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Apple and AT&T Sued, Again, Over 3G
Macworld is reporting that Apple and AT&T are being sued, again, for the lack of delivery on their 3G network. This follows a long line of other lawsuits in San Jose, San Diego, Alabama, Florida, Texas, and New York "The lawsuit charges the companies with Negligence, Breach of Express Warranty, Breach of Implied Warranty of Merchantability, Unjust Enrichment, Negligent Misrepresentation, Violation of the New Jersey Consumer Fraud Act and Other Similar State Statutes, and Breach of Contract. Dickerson is seeking to force Apple and AT&T to correct its labeling and advertising, as well as to recover compensatory, statutory and punitive damages."
The problem with AT&T's 3G is that the connection from your phone to their tower is fast but their tower's connection to the internet is 14k baud dial-up or something. Some towers don't even have internet connectivity, I was on a mountain with 5 bars of 3G, parked, and had no internet connectivity whatsoever. I drove down a small town nearby and it worked fine, except of course for that slow page loading issue.
Except they are.
They claim it does all this wonderful stuff, you buy it and it doesn't work as promised*.
You cant switch providers or get your money back.
In that enviroment suing is the only avenue a consumer has.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Um.. yes, AT&T _IS_ forcing one to use their service. You remember that little thing called a contract?
Granted, nobody forced me to *choose* them, but once they are chosen - I'm locked in for two years!
But what happens when after 6 months or 1 year my service begins to suck? Have I no recourse?
I have no idea if this lawsuit has merit or not, but an attitude of 'don't like it, don't use it' is likely an oversimplification of the situation.
If they weren't locked into a contract, they wouldn't have to sue over it.
Most purchases can be returned when the product doesn't work as advertised. Usually this is because the store has a return policy to keep their customers happy, but some of the time it's the law.
In this case, there not only isn't a policy like that, there's a contract guaranteeing that you have to -continue- paying for it.
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
But it handles WiFi data just fine which is in most cases faster than 3G. I doubt the phone itself is the issue.
Listen, new guy, a word of advice: don't be so quick to jump to a corporate giant's defense here on Slashdot. You'll thank me later. Just toss out a "lame" and be done with it.
Pull your head out of your ass about cell companies screwing American's. AT&T is GSM, verizon is Cdma of one type, sprint is CDMA of another incompatible type. This isn't Europe where everyone uses GSM. In order to switch GSM carriers in the USA you have a chploice of at&t or tmobile in some cities. Tmobile for me is as useful as using posion ivy leaves for toliet paper.
You need a whole other phone if you want to use verizon or sprint.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
WiFi works well, so it's not the CPU on the phone. At least here in NYC the problem is not even the slow speed, as much as the the network is so oversubscribed that the phone can't get any response and the browser just times out.
ssh lag is a really bad example. 3g has reasonable bandwidth but rather high latency. Stuff like ssh will always visibly lag, and this is not at all specific to AT&T.
The problem is network dimensioning and issues of the backhaul connection between the NodeB and the RNC. There are multiple configuration of the NodeB which provides for different Data Rates. There is 384 kbs, 1.8 mbps, 3.6 mbps and 7.2 mbps. AT&T was not interested in 7.2 Mbps until late 2007. In order to support these data rates, there must be a significant connection to the backhaul based for the most part on a number of T1 Lines. AT&T is attempting to dimension their networks based on current data usage so they will always be behind. This is due to cost and many other reasons. There is no reason to equip Nut New Mexico with a 7.2 Mb capable cells. Even on the device side, It is cheaper toi buy a device based on HSDPA only rather than HSUPA/HSDPA.
You can cancel your contract. You'll pay a nice penalty, but you can cancel.
Why should I pay a penalty if the other party didn't uphold its end of the agreement?