Like every week, we offer you our column “It happened at Free and in telecoms…” This one invites you to dive back into the events that made the news of the current week, but during the years , the decades, even the previous centuries. These events will concern Free of course, but more broadly telecoms and digital. Memories memories …
January 9, 2007: Presentation of the first iPhone
It has now been 16 years since the first smartphone in the iPhone range was presented to the eyes of the world. The smartphone that shook up the mobile market forever was only marketed in June of the same year in the United States, then in a few European countries, but the announcement was already like a blow of thunder in the middle. Everyone remembers the first iPhone (or iPhone EDGE or iPhone 2G).
For you, we found the complete Keynote of the time, if you have an hour in front of you…
January 10, 2012: Free Mobile arrives to change everything
Impossible to miss in this column: Free Mobile is celebrating its 11th anniversary. Xavier Niel’s operator has launched headlong into the mobile market by offering two revolutionary packages. One at 2 € per month (0 euro for Freebox subscribers) and the second at 19.99 € per month (15.99 euros per month for Freebox subscribers) and both without commitments. To learn more about what’s changed since that launch, go to our dedicated article.
“Free’s sensational entry into mobile”, “Free shatters the market”, the operator surprised the press with the announcement of its offers
January 11, 2010: Bouygues Telecom announces a mobile recycling service
The green trend is not new and Bouygues Telecom launched a rather special service on January 11, 2010. Indeed, from the internet or from Bouygues Telecom Clubs it was possible, whatever the brand or your operator, to have your phone recycled. An initiative that made everyone happy, since it was possible to recover the value of the telephone as a voucher, or even to donate it to a coastal protection association (therefore tax deductible). Since then, each operator has offered a substantially identical solution.
Already at the time, 42% of users put away their old laptop and never used it again.
January 15, 1997: Bouygues Telecom integrates the answering machine/recorder function into its mobile plans
It’s such a common feature that it’s hard to imagine a mobile plan without it. However, it was in January 26 years ago that Bouygues Telecom integrated a function into its mobile offers: the possibility of having an answering machine and recording these voice messages directly during a call. The youngest (like yours truly) will surely be surprised to learn that this function was not directly accessible when the mobile offers were launched!
January 15, 2008: Free is the first operator to launch its VOD by subscription
Full Free Home Video is the first service of VOD by subscription launched by an operator on January 15, 2008. The service offered many themes (Cinema, series, Kids, etc.) with programs in HD like Pirates of the Caribbean for example. An offer that of course had a price: €9.99 per month. SVOD made by Free, the ancestor of Netflix in a way!
Univers Freebox had also carried out a detailed test when it was released, if you want to dive into the past it’s this way !
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