With yesterday’s report from the Globe and Mail that both Bell and Telus would start charging 15 cents for incoming SMS messages for customers who are not locked into an SMS plan and Roger’s announcement of a data plan for the new iphone that was widely seen as uncompetitive and unfair to consumers, I figured the future of mobile as a mass marketing medium would be still-born until new carriers enter the market next year.

All may not be lost

In reaction to all the negative press received over their original iphone plan, Rogers / Fido this morning announced a new data plan for the new 3G iphone to be released Friday of this week.  Here are some details:

Effective July 11, and as a limited time promotional offer for customers who activate until August 31, 2008 on a three year contract, a data-only offering of 6GB of data for $30 per month is being made available that can be added to any in-market voice plan. For example, with 6GB of data, iPhone 3G
users can visit 35,952 web pages, or send and receive 157,286 emails, or watch 6,292 minutes of YouTube videos each and every month.

You can read the full news release here.  Rogers has also indicated that they will not charge for incoming SMS messages either - making them appear far more pro-consumer than they did just a week ago.

Per my earlier post this week, I still wouldn’t rush to buy that new iphone. Rates and plans are bound to only get better from here.

The CWTA just released updated stats for March 2008:

1. 1.4 billion text / SMS messages were sent in March alone! This is up from 1.2 billion in December 2007.  We are definitely trending towards 20 billion for the year (that would be double 2007 numbers)
2. 42% of messages sent from unique individuals - up from 37% in September 2007. This is really significant because it means the same people aren’t just texting more… we are actually increasing adoption & usage as a whole.

With reasonable data plans finally becoming available in Canada (as low as $7 / month for unlimited on a non-PDA device), we should be expecting huge increases in the mobile web /mobile widgets this year as well.

Rogers is expected to go live shortly with a new data pricing structure that will offer unlimited data for just $20 a month under a new plan called the “communicate value pack” ….which is very similar to the ~20/ month plan offered by AT&T in the U.S. for those with an iphone.

Bell has been offering $7 unlimited data for months now - albeit on their slower 1x network.

This is good news for consumers in Canada looking for affordable packages….and certainly could be interpreted as a signal that the iphone will be coming to Canada this spring as speculated in this blog.