It’s a big milestone for the mobile internet - At the beginning of this month, Vodafone announced some new consumer tariff plans in the UK market which include 500 MB of flat rate mobile internet access. Previously, mobile internet access was charged at a significant monthly premium. Now it’s included “free” in the standard tariff plan.

Don’t get too carried away with Vodafone’s spin on this. Vodafone users aren’t going to be queueing up to change their existing tariffs just yet. Compare the minutes and texts between these new “Vodafone best-ever value tariffs” and “Vodafone’s most popular price plans” on their UK website.

Vodafone’s “best-ever value” tariffs

Vodafone’s “most popular” price plans

I do think that this is exactly the sort of simplification step that is required to open up the mobile internet for the mass market. Mobile internet pricing has been enormously complicated and confusing for users. People are scared that if they use the mobile internet they’ll get hit with big unforeseen bills - even when they have flat rate tariffs, as one Vodafone UK user with a flat rate data card connection found out when he went to Germany and accidentally downloaded a whole episode of Friends that his wife had previously set running on his laptop in the UK – the world’s most expensive premium download at £11,000 or $22,000USD.

Mobile internet has a bright future ahead of it when operators include a big flat rate chunk of data as a standard feature of mainstream consumer contract tariffs. We are going to see a lot more of this kind of pricing in the US and in Western European markets where there is enough 3.5G infrastructure installed to enable it.

Fascinating comparison from Nigel Bannister at Leicester University (via ShinyShiny)

Text messaging costs four times as much as receiving information from Nasa’s Hubble Space Telescope.

It cost £85 to obtain a megabyte of data from Hubble, 595km (370 miles) from Earth, as opposed to sending a 5p text, which works out at about £375 per megabyte.

Scientist Nigel Bannister, of Leicester University, said: ‘Hubble is by no means a cheap mission – but the mobile phone text costs were pretty astronomical.’

If you’re a heavy texter, it’s worth investigating a variety of tariffs to find the one that suits you best. And no matter whether you’re more of a voice, SMS or web user, remember to check every so often with your operator to find out whether you’re able to change your deal - without necessarily increasing your tariff.

For example, as we’ve mentioned before, Vodafone has added 500MB of free data to all pay monthly contracts but, if you’re an existing customer, you need to call to get this added to your current deal, as your operator cannot change terms and conditions of your contract without your approval. So what are you waiting for? Call your operator and see if you can get a deal that suits you better.

Meanwhile, if you’re not interested in browsing, but just want the ultimate el cheapo phone, how about a phone for £13 (that’s $25 USD!) on pay as you go. Not a bad phone to have around, that way you won’t shed a tear when it meets a watery grave in a pint of beer this Summer!