I heard about such Ukrainian "invention" - cheap GSM phone w/o any display, but I considered it as a kind of April Fool's Day joke. But I wouldn't be surprised if Belarussian authorithies (perhaps Aleksandr Grigorievich himself :) ) were told their electronic industry to create a national model of a GSM phone :D.

I read once in a newspaper that this network has about 20 000 users, none of them private. And the Beloved Leader doesn't need a mobile phone - AFAIK he has a high speed satellite internet link in his train. Moreover, I suppose he has one or more satellite phones :P.

That's right - the Cuban economy is still so "communist" that IMHO without large number of incoming tourists they wouldn't afford such a "luxury" :P

Right, but I think that we should close that thread but it went too far from Belarus :)

No problem, you can go on, maybe we can then split the thread in 2 parts, depending on which subject will become prevalent! :) And I'm a great fan of Aleksandr Grigorievich (:lol:), so I'm very interested in your discussion! :)

<span style='font-size:11pt;line-height:100%'>Belarus? BeST attracts more users, targets low-end users</span>

MINSK, Jan 11 (Prime-Tass) -- State-controlled Belarus Telecommunications Network, or BeST, which started commercial operations in the capital city of Minsk on December 21, 2005, attracted its first 1,000 subscribers through its program that envisages preferential tariffs for some categories of subscribers, Sergei Poblaguyev, the company's deputy general director, told a press conference Wednesday.

The total number of BeST's subscribers stands below 2,000 people as of now, Poblaguyev said.

Subscribers under 33 make up 80% of total subscribers attracted through the program, which will continue until February 15, Poblaguyev said.

Currently BeST has a switchboard center with a capacity of 150,000 numbers, which can be increased to 3 million, and over 30 base stations in Minsk, Poblaguyev said.

Other mobile operators in Belarus, in addition to BeST, include two GSM operators, Mobile Digital Communications and Belarusian-Russian joint venture Mobile TeleSystems, or MTS Belarus, and BelCel, which operates in NMT450 and IMT-MC-450 standards.

Belarus state-owned company Agat holds 75% stake in BeST, while state-controlled fixed-line monopoly Beltelecom holds 25% stake in the company.

Today I talked to my Belarusian-origin colleague about BeST. First, he had no idea what I meant. But when I showed him the website, he shouted "Now I know, it's Lukashenko's network" :D. He told that with its poor coverage, services and tariffs nobody takes this network seriously. Moreover, he confirmed that it was seriously considered that this company would Belarussian-made phones with SIM permanently stuck inside :lol: . Happily, at least this brilliant idea didn't come true :whistle:

http://www.axisglobe.com/Image/2005/...rus/lukash.jpg

You enemy of the State of Belarus!!!
don't say false things! BeST is having and incredible success, it already has 90% of the Belarussian mobile customers and after the elections it will have 100% for sure, the people are with the President!

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

Oh, what a crazy idea! The next step would be a phone permanently locked to a single BTS. :lol: I'm really obsessed with the level of marasmus there. Luckily, they could understand it and started a sort of strange but still generally normal GSM operator.

Effendi, you get the point! :lol: I wish you were able to understand his speeches, so you'd laugh much more. :P

Crazy? I heard that in USA there are such GSM phones, with "permament" SIMs...Could anyway confirm/deny?

As to locking to the BTS - in Poland there are two landline operators which use wireless technology with landline numbering. These are: Sferia (CDMA) in Warsaw, and Polish Telecom (NMT) on rural areas. Because phones connected in those networks are considered "fixed", their users are told that they can't go outside coverage of their "native" towers. But the reality is different - they usually work in the entire service area. But if they didn't, nobody could complain after all they "fixed" networks only... :)

What language does he speak? I heard him "in original" a few times and had impression that it wasn't Russian I had learnt at school :unsure:

We have something not so different from that here in Italy too... and with the newest operator, the 3rd Generation one: almost all 3's bundle kits with an u-sim and a phone are "sim-locked", not in the way it's intended in the UK, USA or other countries (i.e. you can use only the sim of that operator), but in a more strict way: you can use that phone with that u-sim only! That's for 1 year, from the 13th month you can use also other 3 u-sim, but not other operator's.

I know in the USA there are a couple of MVNOs which have something maybe even worse, Trafcone and Net10: you can use their simcard on their phones only, it doesn't work on other models...

And just to write something slightly IT: does my friend Alexander speak in Belarussian on his speeches? I think he speaks Russian, also his wonderful website is in RU and EN, not in BY like his opponent's...

Przemolog, we had (or may be still have in some regions) the same situation with CDMA-800 band here in Russia. It was called 'the band licensed for the fixed telephony service', so CDMA-800 phones were expected to be locked to a single BTS. Were expected but not always were, though. :P Also, there was a 'rural street phone' service provided by the NMT operator (Delta Telecom), they placed some Nokia-10 (or may be 11 or 12, I'm not sure, I mean the fixed NMT cellphone and I don't remember the exact model number) and used them as public street phones. They were locked to their BTSes too, AFAIK. Anyway, this is not as crazy as locking GSM phones, I guess. NMT didn't use SIMs and so on, so it was initially more 'fixed'.

Lukashenko speaks Russian wherever he talks, AFAIK. I'm not perfectly sure, but I saw him speaking only Russian even when I was watching the state TV channel in Belarus (I've been to Belarus a few times). I've never heard him speaking Belarussian. His Russian is a bit funny (he has a sort of Belarussian accent/dialect, he pronounces some sounds specifically and his speech has some funny intonations), but it's still Russian that I easily understand. I can understand most of the Belarussian too, but it sounds to me as a very distorted and funny language, which is surely not Russian. :)

<span style='font-size:13pt;line-height:100%'>Belarusian GSM operator BeST user base at 2,000 as of Feb 1</span>

MINSK, Feb 3 (Prime-Tass) -- The subscriber base of state-controlled Belarus Telecommunications Network, or BeST, which started commercial operations in the capital city of Minsk on December 21, 2005, amounted to 2,000 users as of February 1, the company said late on Thursday.

Currently BeST has a switchboard center with a capacity of 150,000 numbers, which can be increased to 3 million, and over 30 base stations in Minsk.

Other mobile operators in Belarus, in addition to BeST, include two GSM operators, Mobile Digital Communications and Belarusian-Russian joint venture Mobile TeleSystems, or MTS Belarus, and BelCel, which operates in NMT450 and CDMA-450 standards.

As of February 1, the total amount of mobile subscribers in Belarus stood at 4.230 million users.

Belarusian state-owned company Agat holds 75% stake in BeST, while state-controlled fixed-line monopoly Beltelecom holds 25% stake in the company.