A group consisting of all major UK mobile operators today announced its intention to introduce a revolutionary billing scheme aimed to increase network air time usage. The founding members of this initiative are 3G Three, O2, Orange, T-Mobile and Vodafone agreed to cooperate closely on implementing the new billing technology that will be marketed as Looser Pays. The core idea is that the cost of the call will be billed to the party that hangs up first. Unlike the previously used system where the calling party i. e. the party that initiated the phone call had to be charged and as a result deterred many customers from initiating a phone call, now the party that disconnects first will be the one to bear the charges. This groundbreaking initiative is expected to increase combined total air-time of the founding networks roughly by 500%. Analysts estimate that this will increase the profits by the same value of 500%. Future administration and development of the scheme will be handled by an independent entity sponsored by all involved networks.
An Orange Group spokesman confirmed that the new initiative:
…will provide customers with a more consistent and improved user experience across different devices, whilst also enabling individual operators and manufacturers to customise and differentiate their offering. The founding group intends to achieve its goals by identifying common mobile operators’ requirements, with the aim of establishing an open framework for mobile device manufacturers and associated software and hardware suppliers to develop open mobile terminal platform compliant products. The group aims to use existing standards, where they exist, and to further encourage the development of standards by presenting coordinated requirements.
At the same time Virgin Mobile spokesperson insisted that:
The initiative is cool cuz ppl luv takin and they h8 lzrrz.
adding that she loves pink phones and wants more chocolate phones to be released right now. She also suggested that the new product sould be re-branded to LZR PZ.
Vodafone UK representative emphasised that:
As a technology neutral organisation, all technology vendors will be free to contribute to and support Looser Pays requirements and to provide Looser Pays compliant products.
In words of O2 spokesman:
The need for a common user experience is a must for the mass-market acceptance of mobile payments. Using Looser Pays billing should be a process that users understand, trust and can easily adopt. These are the key criteria for the Looser Pays initiative.
Initially the Looser Pays initiative had been vigorously opposed by the governing body of Call Centre Industry for fears it may damage their profits. However after the initiators offered to re-train Call Centre personnel at their expense the attitude remarkably softened and as one call centre manager expressed it:
There are difficult times ahead but we all have to adopt. Merely shouting at a caller and calling him or her names will bring you nowhere as it will not make the calling party hang up, on contrary it may only escalate the whole conversation and in this case our operators will have to have the nerves of steel not to hang up first. We already begun training our operators and they all will go through an intensive psychological training course that will teach a few tricks making the caller hang up first without even noticing.
Another opposing force that might have come into play the Ofcom, the governmental body supervising Telecommunications Industry in the UK seems to be neutralised already and as indicated by an Ofcom spokesman:
Looser Pays is an exiting initiative that brings consumer market towards the most up-to-date standards of the 21st century. We totally support the Looser Pays initiative as we also expect it to be beneficial for the society as a whole as it will make people more friendly since it will be simply imprudent to hang up on someone. Old system deterred people from calling, the Looser Pays will make them talk more and be more sociable.
The introduction of this initiative adds significant weight to the whole industry that now encompasses the world’s biggest mobile telecommunications players with a combined subscriber base of over 200 million potential consumers.
A number of non-UK network operators including NTT DoCoMo, SMART Communications, Telefónica Móviles, TIM (Telecom Italia Mobile) already expressed their intention to join the initiative.
It is not incidental that this announcement comes on April the 1st.
tags: 3g, all fools day, april fools, april fools day, ntt docomo, o2, orange, smart communications, t-mobile, tim, telefónica móviles, three, virgin mobile, vodafone, chocolate phones, looser pays, looser pays initiative, pink phones, press releases
As a continuation of their branded line-up of phone started by Virgin Lobster the well-known international brand Virgin releases a new mobile collection called Pussy.
The production of the new phone is outsourced to Taiwanese ODM manufacturers who claim that their production facilities are ready to accept more orders for new Virgin Pussies whenever they come.
Virgin PLC founder Sir Richard Branson admitted that the idea of the new mobile phone brand actually belongs to him.
Pamela Anderson, the face of Virgin Mobile TV advertising campaign is also highly supportive of the idea. “My Virgin Pussy is the best device I’ve ever had in my entire life” she says.
French cosmetic giant 
