I have this phone, and while I was disappointed that it wouldn't sync with my macs via bluetooth, I didn't think of suing. Perhaps I should have, but I just am not that litigious. I'll have to check to see if there are any good hacks at this siteI still like the phone....
WSJ.com - Cellphone Users Sue, Saying Carrier Cut Phone's Features
A group of cellphone users has filed an unusual lawsuit in a California court against Verizon Wireless, charging the nation's second-largest cellular carrier with deceit for disabling certain features of a new high-end Motorola Inc. phone called the V710.
The main charge: Verizon Wireless removed much of the phone's Bluetooth technology -- a short-range wireless system -- so subscribers would have to pay to use the company's network to send things such as e-mail, photos and calendar entries to other devices. The lawsuit, recently filed in Los Angeles Superior Court, seeks class-action status.
Verizon Wireless says it ordered the phone from Motorola without all the Bluetooth capabilities, though it left intact the technology that allows callers to talk using wireless headsets. That is little comfort, though, to customers who say they bought the phone based on Motorola's splashy ad campaign for the highly anticipated model.
“It's like buying an SUV that can't go in the mud,” said Jonathan Zdziarski, a software engineer who lives in Milledgeville, Ga., and who bought the Motorola phone from Verizon Wireless for $519. He was so upset when he discovered the restrictions Verizon Wireless placed on his V710 that he set up an online “hacker fund” to challenge computer experts to hack the V710 and re-enable the most important Bluetooth functions on the phone.
The lawsuit cuts to the heart of an emerging and thorny issue in the burgeoning global cellphone industry: the fight for control among phone makers, carriers and consumers as these handsets become more like computers and not just calling devices. At stake is billions of dollars of revenue companies hope to generate as cellphones become capable of a growing array of tasks, from sending e-mail and photos to showing videos and displaying lists of nearby restaurants and stores. Consumers and tech enthusiasts fear these capabilities could become increasingly fee-based....
“The problem is that manufacturers make the phones with certain capabilities and advertise them,” said Michael Kelly, the lawyer for the plaintiffs in the California lawsuit. But then, buyers purchase them from another company, the wireless carrier, which can change the features to maximize revenue, he said. “When those functions aren't there or come at a price, the buyers get very upset.”
Motorola launched the V710 last August through Verizon Wireless as the carrier's first cellphone with Bluetooth. The short-range technology is designed to enable users to zap data, including MP3 music files, between their cellphones and computers or personal digital assistants. It also can link a phone with a wireless headset. But the Verizon model doesn't do all these things. Motorola, which was not named in the lawsuit, declined to comment... The lawsuit contends that the term Bluetooth represents certain features, so to say that a cellphone has Bluetooth but then deliver only some of its features is misleading. Verizon Wireless's Web site touts the Bluetooth functions on the V710 model by saying “you can make hands-free, eyes-free calls, and connect to your PC or PDA whenever and wherever you want.”
--update 5/15/05, per MacOSXHints, in Tiger, you should be able to use bluetooth on this phone....
1. Make sure your phone has the latest firmware (go to the menu, select Phone Info, select Other Information, select S/W Version). Synchronization was added in version 8700_01.40.0R. If you don't have the latest firmware, go to a Verizon store and have them upgrade it.
2. Change the existing V710 entry in /Applications: iSync.app: Contents: PlugIns: ApplePhoneConduit.syncdevice: Contents: PlugIns: PhoneModelsSync.phoneplugin: Contents: Resources: MetaClasses.plist to use the USB-BT driver. When you're done, the entry should look like this:
