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Apple May Need To Rethink 4G Claims (and Pay Refunds) In More Countries
redletterdave writes "After the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) won a battle with Apple after alleging the Cupertino-based company was misleading customers about its third-generation iPad, authorities in other countries are now assessing the compatibility of the new iPad with local 4G LTE networks to see if their customers should deserve refunds too. The UK's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) confirmed on Tuesday that it is investigating complaints of Apple's misleading '4G' claim, while Sweden and Denmark are also reportedly considering investigations, after agencies within both countries received 'several complaints' from customers about 4G connectivity. Even though these countries carry broad LTE coverage, the new iPad isn't supported on any of those networks."
Currently, there's not a single commercial 4G network deployed anywhere on the planet. LTE is officially 3.9G, so every manufacturer or carrier that advertises 4G is bullshitting just as much as Apple. Which doesn't make it better, but still.
The LTE modem doesn't work anywhere else in the world.
Then there's the whole DC-HSPA+ 4G "Faux-G" debate.
And, if you're on AT&T the new iPad will display 4G for HSPA+. Apple: fighting the corner of the users.
(reading the fine print..) "but you may not be able to drive at the maximum speed depending on the laws in your country"
"I cry foul! You promised me I could drive this car at 100mph! None of the roads in my area allow that speed! Liars! I want money!"
sad. Brain. You have one. Use it. I'm not your Captain Obvious.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
AT&T "4G" is a joke here. After a week of running around looking for WiFi in order to even use my iPad here in Los Angeles (supposedly one of AT&T's "LTE" markets), I finally returned the iPad for a Verizon model. It's a completely different device. 12-15mbps down / 5-10mbps up throughout LA and the valley. The AT&T model of the iPad is *not* a 4G device...
"Owning a computer is like having your very own TV -- with a built in radio!" - Ed Helms
http://www.apple.com/uk/ipad/
Ultra-fast 4G. Full speed ahead.
Designed with next-generation wireless technology, the new iPad with Wi-Fi + 4G connects to fast data networks around the world.
http://www.apple.com/uk/ipad/
Ultra-fast 4G. Full speed ahead.
Designed with next-generation wireless technology, the new iPad with Wi-Fi + 4G connects to fast data networks around the world.*
* Only in America. Fixed that for them.
It specifically says which LTE networks are supported. Is the new standard for ads now to be that only the largest print claims count?
If they sell their iPad in $country saying it 'supports LTE' than yes, as a customer I expect to be able to use LTE in THAT COUNTRY. Putting in the fine print 'only if your in the US or Canada' is misleading advertisement.
That may not be a problem in the US, but in other parts of the world, especially in Europe, ads are expected to be truthful and not misleading. Trying to wiggle out by using the fine print to basically negate the statments you make in big letters may run afoul to consumer protection.
And I still wonder: Why did Apple use a chipset that only supports the LTE frequencies used in the US and Canada? There are chipsets that support the other frequencies.
Would it have been to expensive to build two or three different models for different markets? Would it have been to expensive to use a chipset that supports all frequencies (assuming such a beast exists)?
Or is it just once again the America-centric world view that Apple (and other companies) have shown more than once in the past?
Yeah, that is misleading - even if it dose say at the bottom:
It implies that 4G will work "around the world", yet it only works in the US and Canada... not even the UK market where this is advertised. The Australian page has the exact same copy.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
You have a lot to learn about how consumer protection laws work over here. Yes, you can't claim one thing in the largest letters in the ads if the consumer can't reasonably expect it to be true. However, the reporting is a bit overblown as they're only thinking about starting an investigation. Quoting the Swedish Consumer Agency (my own error-prone translation of a MacWorld article at http://macworld.idg.se/2.1038/1.440631/konsumentverket-granskar-apple):
"- This is probably something we have to look into, it isn't totally obvious, says Marek Andresson, jurist at the Swedish Consumer Agency to the news agency TT.
- This advertisement might satisfy the demands of the law, but it could have been clearer. It needs to be correct and not misleading. It is only two countries on another continent where the product works according to the ads. But at the same time Apple isn't withholding information, says Marek Andersson."
My thoughts also. The ACCC don't need to 'battle' with corporations. They make a ruling, and that's it.
In Finland they have same problem. They're adverising 4G features, even if those aren't supported in Finnish frequencies. Finnish operators are also advertising DC-HSPA as 4G even if it isn't. As far as I know only LTE Advanced would be real 4G. This is just like LED-televisions. Well, why they still got that LCD element there? It shouldn't be needed at all when you got real LED-tv.
>>>Ultra-fast 4G. Full speed ahead..... the new iPad with Wi-Fi + 4G connects to fast data networks around the world.
Except 4G only works in North america. I didn't realize the U.S. and Canada were now considered "the world". Wow. Did the Congress bomb everyone else into oblivion?
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
As a Sprint customer living in Raleigh NC I can attest that for the most part their claims of 3G let alone 4G are a farce. Data network coverage is spotty down to the individual home on the individual street. If you move literally 50 ft your coverage drops out. Speed tests regularly show 1kpbs down and 0.1 kbps up. But since Sprint charges you $10/month for every phone which CAN access 4G whether it actually does or even whether Sprint offers the service where the phone is used, this is how they get around the 'unlimited no caps' issue that the other carriers have. They simply charge everyone for what does not exist and this makes up for the bandwidth hogs.
And a VW Beetle is faster than a Porsche even when the Porsche is in excellent condition with a skilled driver behind the wheel. But if I bought a Beetle based only on it being "faster than a Porsche", and then discovered it wasn't, I'd be rather pissed off.
How is Apple's 4G chicanery any different?
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
>>> Is the new standard for ads now to be that only the largest print claims count?
That's why ISPs are getting sued for claiming "unlimited" internet, even if the 1-point-size print clarifies that it is only 5 gigabytes.
BTW Sony got in trouble in the EU for advertising PS3s as supporting "other OSes" like Linux and then turning-off that feature. They had to refund money to customers, even if the purchase had occurred two years earlier. You don't false-advertise in the EU and get away with it.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
I'm happy that we are looking into this. Thing is, Sweden actually has the oldest LTE network in the world, so if an ad mentions LTE at all, obviously we would assume that we could use it, but the new iPad doesn't work on our network is because it uses different frequencies from the US network.
Yes, maybe at some point in the future it will work around the world. Currently, the only places it will work on "4G" are the US and Canada.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
ANNNDD... it's now been reworded. Hope someone had a copy of the original page.
Waiting for an amusing sig.
I have AT&T in the DC Metro area here with "4g" (HSPA+).
It's pretty rare that I can even break 1mbps, let alone the theoretical max of 14mbps. The very best I've seen is around 5mbps and that was in one very rare instance.
Seriously until they can get at least near LTE speeds which are close to broadband, it's pretty ridiculous for them to claim they've leapt forward a generation.
America IS the center of the world and, barring the current administration, is unashamed of the fact. Sheesh. Get over it.
Facts take all of the premium out of arm waving - T. Reynolds
It specifically says which LTE networks are supported. Is the new standard for ads now to be that only the largest print claims count?
Yes. In much or Europe that's been the standard for a while. These cases aren't tried in court where the standard is "can a lawyer prove that the ad is technically correct" but are investigated by industry regulators such as the ASA in the UK, where:
So they may also take into account what the typical customer understands by "4G" which (whatever the ITU and T-Mobile USA say) is used in Europe almost exclusively to refer to forthcoming LTE or WiMax networks - whereas HSPA+ etc. are still called 3G - see e.g. Ofcom, the UK telecoms regulatory authority:
...and that's the beef: some EU countries already have 4G (meaning LTE) networks, while others (e.g. the UK) are planning them within the lifetime of a nice new iPad, so seeing a product with "iPad with WiFi and 4G" on the box in large friendly letters does imply that you should expect some future proofing in terms of coverage and carrier choice, if not speed. Even if customers aren't crying into their beer because they've found out that their 3G is just as good as current US 4G, the practice of selling kit as "4G" - in countries where that doesn't mean what people think that it means - is well worth nipping in the bud before every manufacture jumps on the bandwagon and causes mass confusion.
Oh, and its not worth shouting "Aha!" and linking to bits of the Apple website, because Apple have already made changes to the specific wording and footnotes on their international sites this subject since this fuss started.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
...it's "Offer" refunds.
Sure, you can give Apple back the iPad, and they'll give you your money back.
It's not like Apple will have trouble selling that iPad, and now you don't have one anymore.
Winners everyone on this one, eh?
Except that the LTE frequencies the ipad supports are already occupied in the UK by freeview; our over-the-air digital TV network that is pretty much rolled out country wide now, and is the way the vast majority of people watch TV. The odds of those frequencies being available for use in the UK for LTE wireless are... slim, to say the least. IIRC, general-use LTE spectrum is earmarked to be taken from the current analog TV bands, once the last transmitters are switched off - the auctions are scheduled for 2013. And the ipad radio won't work on those frequencies. The same is true across most (all?) of europe.
Long story short - the new ipad will only ever be a 3.5G (HSPA+) device in the UK, same as the previous version and virtually everything else with a 3G chip in it that's on the shelves. Marketing it as a '4G' device - against others which WILL offer LTE support in the UK, either on the current limited trial networks (O2 have a couple), or when it starts to roll out more generally next year - is a big fat marketing lie. Putting it in big print as a feature - the 'Wi-fi + 4G' model - will mislead people into thinking it will work for them _here_ not only if they go on holiday to the US and get a data-roaming sim there.
I hope the ASA slaps them with a fat fine, orders them to revise all their adverts to remove the claims, and compensation should be made available to those customers who bought the product because they were mislead by the headline advertising into thinking the ipad 3 can do something that it cannot, and never will.
Remember kids, it's all fun and games until someone commits wholesale galactic genocide.
I should have added "Stupid advertisers" to this post. I was criticizing them.
My AC stalker: " I personally agree with your posts most of the time, but that won't keep me from modding you troll"
That sort of fix sounds like one that "only works in America" too. EU has specific laws that forbid this kind of bait and switch in small print, and Apple has clearly ran afoul of these laws in its marketing.
The product is called "iPad with Wi-Fi + 4G", and it will connect to fast data networks around the world. Is 3G fast?
It is a terrible shame that "LTE" doesn't describe a data network around the world. Are there any products that can roam worldwide on LTE?
I'm quite literate and I find this literature misleading. Just because it is technically correct does not make it any less misleading. I like Apple and their products, but I don't like ads like this.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
You think that's bad? This Australian specific page on the Apple website makes me think straight away that Optus Virgin and Telstra are the phone companies that I need to talk to in order to get the full benefits of the iPad.
Telstra's 4G network doesn't work on the frequency used by the iPad, and the other two companies don't even offer 4G, not even HSPA+.
If you think that I'll be happy to sell you a car. It will naturally work around the world but you'll need to find a fuel station that offers an unobtainium catalyst to use it.
Is the new standard for ads now to be that only the largest print claims count?
No. The standard isn't new. This is what you get when you have a consumer watchdog that actually makes sure the little folk don't get shafted. It's also why you won't see an advertisement for "Unlimited* Broadband" in Australia.
You don't need fineprint. It's not like Apple America wrote the Australian adverts. There are country specific ads, and country specific websites. Don't support 4G here because the radio in the device doesn't use our frequency bands? Don't advertise it as WiFi+4G.
It really is that simple.
Until now the world has bene DOMINATED by business operating under the "well yes but NOT IN YOUR PART OF THE WORLD" methodology.
And nobody (with a voice) thought that was a bad thing.
Suddenly companies are discovering that insert weasel words here is insufficient protection from lawsuits and punitive damages.
It's about time!
For the life of me I do not understand why "if you cannot deliver said functionality in a given country, then YOU CANNOT MARKET UNDER SAID TECHNOLOGY BANNER (in said country)" is such a difficult concept.
Here's hoping for a groundswell realisation that you cannot have your cake and eat it too applies to corporations as well as it applies to individuals.
Visit CryptoGnome in his home.
Does someone sell tickets to that in Australia?
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
I didn't realize the U.S. and Canada were now considered "the world". Wow.
I take it you're not a baseball fan...
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
Actually, here in Norway, the consumer watchdog has already decided that Apple has been misleading in their advertising of the iPad as 4G. Last time I checked, Norway was in Europe.
for i in `facebook friends "=bday" 2>/dev/null | cut -d " " -f 3-`; do facebook wallpost $i "Happy birthday!"; done