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educating america on SIM cards

matt brings up a good point in his P800 review here on which i will elaborate - most americans who use a cell phone don't know about the SIM card, and GSM operators in the us should be making a point to tell them about it!

if you are here, you probably know what a SIM card is, but in case you do not, the SIM (subscriber identification module) is a chip that fits inside a cell phone that carries a unique identifier which allows a carrier to tie a phone number to the card. a subscriber can use the SIM to store his or her address book, as well as other pieces of data that may be used by a phone.

the power of the SIM card is that you can move it from phone to phone and keep the same phone number and address book. you can have multiple phones and use them for occaisions as you see fit. you can upgrade to a new phone easily and sell you own phone on ebay. you can trade phones with your sister for the day.

this is a huge competitive advantage GSM providers have over CDMA providers, and T-Mobile and ATT Wireless do nothing to promote it! most of their subscribers know nothing about their SIM or what they can do with it. with as much money that is spent in the cell phone accessory market ( faceplates, cases, glow antennas ) for subs to personalize their phones, it seems like this would be a no-brainer to market this capability.

in europe, a SIM card is part of the culture and people treat their SIM like their drivers license. in china, the are even using SIMs in CDMA devices. will the us CDMA providers adopt this standard? probably not until it's well tested in the rest of the CDMA markets like china and korea.

so yeah, we realize you make more money on an additional line than on a handset - but in the wake of wireless number portability, couldn't you the GSM operators in north america perhaps get someone to stay by making this capability known ?