T-mobile making changes?

Here's the skinny. I was about to sign up tomorrow when a new store opened where my friend will work (who is still in training), but he just dealt me some bad news. Apparently, T-mobile is making changes to their entire network and their web site and what he told me is "Everyone in the market with a smart phone will be required to have a data plan for the entire length of the contract". Meaning I would have to be locked into at least the $25 plan. He said the reason he is getting behind the change is b/c apparently "All the other carriers are doing it". That is what T-mo told him. They also changed their website today and he's thinking new customers will not be able to change their phone online and choose a lower plan since they are trying to enforce this new data contract life. This may be make or break for me now b/c I really wanted to get the behold and then lower the data plan to the web2go b/c I don't want to pay $50 each month for two lines when I don't even pay that much at home, but he said they are doing away with the web2go also. Can anyone shed some more light on this?

My Behold was always detected and displayed on my online account. I would manually change it to smth else to be able to add/change to web2go service. However it will eventually switch back to the Behold, the web2go remaining active though. Now that I'm using a non-T-Mo phone, the area where the phone is shown said "Sorry—we’re not sure which phone you’re using, so we’re not able to display resources. Please select a phone." This is not bad, but I don't know whether it is good enough to let me hold on to my web2go service if/when they decide to cut it off for smartphones.

man they bet not try and pull the jive.. they will lose a lot of business.. they have to HONOR they word. if they do pull this here thats bogus tho str8 up

nah... thats why ya boy is still in trainin! lol. i jus got off the phone w/ tmo and they said its bcuz a lot off ppl are gettin phones from like ebay or 2nd hand, callin in and sayin the phones are not workin correctly.. so startin TODAY! (for new contracts not exsisting) whateva phone u have, blackberry, sidekick, G1, or etc. u will have to get the data plan feature for THAT phone (if it requires). Like i said for the text msg and all that.. ur bill is locked in so unless U make the changes on ur bill whateva u r payin now is what u'll be payin until ur contract is up, or u change something on it.

now with unlocked phones i dunno how that will apply, sorry pimp

Ok people calm down. Check out this link it'll explain everything. Only the G1, Crackberry (not pearl & pearl flip), smartphones (includes Winmo). The Behold is not a smartphone! if u want data it'll be atleast $10 a month, this only affects new custs. tzones is getting phased out. So all u 5.99 hackers are sol.

http://www.tmonews.com/2009/05/data-plan-recap/

Whoa whoa whoa, cash...back up.  So you're saying that even though I added the 5.99 t-zones through a T-mo rep. that they're just gonna up and change my plan?  I thought I would at least have to be notified; moreover, I should be the one that REQUESTS the change...right?

look, i called the tmo today.. and they tol me.. whateva ur locked in on (ur contract/plan) is waht u'll still have, this only applies to the ppl start a new plan after today.the only changes u'll have on UR plan is whateva U change it too. but they did say if u did have a smartphone, blkberry etc. u would have to get at least 1 feature for that phone on ur plan. like data plan that fits for ur phone. (if u have a sidekick u gotta get a sidekick plan, blkberry u have to get that plan etc. it doesn't have to be the exspensive plan. u guys are blowin this up way to much.. be cool, read the post and comprehend whats bein said..