After weirding us out, T-Mobile intrigues with Jump, family plans and phones

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Ray, second from left, sits with Team T-Mobile

We weren't sure what to expect when we sat down in the room for T-Mobile's New York City press event and saw a quartet of dolls seated on chairs on the stage.

Today's happening, led by a little less curse-y John Legere, ended up making more sense as time went on and the CEO and his cohorts got to the announcements.

Plus, it turns out the dolls were a swipe at AT&T's "It's Not Complicated" ad campaign, featuring a stone-faced adult talking puppy brothers with youngsters.

Creep dolls

This worried us

While the company's new upgrade program - known as Jump - was the focus, Neville Ray, the UN-carrier's CTO whom we caught up with post-event, bragged that its 4G LTE network is now available in 116 metro markets, covering 157 million people.

This is ahead of T-Mobile's 100 million people by mid-year goal, and the company said its on track to hit its 200 million mark earlier than expected this year.

It's important to note that coverage isn't complete in all of these places, with a few waiting to be fully "unleashed," but progress is on the march for Magenta.

Viva la revolution

T-Mobile, ever the rebel in the mobile world first outlined its B.S.-busting no contract world of wireless plans earlier in March. Today, the UN-carrier pushed the envelope even further with a new deal called "Just Upgrade My Phone" (or Jump, for short).

The program lets users upgrade to a new device any time they want whether their phones are lost, stolen, damaged, malfunctioning or they just feel like it.

T-Mobile CEO John Legere said Jump is meant for those "Oh sh*t moments" when you just have to get a new phone, like when you see that "kid next to you has a better phone and it just really pisses you off."

#Hate2Wait

Instead of waiting a supposed 730 days to upgrade, T-Mobile customers can enroll in a upgrade plan that's good for up to two phone changes a year with a $10 a month fee. The program requires six months worth of enrollment before taking effect.

"Both carriers [Verizon and AT&T] are have moved their upgrade cycles to two years," Ray told TechRadar after the press conference. "Which is, as John just said, is the opposite of what consumers are looking for and demanding."

T-Mo even went as far as making a call to arms on Twitter with the hashtag #Hate2Wait. The wireless company invited everyone to gripe about all the times they couldn't wait upgrade their phones for a chance to win one of 730 Samsung Galaxy S4s.

Hate2Wait hashtag

We're so mad

"We're out to disrupt. Customers hate this industry," Ray told us. "So we've been taking pieces down one at a time. Take contracts away, get rid of this unlimited stuff. We're trying to break down some of those barriers in the network because we have the capacity and the technology to take it on."

Family comes first

Its plans to "Unleash" - the telecom's favorite buzz word - mobile customers also extended to families without the need for a credit check. The new Simple Choice plan includes up to four plan lines with unlimited talk, text, web and up to 500MB of data for $100 a month.

"We've often stood for trying to bring great service to these folks who have often been dismissed by Verizon and AT&T," Ray said. "I mean they come in and 'You don't have credit? See ya.'

"Why should we be sending away families that really need those services? I think going forward we're going to break a lot of industry norms."

Family Plan

Simple math

A slew of new devices

T-Mo also announced that two new phones, Sony's Xperia Z and Nokia's Lumia 925, will be hitting its airwaves soon.

Starting July 16, customers can pre-order the T-Mobile exclusive Xperia Z for $99.99 down and 24 monthly payments of $20. The 925 will start selling on July 17 - same day as the Z - for $49.99 and the same 24 monthly payments.

Meanwhile, the Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 will be getting a 4G LTE upgrade as well.

The company ended with a teaser: stay tuned for Phase III of its UN-carrier roll out to come before year's end.

Kevin Lee

Kevin Lee was a former computing reporter at TechRadar. Kevin is now the SEO Updates Editor at IGN based in New York. He handles all of the best of tech buying guides while also dipping his hand in the entertainment and games evergreen content. Kevin has over eight years of experience in the tech and games publications with previous bylines at Polygon, PC World, and more. Outside of work, Kevin is major movie buff of cult and bad films. He also regularly plays flight & space sim and racing games. IRL he's a fan of archery, axe throwing, and board games.