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We at scaredpoet.com know that quite a few of our readers are Sprint PCS users. Many of them use a product known as PCS Vision for mobile data service. And while the service is intended for trivial little things like downloading ringtones and sending short messages with low-res photos attached, there are ways to hook up your Sprint PCS phone to certain devices, like laptops, and with the proper installed drivers turn said wireless phone into a fully functional portable modem that gives you data speeds equivalent to and sometimes faster than dialup. While it’s not as fast as WiFi, the service is much more widespread and works well in places where a WiFi hotspot isn’t available… or the hotspot isn’t free and you’re unable or unwilling to shell out the dough to connect with it.

Of course, we must remind people that such a practice officially violates the Terms and Conditions of said data plans. The reason being that while the data plans are “unlimited,” the assumption is that surfing from the strict and tiny confines of your cell phone’s 1.5 inch screen would never generate gobs of traffic, while a bandwidth-hungry power user on a laptop most certainly would.

In spite of the official frowning on “tethered” connections, as they’re known, users do report that they continue this practice. When the SonyEricsson T608 was introduced sporting Bluetooth capability, tetherers snapped up the extremely limited supply of phones quickly because it made the practice even easier. Sadly, lore has it that only 10,000 of these phones were ever made before SonyEricsson decided to leave the US CDMA market. Of that number, many of the units, which never underwent full testing and development, ended up dead on arrival. And of the handsets still in existence, everyone agrees the phone is very slow to respond to commands and keystrokes and operates with bug-riddled firmware.

Even so, the T608 made tethering phenominally easy. So it was no surprise that when the next Bluetooth phone arrived on scene, the ability to tether over bluetooth was disabled. There was outrage when word of this hobbling first came out, especially because this new phone is not cheap, and people generally don’t take it well when an expensive piece of hardware is hobbled in some way.

The outrage caused Sprint to backtrack significantly. Yes, they said, bluetooth tethering would be disabled on this phone when it first goes on sale, but a future patch would re-enable it, once they’re sure they can figure out a way to uhm.. prevent abuse.

Well, two days after the launch, someone found a way to re-enable tethering… without having to wait for Sprint to get around to it.

Now, we must repeat, at scaredpoet.com, we do not condone abusing PCS Vision service by tethering. Therefore, owners of the Treo 650 should not download this patched file and install it on an SD card. Nor should they use this utility to then copy that patched file to the Treo’s RAM, thus enabling the Dial-Up-Networking profile on the Treo.

We at scaredpoet.com do not encourage such unethical behavior. No sir. That would be, well, unethical.

Also, please note: If you decide to be, erm, unethical, be aware that Sprint could contact you and force your account off the “unlimited” data plan and onto a $0.01/kb plan instead. While 1 cent pet kilobyte sounds cheap, those pennies add up when you consider that if you download a 50MB file under this plan, you’ll find a $512.00 charge on your next cell phone bill. Even so, many users have reported that as long as the abuse isn’t egregious (i.e. downloading more than a couple GB of data per month, using P2P programs, etc.), Sprint won’t bother. However, the risk of enforcement remains, and Sprint could tighten up its standards for enfrocing the TOS at any time.

Lastly: This updated profile (which you shouldn’t download, ahem) is not guaranteed to work with the Cingular Version of the Treo 650. Early reports indicate that the profile will not function correctly, so definitely do not do this if your Treo 650 comes from Cingular.

I’m starting to grow increasingly concerned by certain manufacturers’ apparent desire to put very complicated, delicate, expensive pieces of equipment in the hands of people who clearly lack the skills and competency to use them. I don’t like to berate people, but I do find it to be a sad state of affairs when I encounter fully grown adults who still, to this day, don’t know simple skills like how to navigate on a computer with a mouse.

Yes, everyone must learn sometime and we must all have patience for those who aren’t exposed to complex things like computers, yadda yadda, but the mouse has been commonplace in the computing landscape – nay, in the very cultural landscape of nearly every first- and second-world country – for almost 20 years now, when Apple made it standard equipment on their Macintosh computers. Even my parents, who are among the endanagered genus of the human species who still don’t have a computer in the house, are familiar with this concept and could probably muddle through pretty well if someone thrust a computer in front of them and told them to surf eBay.

So it is also true with cell phones. Yes, you know it’s true… some people have cell phones and don’t know how to use them. You encounter one every time you see someone standing still in the middle of a public spot, befuddled look on their face, trying to figure out how to make that newfangled contraption in their hands call Aunt Millie. And this lack of skill is just inexcusable. People, phones have been around since the late 1800s! the only difference now is there’s :GASP!: – no wire attached – and you might have to push an extra button or two to tell the phone you’re done dialing and it’s time to connect the call.

Well, for these poor folks, phones are alas, getting more complex, such that the phone-neanderthals among us are falling behind. New technology is coming, and phones are getting, well, smarter. And I’m sorry folks, but if you’re one of the people I’m talking about, it’s time to brush up on your tech skills!

Why am I ranting about this? Because, as I was casting away my previous “dumb” phone for one with a higher IQ, I had to read the instructions for a certain accessory that works with the new phone. And I was, well, dumbfounded and just a little insulted when diagrams like the following appeared:

Is this what we’ve come to? Turning Mr. Phone and Mr. Headset into happy cartoon characters that “bond” through the magic of Mr. HappyZap, the radio wave? Since when does simple English (“To start: press the “connect” button on your headset. Duh, you’re finished!”) no longer suffice?

I can just see this getting so much worse…