Both Verizon and AT&T are planning to roll-out shared data plans this year. Targeting family and small-business users, the new data plans will allow customers to share their data plan on different devices. However, T-Mobile USA addresses shared data plans as "potentially confusing and expensive" reflecting that the carrier is in no mood to follow the footsteps of the two top U.S. cellular carriers.

Data plans are useful when customers have a lot of Internet-connected gadgets like smartphone, tablet and other wireless devices. Simply, the new data plans let you split a bucketful of data between various devices providing an economical option for families as well as small business people.

Earlier this year, Verizon Wireless CFO Fran Shammo revealed that the carrier is planning to put the shared data plans at high priority when it launches latter this summer. AT&T is also on the same roadmap.

The introduction of new plans could be an industry changing move. But T-Mobile thinks in a totally different way.

"Some of our competitors are backing away from simple, unlimited data and moving to family shared data plans. But would this approach actually deliver a better value to consumers? Do families really want to keep track of each others' data consumption? We don't think so. Just imagine mom's email is suddenly unavailable because her teenage son watched an HD movie on his phone, consuming the family's data allotment," said Andrew Sherrard, senior Vice President of Marketing at T-Mobile, in a post on carrier's blog.

T-Mobile is arguing on the success of shared data plans considers mobile tethering as a better option that shared data plans. T-Mobile argues that the same functionality is provided by tethering to power multiple devices via Wi-Fi.

"Mobile believes that consumers today do not want a 'one size fits all' approach to shared family data plans, nor would they benefit from that model," Sherrard added.

Shared data plans aren't something totally new. Wireless cellular customers have been managing share voice minutes for years. In case of shared internet plans, consumers will have to strictly manage the Internet usage to avoid extra charges, which is technically a complex approach.

Do you think that shared data plans will be useful? Or they are just to grab few more dollars from your pocket? Let us know.