Sign o' the times

Ask to choose the most pressing issues of the day, one may come up with: world economic turmoil, Gaza, Gazprom, ending true poverty/hunger, Irak, Afghanistan, Zimbabwe, or even pirates.

Obviously you are not in Brussels. Truly serious issues of the day require truly serious action by truly serious individuals:

Mobile phone operators in the European Union may face a ban on charging customers for receiving voice mail messages outside their home state in the EU, turning the screw on industry revenues, a document showed on Monday.

EU Telecoms Commissioner Viviane Reding has proposed capping the retail price of roamed text messages at 11 euro cents (15 U.S. cents) each from July compared with around 29 cents now.

She has also proposed a cap of 1 euro per megabyte on the wholesale price of data downloads such as using a phone or laptop to check emails or surf the Web outside a home state in the 27-nation EU.

Reding also wants existing price caps on roamed voice calls to be extended by three years to 2013.

Of course this will result in higher domestic mobile costs for the consumer and less competition. All designed to stick it to the man. Go ahead, pay more with less choice and enjoy the benefits of those unintended consequences.

If we are really lucky mobile providers will find roaming unprofitable enough to discontinue those services abroad. That'll show 'em who's boss.