The Japanese and American cell phone markets are opposite like lamb and tuna fish. That was one of the first things that I noticed when I spent a few weeks there two summers ago. I’ve always had a less than optimal view of our cell phone market’s infrastructure where the best network gets the ugliest phones and the worse network gets all of the good looking phones but without the reception. That’s why when I went to Japan and saw that multiple companies had summer cell phone lines coming out like seasonal clothing lines, I was taken aback.
I was used to a network here where my phone’s novelty wears off within the hour that I get it, and then I’m trapped in a contract for far too long with expensive escape fees. In Japan though, I could customize my plan (daytime only service or TV reception for example) with a good looking phone and solid service even underground in subway stations, according to Japanese cell phone customers.
If the cell phone world is so perfect in Japan, why is it so fundamentally flawed here in the States? Why is it so rigid, straight forward and uncompromising? Why as consumers haven’t we demanded the flexibility that the Japanese cell phone industry exudes?