AT&T Capping Household DSL Bandwidth Starting May 2nd.

Bad news for “unlimited” data users, AT&T is killing off “unlimited”…again. This time, it’s hitting your household instead of your cellphone. According to reports from DSLReports and confirmation with AT&T PR guy, Seth Bloom, “unlimited” is a thing of the past. Starting May 2nd, your typical non-U-Verse package will have a 150GB data cap. U-Verse customers will have a bit loftier ceiling at 250GB. Overages will set you back $10 per extra 50GB of data. In a small act of good will, AT&T will email customers when they’ve hit 65%, 90%, and 100% of their allotted bandwidth.

AT&T maintains that a paltry 2% of customers (whom consume 20% of the company’s bandwidth) will be affected. That leaves 98% of us to go on with business as usual. However, we can’t but help but feel screwed by AT&T yet again. Comcast has a similar cap set around 250GB for all users regardless of package they subscribe to. With all media providers, ISPs, and every company in between talking up social networking, photo sharing, video uploads, and online gaming, 150GB is going to become less and less generous with each passing year. (Read: today’s heavy user is tomorrow’s standard user.) The most popular online service that could easily bump up against that cap that we can think of off hand — Netflix. AT&T should have led in this regard instead of merely following — half-assed we might add. But that’s business (and AT&T) for you.

We’d like to reach out to AT&T to provide us with some actual data proving to us that the killing of unlimited data is actually justified and that rising bandwidth usage is indeed a problem. It’s only fair, right? AT&T, we’re waiting…

HTC Incredible 2 Shows Its Face.

Say hello to the HTC Incredible 2 slated to hit Verizon sometime in April. The picture above comes by way of AndroidSPINN, and shows the updated Incredible running Android 2.3 (with Sense UI) atop some pretty speedy hardware:

• 1Ghz Qualcomm MSM 8655 processor

• 4.0” Super LCD WVGA

• 8MP camera w/ flash

• 4GB internal storage

• 768mb of RAM

Not to top of the line, but certainly worth a look wouldn’t you say? AndroidSPINN has more pics to wet your whistle if you so choose…

Via: AndroidSPINN

[Update] Twitter: “Please Stop Making Third-Party Apps”.

In a bizarre move yesterday, Twitter instructed third party developers via their official developer email list to stop developing stand alone Twitter applications. Usually, a service such as Twitter would be doing the exact opposite. What’s the deal? Twitter wants a more consistant user experience. According to Twitter’s Ryan Sarver, consumers are still confused between the various Twitter apps and how those Twitter apps present the core Twitter functions.

We can see both sides of the argument — how are new and innovative designs, features, and services supposed to develop if they are being artificially restricted? At the same time, how can Twitter grow their brand if it is becoming increasingly striated?

Currently, this request only affects potential 3rd party apps in development. No mention is made of already released apps receiving updates. However, enforcing such a mandate on already released apps seems downright ridiculous. We’ll see how this evolves in the coming weeks and months…

Update

After going through various iOS and Android Twitter apps, I find myself slightly miffed at Twitter’s stance here. They’re telling third party devs that they can do their own service better, and to let them handle the core app — at the same time they say Twitter app developers can further refine their apps to match Twitter’s own app. Excuse me Twitter, there are numerous Twitter apps better than your own. If anyone needs catching up to do, it’s you. Hello, multiple account support on Android…anytime soon…?

iPad 2 Processor Clocks In At 900MHz.

The iPad 2 was long rumored to have a dual-core ARM processor humming along at 1GHz. But alas, the truth has come out and it’s not quite so true. The iPad 2′s dual-core ARM processor is actually clocked at 900MHz per core, this according to Anandtech. Is 100MHz going to make a huge difference? Hardly. Apple likely had battery life in mind when it reigned in speeds slightly. How are all the new iPad 2 owners enjoying their new tablet beauty tonight?

HTC Thunderbolt Coming March 21st?

Our friends over at Erictric may have stumbled onto something quite interesting — a release date for the much hyped and sought after HTC Thunderbolt, LTE equipped Android phone. The tipster pre-ordered an HTC Thunderbolt through his local Palm Beach Gardens, Florida Best Buy store. Said tipster claims to have had just received a phone call from the Best Buy manager regarding his pre-order, stating that he could pick it up Monday, March 21st in store. Furthermore, the Best Buy manager also re-iterated that Verizon’s LTE plans will cost the same as their current 3G plans.

We’ve heard both ways concerning Verizon’s LTE data plans being more expensive/the same as their current plans. So this could very well be true. As for the actual release date — we’ll have to wait and see. For now, we’ll have to take the Best Buy manager’s word with a grain of salt, regardless of how confident he is. Either way, we want one sooner rather than later.

Live To Die Another Day: Revamped Symbian UI Revealed.

Even though Nokia is dead set on putting Symbian out to pasture and move on with their new WP7 beauty, scores of Symbian users not yet sold on WP7 or unable/unwilling to upgrade means Nokia will still have to support them too. And Nokia’s Benelux product manager, Marc Driessen, has some new and exciting news for that very crowd pertaining to Symbian S^3/4 — a revamped UI.

S^4 was shelved several months back, but the refreshed UI has been ported down to S^3. As far as looks go, it’s still very 2004ish, but honestly it is much better than the current paint Symbian users make do with. Overall, new icons, widgets, pull down notification shades, and plenty of other small tweaks are baked into this new update.

As of now, Nokia hasn’t and won’t provide specifics as to when we’ll see this revamped S^x released or what devices will receive said update. Nokia users, it is what you’ve hoped and dreamed for, or are you focused on the future with WP7?

RIM Designs The PlayBook To Fail. Employs DRM-Saturated, 7Digital As PlayBook’s Music Store.

The BlackBerry PlayBook is one of the most hyped up tablets of 2011 due in part to the brand new QNX operating system. But that and all the power in the world can’t save it from the worst crutch — DRM. RIM has employed 7Digital as the PlayBook’s sole online music store. Mind you, 7Digital is chock full of DRM-laden music limited to a certain number (5) of devices with further restrictions such as the inability to use said “purchased” content as ringtones and/or notification alerts. Adding insult to injury, you are only allowed to download your “purchased” content a set number of times and 7 Digital can even change the terms of the contract (and further limit the number devices/downloads you can make use of) as they see fit.

With two of the market leaders — Amazon and Apple — already years ahead of RIM when it comes to catalog size as well as pro-consumer policies in regards to music content, it’s highly disappointing to see RIM start the PlayBook off on such a bad footing out of the gate and not make use of their competitors previous follies. Hopefully RIM can work their magic and re-write the offending licenses and deals neutering their PlayBook music store or flat out find a new partner to deliver the goods. As it stands now, 7Digital is a shackle to an otherwise seemingly great tablet.