The last five days or so has seen a rush of discussion regarding “Project Black.” The guessing game for “Project Black” has taken the T-Mobile Internet with hopes from an iPhone launch to an unlimited plan that makes even Sprint jealous. However, this morning was also met by an editorial courtesy of Engadget that begs the question, is a $50 dollar all-you-can-use plan enough to boost T-Mobile USA’s fortunes? The short answer is no, courtesy of the Blogosphere who simply don’t believe that a $50 dollar all-you-can-use plan is enough to give T-Mobile a chance at passing Sprint and taking 3rd place in the US wireless game. Is that the endgame for T-Mobile, $50 dollars and that’s the last gamble before Deutsche Telekom comes a’knockin? First and foremost, we don’t believe that the rate plan is the entire “Project Black” undertaking. Aside from the one thing we know to be true, that the uniforms in the retail stores will be changing, everything else is unsubstantiated.
That’s not to say that the guessing game around the web is wrong or that the hopes of many will be shut down. Engadget isn’t wrong per se, I would just like to think that T-Mobile is smarter than simply launching a $50 plan and hope it carries them past the likes of Sprint. While a plan at that dollar value is certainly more in line with budget carriers like Metro, Cricket or Boost, T-Mobile can’t count on stealing their customers to launch past Sprint. More is required–more plans, more phones and my favorite factor: marketing. Verizon has an awesome marketing campaign; see this link if you don’t think they have a clever team. AT&T has awful marketing, more bars in more places simply makes me think of more “bars” in more places. As in a bar to help me cope with the dropped calls and shoddy network quality.
I don’t think any readers of this website want T-Mobile to stay in fourth place; the customer service is too good and the network is simply far better than some want to believe. T-Mobile once suffered a stigma regarding network quality, yet in recent years has improved the network a hundred times over. The stigma is all but removed, and yet even with award winning customer service, T-Mobile is far too often overlooked. A game changer is needed, there is no question about that. There is only one question right now: is “Project Black” game changing or wishful thinking? Time will tell and it won’t be to long now till we know for sure what’s coming. Trainings are happening soon and leaks are sure to happen, if not to us, to someone else who definitely won’t waste time posting it for the masses.
Whatever happens, we’re behind T-Mobile in achieving their wireless ambitions, we just hope that the T-Mobile powers that be understand what it’s going to take. I’m going to take this website out on a limb and say this $50 dollar plan isn’t correct, it’s not even close to what “Project Dark” is. We’re not saying a rate plan isn’t “Project Dark,” but we have it on good word that any speculation up to this point is wrong. How wrong we don’t know, but wrong. Am I saying this is another unsubstantial claim, yes, but I wouldn’t write it up if I didn’t have good reason to believe it. So you heard it here first, the rate plan claim isn’t “Project Dark,” it may not even exist. If we’re wrong, the $50 plan is awesome, if we’re right, something bigger is brewing. Something much bigger.