Smart Phone

I don’t have a smart phone but I have a smart phone.

This is our phone:It’s just a phone. No camera. No web.  No email. No video. Just a phone.

It’s pay as you go and given our usage it’s about $10 a month. And the phone itself was $20. So to operate this phone for 1 year it costs about $140.

Don’t get me wrong–my wife and would love to each have an iPhone. Most of my wife’s friends have iPhones so every now and then something like this happens:

Wife shows up for an activity with 3 kids in tow. None of her friends are present. Calls one of her friends who’s supposed to be there. No answer. Goes home. Checks e-mail. Sees e-mail from a couple of hours ago.

Simulated e-mail: Hey everyone – we’re going to move the activity from Joan’s house to Jenny’s house because she’s got the pool and it’s going to be really hot today. See ya there!

Sent from my iPhone

It does amaze me that such a majority of people I see have some kind of a smart phone. I was curious how this would fit into a monthly budget so I did a little research (focus on the word “little” – this is not comprehensive). Here’s a scenario if you bought the iPhone 4 from AT&T as a new customer. I tried to pick some of the basic options to see a monthly cost

• 16GB iPhone 4 (Black or White): $199
• Data Plan: PlanDataPlus is a $15-per-month plan that allows you to access 200MB of data
• Voice Plan: $39.99 per month: 450 voice minutes
• Text Plan: $5 per month: 200 messages (sent or received); 10 cents for each additional message
• $15 + $40 + $5 = $60 plus some taxes and fees it’s probably $75 / month.

So while I may have a “dumb phone” and am frustrated by it’s lack of features and, to be honest, slightly embarrassed at it’s ridiculousness given that it’s 2011, it’s $120 a year compared to $900 for a smart phone (7.5x more expensive) not including cost of the phone.

I’d say that I have a smart phone after all.