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211 Comments
- kevbryant, on 10/12/2007, -18/+598any company that would intentionally allow a customer to spend more than they can afford to deserves a strong kick in the nuts. the kind that makes your stomach turn.
- Anth741, on 10/12/2007, -9/+351I'm aware that this has nothing to do with the parent, I just wanted to put it on top.Some people are asking where they can download it.
http://s94141699.onlinehome.us/verizon_minutes_used-0.83-fx.xpi
That's from the article.
there are also links to T-Mobile and cingular versions extension.
Please Digg me up if it helped so the links don't get modded down for being irrelevant to parent. - niwnfyc, on 10/12/2007, -11/+190THERE WAS A BUG IN AN EARLIER VERSION OF THE EXTENSION THAT CAUSED EXCESSIVE PINGING TO VERIZON'S SERVERS. VERIZON INFORMED MOZILLA, WHICH IS WHY THE EXTENSION IS NOT ONLINE ANYMORE!!! THE BUG HAS SINCE BEEN FIXED AND THERE IS NO EVIDENCE THAT VERIZON IS UPSET ANYMORE. STOP DIGGING THIS STORY!!!!
From the comments section of TFA:
" an older version of the extension (0.4) had a bug that may cause excessive pinging of the verizon web site if you didn't put in your correct password. verizon complained to Mozilla. The bug was fixed long time ago. i am still waiting for response from Mozilla." - radu79, on 10/12/2007, -12/+169Welcome in the brave new world of Capitalism :)
It's one thing for Verizon, or any other cellphone company to expect and desire that the customers do not notice they spent their free minutes, but it's totally different when they complain about an application which allows the customer to track their minutes. It's disgusting and revolting.
On the other hand, I couldn't find any info from that link about Verizon bitching to Mozilla. Did I miss something? - dirtyfratboy, on 10/12/2007, -6/+136Not a good idea to force the extension to go underground... Companies just don't understand that trying to shut good things down only brings a larger crowd *cough* Pirate Bay *cough*. I didn't know about this extension until today, and I'm guessing that I'm not alone.
- rderveloy, on 10/12/2007, -10/+85Ahh, yet another example of Verizon's great customer service!
- sahaskatta, on 10/12/2007, -5/+77you can also check your minutes usage on any verizon phone by dialing #min and within a few seconds a FREE text message will be sent to your phone with details on you usage.
P.S. #data for text message useage and #bal for balance. All are FREE! - ViperDaimao, on 10/12/2007, -7/+55This is inacurate and false. You're all bein duped by the submitter.
From the comments section of the linked article:
Winston Huang [the extension author -ed.] said...
" an older version of the extension (0.4) had a bug that may cause excessive pinging of the verizon web site if you didn't put in your correct password. verizon complained to Mozilla. The bug was fixed long time ago. i am still waiting for response from Mozilla." - Contrarian, on 10/12/2007, -5/+47I want to add that Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile, Cingular make a ton of money off customers who exceed their minutes.
This Firefox extension is great as it sits in the status bar like that ForecastFox weather extension and just lets you know how many minutes are used without taking up any screen space on your browser.
I like that idea of pre-warning users that have, for example, only 60 minutes left on their monthly allotted minutes with say a yellow color. Or for that matter reversing the number and have uses enter their total peak minutes and just have it subtract thus giving minutes left.
Lots of potential for this extension. - jmdajr, on 10/12/2007, -5/+42thanks for the link! I will never go over now!
- jeruvin, on 10/12/2007, -8/+35You know they don't want you to know. My damn cell phone does tons of crap I don't really need it to do. I'd really like it to just display easily how many minutes I've used and have remaining. They make money screwing customers who lose track of how many minutes are remaining on thier plan.
It's all about the money.
***** them ALL! - Darmichar, on 10/12/2007, -1/+25Sprint PCS is easy to keep track of.
Just dial *4 on your phone, and it will give you a complete rundown of your account/minutes used. - CharlesDarwin, on 10/12/2007, -0/+18I dugg this story just because I didn't know about this extension!
- silenceHR, on 10/12/2007, -4/+21this needs as many diggs as possible.... this is great tool (no, I dont use Verizon) and if i needed it it would be in my top 10 FF extensions
- rstarr, on 10/12/2007, -2/+16T-Mobile dial "#646#" to check minutes
- tombomb, on 10/12/2007, -3/+16Ya know, the first thing that arrived in my mind when i sae this was: Verizon is a dick.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+13For Cingular it's *646#
- xLiKx, on 10/12/2007, -11/+21verizon, cry me a river
- tcammack, on 10/12/2007, -1/+11Im a Verizon customer in Kansas City. I love the service, but STOP CRIPPLING MY PHONES!!! I PAID for it, i should be able to make the choice to buy your songs or backgrounds if I choose. Also, I wish they would stop disabling the bluetooth so that it only works with certain verizon accessories!
- ViperDaimao, on 10/12/2007, -4/+13Yes it's very possible steve. In fact that's exactly what it is.
From the comments section of the linked article:
Winston Huang [the extension author -ed.] said...
" an older version of the extension (0.4) had a bug that may cause excessive pinging of the verizon web site if you didn't put in your correct password. verizon complained to Mozilla. The bug was fixed long time ago. i am still waiting for response from Mozilla."
The submitter is a liar and fooling you all. - Bara, on 10/12/2007, -3/+12Really interesting... I wonder if something like this exists for T-mobile...
Either way, this will turn out to be some bad publicity for Verizon if it makes it to the frontpage, and they deserve it, so everybody Digg! - corduroy, on 10/12/2007, -2/+10And if a person is using a T-Mobile prepaid plan, it's #999#
- semiautomata, on 10/12/2007, -2/+10The write-up is disingenuous to the point of falsehood. From the comments section of the linked article:
Winston Huang [the extension author -ed.] said...
" an older version of the extension (0.4) had a bug that may cause excessive pinging of the verizon web site if you didn't put in your correct password. verizon complained to Mozilla. The bug was fixed long time ago. i am still waiting for response from Mozilla."
I know we all hate big corporations, but try not to knee-jerks so much, folks. - pexor, on 10/12/2007, -5/+13Whoah y'all, chill for a minute. I was pretty angry when I first read this headline, but after going to the page I'm even more angry at the submitter. That sensationalist title is itching our liberal trigger finger in hopes of getting the ***** dugg out of the article. It worked, and the plugin is sweet, but keep your heads on. Verizon is OK with the plugin itself, they were just upset because of the bug. That sounds perfectly reasonable to me. Yah, they mistakenly went to Mozilla to complain about it, but I wouldn't expect any less from Verizon.
- Djerrid, on 10/12/2007, -2/+10If you are just looking for a basic cell phone and don't have it permanently attached to your ear, I'd suggest you get a prepaid phone. I've had my Virgin Mobile for a few years and pay a total of $5/month and use it a few times a week. I like paying for only what I use.
http://www.virginmobileusa.com/rates/minute.do
(Really, I'm not shilling for them. I just like their cheap-ass plan.) - jkaiser, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9dugg because i didnt know of this extension
- icepick314, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8didn't Verizon also made some of the Razr model to lock out options for custom ringtones? so people HAVE to buy ringtones if they want something different instead of using mp3s to make one on your own....
what's up with these companies screwing with customers and trying to milk out as much as they can? - subject117, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8This story is inaccurate as Verizon only complained about excessive pinging at first. Please research before you post stories.
- sporktek, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9From the same guy:
http://optimize-it.blogspot.com/
I'm gonna get it. The last couple months I've gone over my minutes a little. - Omeganon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7Ok. You guys are getting as bad as /. I don't see anywhere on the linked site anything that implies "Verizon essentially doesn't want it "too" easy for customers to check their minutes ". There could be a number of other perfectly valid reasons why they might not like it.
From a provider perspective, you build a server farm to handle a projected number of requests. You expect x number of requests from y number of people a day and provision hardware accordingly. This plug-in would appear to make x much higher at the least. Instead of checking once a day/week/month They're now checking every time they open their browser (or whatever it's cycle is).
That's additional cost for Verizon, not only for bandwidth but for server resources that this plug-in author dumped on them. Granted, they're a big company but I wouldn't like it either if I were them. - killermonk, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9You can also dial '#225#' to check your account balance, and '#674#' to check you text message usage
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+9Verizon:
Has the least minutes and the most expensive plans.
Disables your phones hardware so you have to pay to transfer pictures and songs to your phone despite your phone being built to do this for free.
Gives all your private data to Bush.
Can't compete with VoIP due to it's own incompetence and instead of investing in their own program they play dirty and file bogus patent lawsuits against Vonage.
Yeah, Verizon sucks, they offer no advantage's over their competition and charge more. Why are you surprised they would try to screw over their customers as well? - jasqwerty, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7Ah, more & more proof the people on Digg are mentally retarded. :-)
- ViperDaimao, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8Wrong. The submitter is a liar and is fooling you. This has nothing to do with not wating you to know how many minutes you have. In fact it's simple to get your minutes usage either through their website, by calling them, or by text message. How much easier could it be?
From the comments section of the linked article:
Winston Huang [the extension author -ed.] said...
" an older version of the extension (0.4) had a bug that may cause excessive pinging of the verizon web site if you didn't put in your correct password. verizon complained to Mozilla. The bug was fixed long time ago. i am still waiting for response from Mozilla." - allanpat, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7i can't seem to find one for sprint
- HMTKSteve, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8Is it possible the problem lies in how the extension gets the information?
Is it possible that the extension (if lots of people use it) results in crashing their web servers?
They might see this as a very big "leach" on their bandwidth/servers. - stmiller, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7Yes the Razr is locked down tight with Verizon. Cannot transfer images, ringtones, etc. to your computer unless you hack your phone. They want you to pay to release your images onto their servers which you can fetch for a fee.
- slimbooty, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6Here's one that always pissed me off about Sprint; when I check my voicemail from MY phone it counts the minutes I used for that phone call since it is still considered a call (to my own phone). However, when I check my voicemail from MY GIRLFRIENDS phone it is free (since calls between sprint customers are free).
- MasterBlaster, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6I was seriously about to start a Verizon account for local phone service and DirecTV. After seeing this, I think I just reconsidered. Can you hear me now???
- Anth741, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7Yea well, I get very upset every month when I have to pay the phone bill.
- Lurk3r, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5Thats because the man wasn't trying to keep the people down before.
- angelp, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5Wow....considering the story is inaccurate, it looks like you cancelled your account for nothing.
- fracai, on 10/12/2007, -4/+9I am Verizon. I love that you pay me, but STOP COMPLAINING WHEN I CRIPPLE YOUR PHONES!!! You PAID for it. I should be able to make the choice whether you buy my songs or backgrounds or use your own on a phone you PAID me for if I choose. Also, I wish you would stop COMPLAINING about the disabled bluetooth that only works with certain verizon accessories!
Sheesh, if you aren't happy with your service find a competing service that makes you happy. Don't get me wrong, I wish they didn't cripple the phones, but insisting that you're somehow entitled to it is bunk. Verizon sells crippled phones. If you don't like to buy crippled phones don't buy it. Complaining only works if they care. Clearly there aren't enough people complaining or leaving for a competitor.
This changes of course if Verizon ever claimed that you'd be able to load your own songs without using their services. Somehow I doubt that that has been claimed. - SectorNation, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8Dear Verizon. Customers have the right to make intelligent usage decisions regarding your service. Quit your whining.
- maverick999, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5Here's a guy that's working on one for Cingular:
http://activemind.wordpress.com/ - berberrama, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6How I decide to track my minutes is none of my providers business as long as I pay my bill!!!!!!!
- ldhertert, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7Is the source available for this extension? I really don't like the idea of entering my verizon account information into an application that I have no reason to trust.
- arashm, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4I've asked them once and they said it doesn't cost you to check *4
- Canth, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5It's amazing how much American phone companies mess with the apps on the mobile phones. I have a nextel (motorola i530.. company cheapo phone) and it's running nextel's version... the bult-in text messaging is cripled, and the only way to message is to go online. and that interface is the worst ever.
I wish I was back in Europe where cell phone carriers don't dick around with the phone and just give you the phone, and all features that the manufacturer put on, and then have their network block access to features you're not subscribed to. Easy to swap phone hardware, and everything works solid. (no cripling of bluetooth or such) - jedi6, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I tried to let everyone know about this extension months ago but no one dugg it at the time apparently.
http://digg.com/software/One_of_the_most_useful_Firefox_extensions._Verizon_Minutes_Used. -
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