Slashdot Mirror
AT&T Defends Controversial FaceTime Policy Following Widespread Backlash
zacharye writes "AT&T is wasting no time hitting back at critics of its decision to limit the use of popular video chat app FaceTime over its cellular network to users who sign up for its shared data plans. In a post on the company's official public policy blog on Wednesday, AT&T chief privacy officer Bob Quinn sneered at criticisms that restricting FaceTime over cellular to shared data plans violates the Federal Communications Commission's network neutrality rules for wireless networks."
Bullshit!
They just don't want to bother upgrading, it is more profitable to rate limit and jack up prices.
If that fails, you could try one of the complaint departments AT&T actually listens to.
http://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/index.html
http://www.t-mobile.com/
http://shop.sprint.com/mysprint/shop/phone_wall.jsp?filterString=apple&isDeeplinked=true&INTNAV=ATG:HE:iPhones
Their thinking simply doesn't make any sense.
- Androids are outselling iPhones (globally, maybe not AT&T specifically)
- iPhones currently don't have real 4G, which is over 3x faster than 3G on AT&T's network
- Android users now consume more data, faster, and put more strain on the wireless network at any given time, compared to iPhone users
- Skype is available on all major platforms and works over even 3G; quality is surely better on 4G/LTE.
And yet, they're blocking Facetime "out of an overriding concern for the impact this expansion may have on our network and the overall customer experience"??
Logic fail, AT&T. Just admit you're being greedy bastards and think iPhone users are more easily ripped off, that way you'll just be extortionists without also being liars.
The controversy is that this is the latest in a long line of examples of AT&T bitching about people overburdening their poor network with their evil data-hogging ways instead of spending a goddamn dime to upgrade it from its current twine-and-tin-can infrastructure into something that can handle the needs of a 21st-century world superpower.
Everything you just said is valid, and parallels the situation with another utility, namely the power grid. All of the arguments against why we can't have rural cell coverage were previously used to explain why we can't have a rural electrical grid.
The answer turned out to be that government needed to set up power companies, and that utilities needed to be publicly-owned or closely watched and directed (i.e., regulated). Initiatives like the Tennessee Valley Authority meant that my grandparents got to trade in their lanterns and candles for electric lights.
The simple fact is that there are a few core infrastructure industries that need to be either publicly-held (power, water, sanitation, mail) or kept on a very, very tight leash (Banking, see "Glass-Steagal").
AT&T is making a very convincing case that communications infrastructure -- which was already developed and built by tax dollars -- needs to be another publicly-held infrastructure. Here's how you know this is true.
Every time some local municipality gets together and starts putting up their own wreless network, the telecom lobbyists always descend like locusts screaming that "It's not fair to make us compete against government entities!" What they're saying is that private companies in this industry, with their need for profit, can't ever be as efficient as a public effort. All that means is that as technology has progressed, we've simply discovered another industry that operates as a classic "market failure."
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."