Prepaid Culture
We all know that going prepaid is a very Filipino way to do things. Internet access. Cellular phone load credits. NDD and IDD calls. Online gaming. It's a micro-marketing strategy that works not just for the consumers who are counting their pesos and cents, but also benefits the vendors. Call it the mini-size me equivalent of the ICT sector.
If you look at it, going prepaid seems to work in a service-oriented setting of the tech & society variety. Microsoft wants to take it one step further with its Pay-As-You-Go Personal Computing. The tech giant has joined hands (and to a certain extent, purses) with Chinese PC maker Lenovo (IBM, baby) to make - drum roll - PC-ownership more of a reality for people with "variable or unpredictable income".
How does it work? Microsoft claims in its PressPass page for the Pay-As-You-Go venture that with its Microsoft FlexGo technology, hardware, software and service solutions have been 'aligned' "to work in unison to meter and add time to the PC, so retailers, telecommunications providers, banks and OEMs can offer PCs to a broader community of customers ... The technology informs users of time used, showing them how to add more hours by simply typing in a number from a prepaid card. If time is not added, the PC gradually moves into a “reserve tank” or limited-access state until customers purchase more time either online or at local vendors. The PC is owned outright after a set number of hours are purchased."
Sounds interesting, but it's not as easy as it sounds. The customer has to cough up half of the purchase price before he/she/it can take home the PC and go prepaid. Oh, well. Come to think of it, Pay-As-You-Go in the FlexGo sense combines the prepaid way with the traditional method of purchasing on installment.
Microsoft has expressly said in its website's PR pages that market trials have been conducted in Brazil. The next round of pay-asy-you-go and subscription trials will take place in Mexico, China, Hungary, India, Russia, Slovenia and Vietnam.
The Philippines is not on the map. At least, not for the next round. Darn. But maybe the computer giants are concerned with the piracy issue, or they think that we're such a security risk. After all, what's to stop people from plonking half the price in cash, then instead of buying the prepaid cards, re-arranging, if not cannibalizing the specs of the PC? But then, who says it's only in the pearl of the orient that such things happen?
I really wish they'd try out Pay-As-You-Go here. Who knows? It may actually work.
If you look at it, going prepaid seems to work in a service-oriented setting of the tech & society variety. Microsoft wants to take it one step further with its Pay-As-You-Go Personal Computing. The tech giant has joined hands (and to a certain extent, purses) with Chinese PC maker Lenovo (IBM, baby) to make - drum roll - PC-ownership more of a reality for people with "variable or unpredictable income".
How does it work? Microsoft claims in its PressPass page for the Pay-As-You-Go venture that with its Microsoft FlexGo technology, hardware, software and service solutions have been 'aligned' "to work in unison to meter and add time to the PC, so retailers, telecommunications providers, banks and OEMs can offer PCs to a broader community of customers ... The technology informs users of time used, showing them how to add more hours by simply typing in a number from a prepaid card. If time is not added, the PC gradually moves into a “reserve tank” or limited-access state until customers purchase more time either online or at local vendors. The PC is owned outright after a set number of hours are purchased."
Sounds interesting, but it's not as easy as it sounds. The customer has to cough up half of the purchase price before he/she/it can take home the PC and go prepaid. Oh, well. Come to think of it, Pay-As-You-Go in the FlexGo sense combines the prepaid way with the traditional method of purchasing on installment.
Microsoft has expressly said in its website's PR pages that market trials have been conducted in Brazil. The next round of pay-asy-you-go and subscription trials will take place in Mexico, China, Hungary, India, Russia, Slovenia and Vietnam.
The Philippines is not on the map. At least, not for the next round. Darn. But maybe the computer giants are concerned with the piracy issue, or they think that we're such a security risk. After all, what's to stop people from plonking half the price in cash, then instead of buying the prepaid cards, re-arranging, if not cannibalizing the specs of the PC? But then, who says it's only in the pearl of the orient that such things happen?
I really wish they'd try out Pay-As-You-Go here. Who knows? It may actually work.
posted by
Ienni | 5/24/2006 02:05:00 am
4 Comments:
piracy....? at kasama ang china and india? hehehehe. mas malaki lang siguro ang market dun.
t0ni: That, too. O lalo na dahil doon? Microsoft isn't poor by any stretch, and isn't likely to go under from software piracy in the Philippines alone.
By the way, that little tidbit you dropped about net access is true, and I'm crying inside.
shet sobrang nakakainis yun noh? is that really going to be implemented? di ba ang stupid?
t0ni: Yes, it is going to be implemented, asinine decision that it is. Here's the rub. According to my source, there was a memo circulated in late March addressed to the dorm heads ordering them to cease & desist from running internet and the water dispensers. The councils of the dorms who wrote either to protest the unilaterally-issued C&D or to as for extension of time were told, you don't have personality to question it because you aren't recognized by UP. Isn't that BS? What's next to go? The wing TVs and the refs? All installed, by the way, with the dorm manager's permission. The 'issuing authority' (allegedly) considers internet connection as a business or like a business, never mind that the dormers are the ones who are paying for the fees and all the associated hardware, and never mind that there's no profit accruing from it. It makes me wonder if it's a case of "what you want, you have to let someone bid for"? It's a f--cked up, authoritarian and plainly mercenary manner of doing things. By the way, rumor has it that per computation of a certain entity in the university, computers should be assessed for P2000+/sem for power usage on a formula: commercial rate for the PC x 10 hrs x no. of days. If true, isn't that so assuming? Assuming na a student uses the computer for 10 hours a day, every day na walang puknat. Such a being hasn't got a life, unless mandatory sa course niya to make out with a PC. What about class? What about eating, sleeping, jogging, reading, out-of-class studying? Sorry, I got carried away, ang haba na nitong comment.
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