Yebo 4 Less

feo said:
roaming Billboards?

Agh Shame, Like Saule Has Just Mentioned To You, Just Turn Off Cell Broadcasting If You Don't Wanna Be "bombarded" (:rolleyes:) With Cb Messages.

Seems To Me That You Have A Personal Grudge With Vodacom Or Someone That Works There (maybe Even V3g) Because You Continually Find Any Excuse To Knock Them. Imo, If You're Not Gonna Offer Constructive Criticism, Please Just Stfu.
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Qft.
+ 1.
 
Skeptik said:
You seem to miss the logic. Should I turn off CB because it is being used to advertise. Is that what you are saying?? Let's just think about this for a minute and react like adults instead of rudeness like "STFU". I don't like the huge billboards near the airport so I should take another route. I don't like ads on TV, so I should turn it off or watch BBC in the UK where they don't have them. Try dissecting those analogies and see where the logic isn't working.

Oh, and just because I don't like an aspect of a particular network (and I'm vocal about all of them) it doesn't mean I "have a grudge" - though it might suit certain individuals to make such accusations instead of looking inward at what they are doing to get the criticism.
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Please point me in the direction of where you raised the same complaint again the similar service from MTN?:rolleyes:
 
Skeptik said:
You seem to miss the logic. Should I turn off CB because it is being used to advertise. Is that what you are saying?? Let's just think about this for a minute and react like adults instead of rudeness like "STFU". I don't like the huge billboards near the airport so I should take another route. I don't like ads on TV, so I should turn it off or watch BBC in the UK where they don't have them. Try dissecting those analogies and see where the logic isn't working.
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Pretty clear where the logic is not working.

Your analogies seems to point to you taking active action to avoid something you don't like, billboards, TV ads, etc.

Yet, when you have the option to avoid something you don't like on your Vodacom handset (cell broadcasts), even when you have the option to turn if off, you refuse? :confused:

So you rather *suffer* something you don't like. Why? So, you've got something to complain about?
 
Skeptik said:
I don't use MTN for voice. If you actually read my posts instead of blindly complaining about them you would know this already. In principle, I try not to make comments about things I am not familiar with.
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Really? Glad to hear that.

Skeptik said:
By turning off CB, I lose some functionality, not so? So you would rather I do something that will inconvenience me.
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Really, what functionality do you lose? How does turning off cell broadcast inconvenience you? Please enlighten us on this subject you obviously are familiar with (otherwise you would not comment, not so?).

Skeptik said:
I never complained about the concept of CB before, did I? In fact I find it useful to know which cell is in use in order to optimise reception - vital for use of the patchy Vodacom service.
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Glad to hear you find the *patchy* Vodacom coverage even better than MTN (since you don't use MTN for voice). ;)

Never thought we'd see the day Skeptik admits "Vodacom is the better connection" :rolleyes:
 
Skeptik said:
Unfortunately, I keep getting infractions for what I write in this thread with no proper reasons given either. It is therefore no longer a fair debate.

Considering the extreme one-sidedness, it just isn't worth contributing anymore so I apologise to anyone tracking this Vodacom issue. Feel free to take it up on your own and at your own risk.

Skeptik
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Won't you at least answer the question about what functionality you'll lose if you turn off cell broadcasts.

I've got a bunch of nervous engineers here desperately awaiting your answer.

Just post the technical bit here for all of us who don't understand it. You seem to be the only one who knows the functionality here and it's a bit worrisome that the Vodacom engineers overlooked such an elementary thing.

I would assume you DO have the facts and your post above is not an cop-out because you can't substantiate your statement? But I don't think so. You did, after all, say you only post about stuff you know about.
 
And thanks for keeping this tread at the top. Reminds me I want to find out if the cell broadcasts are now considered as advertising from ASA. :D
 
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supersunbird said:
We lose the fucntionality of seeing in what general area we are :p
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No, cell-id's were already replaced by Y4L info.

The question to Skeptik was what functionality he would lose by turning off CB on his handset. He complained that he has to suffer seeing the CB's as he would loose functionality turning them off.

So, we're all trying to figure out what he knows and we all missed.
 
vodacom3g said:
No, cell-id's were already replaced by Y4L info.

The question to Skeptik was what functionality he would lose by turning off CB on his handset. He complained that he has to suffer seeing the CB's as he would loose functionality turning them off.

So, we're all trying to figure out what he knows and we all missed.
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Spelling note: lose :D

I didn't know CB message offered any "functionality". :p
 
I have to side a little bit with Skeptic on this one.

If it wasn't for this forum, and thread, I'd not even know about this gunk, or how to turn it off, or even that I could turn it off.

Why should I have to take half an hour (if I'm lucky) out of my day calling 111, to LEARN how to turn something off on my phone, that wasn't there before and didn't annoy me before?

I use my phone to make and receive phone calls. I'd rather not it be an annoyance any more than that. If Cell Broadcasts could display something useful, rather than annoying to me as a longstanding contract customer I would welcome it. I think Vodacom's marketing budget is big enough for regular channels. Had a look at Loftus in a while?
 
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As for "CB" functionality, I know someone who's life was literally saved by the ability to identify the cell.
 
TheRoDent said:
I use my phone to make and receive phone calls. I'd rather not it be an annoyance any more than that. If Cell Broadcasts could display something useful, rather than annoying to me as a longstanding contract customer I would welcome it. I think Vodacom's marketing budget is big enough for regular channels. Had a look at Loftus in a while?
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Help me here:

How would you suggest the networks (VC / MTN) run a product with variable, time and area sensitive information that must be made available to the subscriber?

Or should they rather scrap the product altogether as a bad idea, if there is no other way to get the info to the sub at that point in time?

I.e. we rather just drop the whole discounted pre-paid product?

Maybe we can run a poll for both networks:

1) Do you want the discounted rates offered by Y4L or MTNZone?
2) Would you rather see the Cell-ID?

Unfortunately those are the only 2 choices available today.

Also, why do you think this is marketing? It obviously is not. At most you can see it as superfluous information meant for pre-paid subscribers that's delivered via CB. And thus your option to turn it off if it's not relevant to you.

BTW, we are working on seeing if we can get a second broadcast channel up for the Cell-ID. In the mean time, you can use a service like Look4Me to find your location by Cell-ID.
 
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Was there a similar uproar about this when MTN did the same thing?

I can see how the information is of no use to contract customers...but for people like me who are making use of this product, it is useful and necessary.

As an analog: When listening to the radio, traffic information from South JHB is of no use to me...but certain people out there need it. Just because something doesn't apply to everyone doesn't mean it has to be scrapped.
 
ic said:
Assuming that the info provided by "CB" is that which one sees when one has "Cell Info Display" enabled [Nokia handsets - not sure what it's called on other types of handsets], then I tend to agree that displaying the 2.xG base-station name must stay, it was also useful to get "3G & HSDPA enabled" as an indication that such a base-station exists.

As an alternative, there is also a Topic Index Reception thing on just about all Nokias [no idea about other types of handsets], years ago MTN used to provide weather etc info using that service, the advantage is that one can subscribe to and unsubscribe from multiple topics, i.e. ignore those that you're not interested in, and only explicitly opt-in for those you are interested in, perhaps this is how Vodacom's Y4L CB messages currently work - I suspect that Cell Info Display is a specific CB Topic number, but I could be way off track here.
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Not at all, they work in 'channels' and we could provide different info sets in different channels (and probably will do), but as always it's a question of what is supported by the various handsets.

While Cell-ID, weather info, etc. is something many would like to see, the whole underlying premise of Y4L (and MTNZone) is that the info MUST be available, so logically it'll get the channel most phones support.
 
The standard CB messages use channel 50. On my Motorola the function is called "Info Services" and you can select which channels you would like to subscribe to.
 
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