The truth about mobile data prices in South Africa

[supersunbird]

@rpm

I am not trying to step on your toes or get into a heated fight.But quite evident from users posting in this thread the article is a bit of a booboo, which has me annoyed and frustrated and questions my sanity.

Will say this if one person has an apple and the other an orange, how do you do a fair comparison between the two, not saying you can't compare them, I am saying they have equal and common characteristics which can be compared like for like, to get fair summary you can only compare characteristics they both have in common or else what is the point of trying to compare them.

Users are idiots, the only booboos are their illogical feelings.

Well, they are comparing oranges in SA to oranges elsewhere in Africa in this article. That's what the main focus is. And article is also saying, if you are not happy to pay the prices for these quality Woolies oranges, go buy oranges at Shoprite, or apples at PnP.

 

[supersunbird]

Well then we should throw fixed data into the mix as well, it is still mobile data technology, with restrictions in place.What about wireless providers their technology is also based on similar tech.Who else has a network like rain.

Only conclusion I have is compare mobile operators to mobile operators and rain like operators to rain like operators.As there is distinct differences between rain and a actual mobile operator.

Rain has no fallback no voice and only offers data.
Mobile operator, offers, voice, data, text, and has fallback technologies.

It is two entirely different services, the deployment and usage of the network is entirely different to a conventional network.

There are 55 odd countries in Africa if all 55 has 4G it is a fair comparison, if a vast majority has 4g it is still a fair comparison. One country has a rain like network to what network do you compare that to.

It is not a fair comparison, not in the slightest.

Then forget about rain and focus on Telkom vs MTN vs Cell C vs Vodacom. Which is YOUR main cellular data provider and why?

 

[supersunbird]

Please explain how "over-subscription " means my one sim runs at 1.5Mbps and my other sim runs at 20Mbps.

Then rain dun goofed and are incompetent (if you are using said SIMs in same device in exact same location in exact same orientation).

 

[wizardofid]

Users are idiots, the only booboos are their illogical feelings.

Well, they are comparing oranges in SA to oranges elsewhere in Africa in this article. That's what the main focus is. And article is also saying, if you are not happy to pay the prices for these quality Woolies oranges, go buy oranges at Shoprite, or apples at PnP.

And you missed the point.... My argument isn't where you buy them, the argument is whether or not rain should be used as a example and classed the same as traditional mobile operators. Which I don't agree with, which I believe is the case here. Pricing whether or not it is cheaper is irrelevant to my point, nor do I care about.

Just want admittance that trying to compare rain to rain is stupid, and not a indication of cheaper pricing.Rest of Africa has standard mobile operations and that is what should have been focused on.

Rain has as of October 2019 a 100k subscribers out of the 55 million odd people here compared to the 95million combined subscribers of traditional mobile subscribers. For every 550 people you have ONE rain subscriber.

For every 950 mobile subscribers you have ONE rain subscriber. The number of active subscribers out number the amount of people in south Africa. Considering rain has made it crystal clear they will NEVER expand outside of metropolitan areas, in what universe is comparing and justifying rain as proof of cheap data a valid and fair comparison.

There is nothing to compare rain to, so why for all that is holy compare it to traditional networks. ?

 

[supersunbird]

And you missed the point.... My argument isn't where you buy them, the argument is whether or not rain should be used as a example and classed the same as traditional mobile operators. Which I don't agree with, which I believe is the case here. Pricing whether or not it is cheaper is irrelevant to my point, nor do I care about.

Just want admittance that trying to compare rain to rain is stupid, and not a indication of cheaper pricing.Rest of Africa has standard mobile operations and that is what should have been focused on.

Rain has as of October 2019 a 100k subscribers out of the 55 million odd people here compared to the 95million combined subscribers of traditional mobile subscribers. For every 550 people you have ONE rain subscriber.

For every 950 mobile subscribers you have ONE rain subscriber. The number of active subscribers out number the amount of people in south Africa. Considering rain has made it crystal clear they will NEVER expand outside of metropolitan areas, in what universe is comparing and justifying rain as proof of cheap data a valid and fair comparison.

There is nothing to compare rain to, so why for all that is holy compare it to traditional networks. ?

Because people go on about how "data is unaffordable" and rain does data.

 

[wizardofid]

Because people go on about how "data is unaffordable" and rain does data.

How many subscribers can you fit on their network before it would go tits up, there is 34 million people in urban areas.With 30 million south Africans below the poverty line (less then 992 rand a month), (18 million having no food security) whether rain or mobile operator, data is unaffordable to more then half of south Africans.I haven't even compared pricing to other countries which are even worse off.

Looking at data pricing in just the south African market, pricing versus disposable income, data is unaffordable.

 

[Swa]

And you missed the point.... My argument isn't where you buy them, the argument is whether or not rain should be used as a example and classed the same as traditional mobile operators. Which I don't agree with, which I believe is the case here. Pricing whether or not it is cheaper is irrelevant to my point, nor do I care about.

Just want admittance that trying to compare rain to rain is stupid, and not a indication of cheaper pricing.Rest of Africa has standard mobile operations and that is what should have been focused on.

Rain has as of October 2019 a 100k subscribers out of the 55 million odd people here compared to the 95million combined subscribers of traditional mobile subscribers. For every 550 people you have ONE rain subscriber.

For every 950 mobile subscribers you have ONE rain subscriber. The number of active subscribers out number the amount of people in south Africa. Considering rain has made it crystal clear they will NEVER expand outside of metropolitan areas, in what universe is comparing and justifying rain as proof of cheap data a valid and fair comparison.

There is nothing to compare rain to, so why for all that is holy compare it to traditional networks. ?

I don't care if it's classed as a full fledged mobile operator. That's the term we are looking for and not real or not real mobile operator. They have data which is the point of the article.

My issue is that just because Vodacom has bigger network investment does not mean that justifies the higher price. They also have 500 times more subscribers so it makes up for it already. But these articles never take that into account even though it's mentioned in every single thread they should. It's all keep on repeating ad nauseam that Vodacom and MTN has bigger network expenditure which I see as a bogus justification.

What the articles should really focus on is Vodacom and MTN's capex per subscriber vs that of Rain, Telkom and Cell C (past). Also if their service is that much better to justify charging 10x as much as their competitors. I don't think it is.

PS: Also this is not a metro area and Rain has coverage. They're just in the early stages so it's not a viable option where you can claim people have the choice.

 

[SNLV30]

Why would anyone pay R80/Gb for 7days on vodacom if you could get it for R19

 

[Ahmed Mahomed Paruk]

We are starting to see big data bundles, at almost fair prices, but the smaller the bundles become tbe bigger one you get torn, by our esteemed Service Providers.

The discrepancy, between both ends is exorbitant in the extreme. Abusively so in my opinion, but hell, what do I know.

Funny how they closed discus comments and opened comments on mybb forum on such a hot topic, like they shoving their opinion down our throats, aka fox news etc