: I mentioned in December that my cellular cassette would arrive in a week or so, along with the higher capacity battery. It is nearly February, and no cassette...or battery. They have been shipped, I have been told, though that was the information given in December also.
Additionally, a subscriber I know has been using the system since November and has not yet been billed for service. Inquiries to this subscriber's service provider resulted in the reply that there were no charges on the billing system; the subscriber, however, claims to have made calls totalling about $750 on the system. Hmmm....
Technically, the IRIDIUM system continues to improve, with call quality going from excellent to fantastic. Time delay, distortion and drops have virtually disappeared. It is exceedingly disappointing to me that such a beautiful system is being compromised by poor marketing and slow phone deliveries. If I were Ed Staiano, heads would be rolling, and if I were John Windolph I'd be giving away handsets personally to every major corporation with a need for such a system. For everyone else, I'd drop the handset price to $1500 and tell the service providers they had one week to deliver every phone shipped to them or be cut out of the action. In one month, IRIDIUM could make irrelevant every pro-Globalstar/anti-IRIDIUM argument, and be the system it should be.
But who am I to say...? Time will validate the argument above far more eloquently than words... |
