In his book The Structure of Scientific Revolution, Thomas Kuhn argues that a change, or shift, in a paradigm is not evolutionary, but revolutionary and requires a drastic jump from one system of thought to another.  While our service providers have not abandoned the current paradigm of buckets of minutes, we did see a huge leap to a potential new thought process emerge today. 

Early this morning, Verizon announced that they will be offering an unlimited calls plan for only $99.99 per month beginning today.  This means that you can call anyone on any network anytime and talk as long as you want for the same low price.  No overages or suprise bills!  I was on a very late night conference call with Verizon only hours before the service went live, I can tell you they are extremely excited to bring this service to the American consumer.

Before the ink was even dry on the USA Today article, Verizon's largest competitor in the US annouced a similar plan.  AT&T's program will begin on February 22 and is almost identical to the Verizon plan.

Then, before we could close-up shop T-Mobile upped the ante by not only providing unlimited calling, but also unlimited text and picture messaging for the same $99 per month.

Lastly, factor in the Unlimited by Boost program that runs on the Sprint network and offers plans in a dozen states and unlimited calling plans as low as $45 per month without signing a contract. 

It is simply amazing to me the strides we have made in this business over the past few years.  To go from $500 brick phones with the best services plans giving you 25 cents a minute to having a Free Motorola Razr and unlimited calling packages is nothing short of astounding.  And with Android, Open Networks, WiMax, and many more innovations on the horizon we may have our paradigm shift sooner rather than later. 

Update (2/28/08):  To no great surprise Sprint announced a similar unlimited plan today although they are offering access to all services for the $99 a month.  Now that all the big players are in the game the competitive pricing wars begin.