First off, if you are already an AT&T customer (I was), all you have to do is pay another $20/month for an unlimited data plan. Or if you already have a data plan with AT&T and a recent SIM card, you can buy the phone, use the "DVD Jon" activation hack, and not pay another dime _and_ not committ to another two years with AT&T. That's cheap. Secondly, if you look at the comparison with moving to a smartphone (depending $50 to $400) and the data plans you have to get for it, its not _that_ different. On the subject of "as good", you are way off the mark. This isn't a phone with some crappy Symbian or Motorolla interface. It isn't even a Q with a crappy implementation of a sub-optimal OS slapped on it. This is a real computer, with a real OS on it. You can't really know what a pleasant experience it is to have that in a form factor that is always with you. You have to try it, and "move in" to the phone so to speak, but once you get used to it you won't go back. Promise.