I have  been trying to escape Verizon Wireless since I made the mistake to sign up for 2 years with them. I have tried everything but the cost of leaving them is greater than the cost of staying with them. They want $175 after 1.5 years for a phone that I want to give them back as cannot be more than $50. Now Verizon Wireless believes that they have something to compete with the iPhone, you can see the pictures and reviews below, is not even close to the iPhone. Also they have technology based with CDMA something that cannot compete with 3G like AT&T.

http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/cellphones/verizons-lg-vx10000-voyager-revealed-and-groped-with-gallery-306428.php

Verizon is going to launch the phones before Xmas to compete with the iPhone, craziness that Apple is foreseen an iPhone Xmas for everybody. I don't think that VW can compete with Apple with the LG VX 10000. Call me crazy, but most of the Verizon Wireless customers are looking forward to their contract ends to move to another carrier with GSM and 3G, cell phones now are more important than ever in the Enterprise world, you are looking for something to travel with and with email and Internet, if anybody ever used a Blackberry from Verizon you know the reason you are not with them anymore. In the same token, service companies should provide service fast and without wasting anytime to the consumer. In my particular case, I have been also fighting with Verizon Wireless for one year trying to make a feature like sending pictures from my phone getting to work. Many 30 minute phone calls to customer support without any success.

Then the increase of price from Verizon Wireless for their text message that does not travel international or even to another carrier for 15 cents instead of 10 cents. They did never send me a notice about this, as I am paperless, and I did not accept the new contract, however I cannot get rid of that contract, so now  I am paying 15 cents for text messages that may not arrived to you.

So, lets make it clear, when you got such a big company based in old technology, bad customer supports and worse yet technical support, coming out with an LG phone that is not even close what the competitor has, that's not a hope for the company. Company shares will been dropping, this Xmas will see the biggest drop of that company. Interesting enough the Verizon company is doing great on FIOS and releasing news about having an iPhone killer never hurts.

I really hope that Verizon will improve service as I am stuck with them, I got still a few options to explore, as many people paid the ridiculous $175 and they are now in a class A lawsuit against Verizon Wirless. Again, that should not be ever an option for a consumer.

If you are a Verizon Wireless customer with a contract and you want an iPhone you won't be able to use it with Verizon Wireless, so this is how you can get out of the contract if you are "lucky", just remember, keep pushing them: http://consumerist.com/consumer/cancellations/break-your-verizon-contract-without-fee-thanks-to-txt-msg-raise-228495.php In any case, they only gave 60 days from March 2007 to get out of the contract, for what other consumers wrote on the consumerist website, they made it very difficult and not many got a successful result. Now I would like to hear if somebody else was successful trying to get out, and if you are a VW user; did you received their notice back in February?

For the people looking for unlocking the iPhone those are the links I promised, however more are coming out everyday, so just search the words unlocking iPhone will give you better results than me.

http://www.unlockiphone.info/ blog just about unlocking the iPhone

Can you accidentally unlock the iPhone? http://www.theiphoneblog.com/2007/07/01/iphone-unlocked-accidently/

Unlocking for version 1.1.1 http://www.iphonesimfree.com/cgi-bin/iphonesimfree/engine.pl?page=home

And great review of the iPhone here: http://simpable.com/technology/iphone-vs-blackberry/

Cheers

Al