AT&T Wireless CEO Hints At Rationing to Manage Disproportionate Data Usage by iPhone Users
AT&T Wireless CEO Hints At Rationing to Manage Disproportionate Data Usage by iPhone Users
Has Apple's partnership with AT&T to exclusively offer connectivity to iPhone users in the United States been more of a curse than a blessing to the latter? Ralph De La Vega, CEO and President of AT&T Mobility could probably be implicitly agreeing to this when he complained about the disproportionate...
Comments
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well frig ATandT,
you got to spend money to make money spend a few more billion on some key areas where data usage is at its highest let everyone know and experience the upgraded network then in comes more happy paying customers -
to be honest, ill dish out the ETF and go back to sprint with their lovely plan prices and 3G speeds. I dont worry about their coverage b.c i live in NYC and our signal is above best...Then ill sell my iphone for more then what i paid for
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I don't no what's up with AT&T, but I'll tell ya this. If AT&T don't fix things by the summer when the new iPhone comes out. I'm all out with AT&T and iPhones. iPhone needs to switch quick. Alot of iPhone 3g users contracts end in summer of 2010. Let's go AT&T or iPhone do something.
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Looks like they want us to change to Verizon when they get the Iphone.
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Honestly, at this point, if my boss asked me what we should do when our contract is up, I would tell him switch to T-Mobile and get the myTouch, my wife has one and the phones are great. They are completely customizable, heck T-Mobile even will help you enable tethering, unlock the phone, etc. if you just ask (and your account is in good standing at least).
The myTouch is a lot more responsive than the 3G, my wife will check her email, voicemail, text messages, etc., start Pandora and get a game going before I can open my email.
Now I don't know how the 3Gs stacks up, but the myTouch has a lot more features than the 3G (out of the box) and a lot more can easily be enabled if you want to. To be honest after she got hers, I wanted one, simply because I don't like waiting for minutes (literally) before anything will open.
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He cries about users clogging their precious network right after I've read several posts
on allowing Skype or VOIP use over the cell network. All sound stupid to me -
I had a 3g for 2 weeks before i traded it in for a 3gs. I have not experienced minute long waits for email on either of those phones. How could it take that long to load your email, you are shamelessly plugging another craptacular HTC product.
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I guess AT&T doesn't grasp the meaning or concept of offering an "unlimited" data plan.
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From my standpoint, if I'm paying for unlimited data and AT&T starts to ration my broadband usage then they are not providing the service I'm paying for. I'd assume that'd be a breech of contract on their part and I'd tell them to find a way to make me happy or they can go stick it.
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I agree with this. I used to be a big AT&T fan boy until here recently. AT&T has mandated all smart phones to be on a data plan. Were is that press release. I can barely get emails pushed from my exchange server. There towers are so overloaded and I just heard a commercial that they have the fastest speed in town. I'd like to know where they tested.
It's crap that we can't get quality service that we pay for.
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I've actually gotten very fast download speeds when I tether my iPhone to my laptop. I have no complaints on the speed when I have 3G coverage but I do go places where I get spotty 3G coverage
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Anytime I'm near a wifi zone I connect to those cause those little networks don't bog down like THE network does. I kinda feel like I'm doing my part in relieving the strain though it probably doesn't make much difference. If they limit my data, they need to limit their price. Fo' sho
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hey man i think that your iphone should be fake, beacause my one is much faster that my touch!!
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It doesn't take a genius to figure out what will happen when AT&T starts to ration data. Sales will drop, Apple will leave, and other companies will benefit. But if AT&T invests all profits into the company, their ratings will grow new customers, keep the exclusive contract with Apple, and make this reccession a thing of the past. AT&T needs to kick it into high gear and pretend that all their customers now own an iPhone.
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Dude, you either don't have an iphone or you have a fake iphone. Which is it?
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It is time to toss ATT out. They cannot play this game with the big boys. Lots of talk and no walk.
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I'm with everyone else.
Iphones wouldn't be such bandwidth hogs if they weren't so consummately usable.
Unless it's a question of engineering at apple, engineers designing the thing predicated on the availability of unlimited bandwidth from the provider. This is only their third stab at making a cell phone. Maybe this is a design consideration they haven't taken into account.
And while everyone is happy about being able to use skype... DUH! Of course it's going to suck up bandwidth. That's an easy start... Get rid of skype, and put all smart phone users on an unlimited minutes plan, with a low minute price tag, you'll get the bandwidth back. Some people will use the minutes. Many of them won't. My only complaint about the iPhone is that it's a phone, and people call me.
As for the rest, it's a trend shift. This is the business they're in. If you push the smartphone thing, sooner or later, you're going to have to support them. The trend is growing. You pushed it, you got it. The future is in customizable platforms running off of an OS that supports applications. Those are going to start eating bandwidth. Especially since many of them can run simultaneously. I can bring up a website while I'm on a call and text someone while the page is loading. WTF did they expect? Low bandwidth usage like they had from windows mobile users whose phones were only loading emails?
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ATT will only be customer focused when they loose the exclusive rights to the iphone. They greedily pay fortunes for the exclusive right for the iphone and then complain that the iphone increases their overhead. They are greedy little bas...ds.
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I drive truck all over the country. I use an at&t card in my laptop. I am in edge cells more than 3g. I contacted them and was told flat out to feel free to change carriers! WTF! I was told low population areas are not even in the plan to upgrade to 3g! I am now sitting in the tiny town of NASHVILLE TN! on a friggin edge cell!! THANKS at&t!
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I pay 20 a month for the other 2 phones in our family to have data access. Otherwise we get whacked with exhorbitant charges. I am required to pay 30 bucks on top of that for my iPhone just for data. We're paying more than we pay for broadband nternet and they are bitching!? AT&T can go f@{< themselves if they think they can throttle my access and still charge me a family premium. Change the basic nature of an 'unlimited' contract and you break it. Android, here I come.
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AT&T is offering the "unlimited" plan but they actually put a number on it if you read the paperwork. Now that being said I think what their saying is we're (att) offering to high of an unlimited plan because these few percent are the only ones using it. What they'll probably do is throttle is back so they charge the crap outta people who are above the "unlimited" amount of usage. Bottom line is AT&T wanted the rights to be exclusive and they got it w/o being full well capable of handling it so now their trying to find a way to squeeze out more money or atleast give even more SUB PAR service.
The problem is their network. Thats why MMS took so long and now tethering is so far outta site. Classic case of their mouth writing a check their ass cant cash!! -
the Cat is out of the bag! Is ATT Uverse next for metered data plans?
betcha it is!
