I thought I had seen it all when I found out back when I was a freshman that JMU offered 3½” disks in some snack machines. Now, as I went up to New Jersey for Thanksgiving, I have now officially seen it all. At the Bowmansville Service Plaza on the Pennsylvania Turnpike (I-76) going eastbound, among some of those use-the-claw-to-win-a-prize machines, plus more conventional vending machines, I ran across this cell phone vending machine. For as low as $19.99, you can get a prepaid cell phone for your use. You get the phone, as well as the airtime. This is also the first time I’ve ever seen a vending machine that accepts credit cards (JAC cards don’t count). Put your credit card in, remove it, get the card authorized, and then make your selection! Sounds like a deal, though there’s likely some hitches in there. First of all, does the phone also come with a charger? Probably not, for that vending machine hole is not all that big. For all we know, the phone is low on its charge, meaning that you’ll have used up your phone’s power before you use up the phone card, necessitating your having to go out and buy a charger that fits your phone for likely at least what you paid for the phone in the first place. Then of course, there’s chance for breakage. If you’ve seen the speed that soda cans hit the bottom, you know what I mean. Ker-PLUNK! Now I have a real cell phone, through Ntelos. That entails a service plan, a contract, a monthly fee, a lease on a phone, and certain amounts of minutes per month that come with the plan. I was talking on the phone one day and accidentally dropped that thing on the ground. End of conversation, and also end of phone for that matter, as it was then inoperable. I had to take that thing back to Ntelos, pay the deductible, and get a new phone. Now imagine a phone that’s manufactured to be as cheap as possible. What are you going to do then if it breaks coming out of the machine, or if you do like me and drop it? Who do you see? And what are the chances of getting back to that vending machine, since it’s on a toll road going eastbound with exits spaced far apart? Kind of a risky venture there…
