I read an article last week that said Sprint and Verizon are gonna drop the whole "extend you contract" thing everytie you make a change to your account in order to keep customers from leaving. Let me see if I can find it.
Edit: here is one of the links:
http://newsreleases.sprint.com/phoen...oom&ID=1074436
Edit 2: this is an article from Phonescoop.com
http://www.phonescoop.com/