AT&T Exec regrets offering unlimited data? That's Karmic justice.

"My only regret was how we introduced pricing in the beginning, because how did we introduce pricing? Thirty dollars and you get all you can eat," he said in the on-stage interview at the Milken Institute's Global Conference on Wednesday. "And it's a variable cost model. Every additional megabyte you use in this network, I have to invest capital."

I agree with him in principle--there should have been more options than "all you can eat" data. Here's the thing, though--it is the phone company's anti-consumer greed that created that monster in the first place! That was, for all intents and purposes, the only option offered, way back in the pre-iPhone era, when users were only going to consume small portions of data. It was a huge rip-off, but they very intentionally offered no practical alternative. It was either that big $30 commitment, or pay-per-megabyte at about $2 Mb--literally 1000X the unit cost of all-you-can eat. Karmic.

PS--AT&T is at it again. Their entry-level data plan is already 50% more than T-Mobile's, but now they are going to a $20 minimum. For $20, T-Mobile gives you TEN TIMES as much data, with a feature that eliminates overages in favor of throttling down to 2G speeds.