Are service provider netbook bundles a good deal? - PC World

You can get a deeply discounted netbook from either AT&T or Verizon, as long as you're willing to sign up for a two-year data plan; but no matter which service provider's netbook deal you choose, the price will be about the same. We saw similar price parity when we conducted our cost-of-ownership study of popular smartphones.

We discovered the similarity in bottom-line prices after examining the two-year costs of ownership of various (subsidized) netbooks sold by Verizon and AT&T (Sprint and T-Mobile don't yet offer such deals). The wireless broadband carriers began selling netbooks only this year, and they have adopted a pricing model similar to the one they use for selling cell phones and smartphones...