AT&T Facing Net Neutrality Complaint Over FaceTime Restrictions

Today several public interest groups, including Public Knowledge, announced plans to file a net neutrality complaint with the FCC over AT&T's restriction of FaceTime on iPads and iPhones. Free Press Policy Director Matt Wood said, "AT&T’s decision to block FaceTime unless a customer pays for voice and text minutes she doesn’t need is a clear violation of the FCC’s Open Internet rules. It’s particularly outrageous that AT&T is requiring this for iPad users, given that this device isn’t even capable of making voice calls. AT&T's actions are incredibly harmful to all of its customers, including the deaf, immigrant families and others with relatives overseas, who depend on mobile video apps to communicate with friends and family." The groups have sent a letter (PDF) to AT&T asking them to reconsider their policy. The communications giant has previously responded to complaints by proclaiming their transparency and saying that charging more for being able to use FaceTime over mobile broadband is a "reasonable restriction."

Comments

Pffftttt...no surprise here

[erp_consultant]

AT&T is going to gouge the consumer for every cent they can. The irony, or course, is that Apple trumpets the fact that you can now make Facetime calls over a 3G/4G connection instead of WiFi. But the owner of the pipes (AT&T) is going to restrict how much of it you can use.

Re:Pffftttt...no surprise here

[Nerdfest]

Has anyone heard of any progress on the 'open standard' that FaceTime was promised as?

Re:Pffftttt...no surprise here

[Charliemopps]

Having worked for AT&T in the past I can guarantee you that their thoughts on this issue are "We don't give a shit and there's not a god damned thing apple can do about it."
AT&T is too big, too entrenched, too immovable. Imagine a company, larger than GM, that you were forced to buy your car from. You could not get a car from anyone else without moving. And then, even if you did move, you more than likely would end up in another area where you had to buy a car made by them. Even if you did end up somewhere that had a different company you could buy a car from, that company would be either selling you an ATT car with a different sticker on it, or at least large parts of the car had been made by ATT.. oh yea, and ATT gets to decide what they charge that other company for those parts and they charge a lot more to them, than they do to themselves so it costs more to buy it from someone else to.

That's what we're dealing with here. An entrenched, 100+ year old government sanctioned monopoly that has more clout in Washington you could possibly imagine. You may think "Well, these are cellphones! ATT doesn't own all the towers! I can get Sprint, or Verizon!" Oh yea? And how are those towers connected? How are the cellular regulations set? Who does congress listen to? You want to lay a new fiber trunk? Who owns the right of way? That's right, you need ATTs permission. ATT IS phone service in this country. Period. If apple wants to get away from ATT they are going to have to start communicating with gravitons or some shit... and even then its likely that ATT will complain to congress and get that form of communication rolled into a new telecom act giving them sole ownership of the relevant bosons or something.

Re:Pffftttt...no surprise here

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

No, not even close. (I am curious where the word 'unlimited' came from...)

We pay for AT&T to deliver bits, we don't want AT&T to dictate what those bits can be used for and increase the price based on that.

Clear enough, or are you actually dumb enough to think AT&T has your best interests in mind?

Re:Pffftttt...no surprise here

[ThermalRunaway]

I'd point to Level3 or (what used to be) Qwest or Global Grossing or other companies that own their own nation wide fiber network. Qwest bought a bunch of railroad right of ways and laid fiber all over the place. So no, all the back haul from towers isnt ATT.

Re:Pffftttt...no surprise here

[DigiShaman]

From AT&T iPhone

FaceTime over Cellular
To enable FaceTime over cellular on this account, contact AT&T at 611 or visit http://www.att.com/mywireless

I you re-watch 2001 Space Odyssey, I think that pops up just shortly before he talks on the phone to his daughter on her birthday. No?

Re:Pffftttt...no surprise here

[ThermalRunaway]

Qwest bought USWest, which was a baby bell. Qwest was purchased by CenturyLink, which is not connected to ATT at all.... ya, it WAS all ATT back when the phone system was first rolled out, but it is completely inaccurate to say that now.

Re:Pffftttt...no surprise here

[macs4all]

AT&T is going to gouge the consumer for every cent they can. The irony, or course, is that Apple trumpets the fact that you can now make Facetime calls over a 3G/4G connection instead of WiFi. But the owner of the pipes (AT&T) is going to restrict how much of it you can use.

Um, I know you don't keep up on such things; but Apple has been on carriers other than AT&T for some time now, and they don't all pose restrictions on FaceTime. So it is not in the least disingenuous for Apple to tout that new feature in iOS 6.

Having said that, and as an AT&T customer myself, I think that what they are doing with both FaceTime AND Tethering should be frickin' illegal, even if it isn't. It's my data I'm paying for. AT&T SHOULD be a dumb pipe, nothing more, nothing less...

Re:Pffftttt...no surprise here

[macs4all]

So all you are asking for is unlimited bandwidth at no extra charge. Seems reasonable to me.

No, this is quite different.

Here they are saying that, even though you may be far under your data plan limit, because the packets contain a certain type of data, the common carrier thinks they have a right to pose an arbitrary restriction upon passing them through their network.

Re:Pffftttt...no surprise here

[zoloto]

It's called an iPad data plan. Pick up a sim card for an iPad at an AT&T store, plug it into your phone and visit https://dcp2.att.com/OEPNDClient/ to sign up for one using your iPhone's information. Next go to unlockit.co.nz on your phone (using wifi, of course) and change your APN using their "Create APN" link on the bottom and pick the option "Broadband". Install the new APN profile and presto, your iPhone (or other device if you know how to change your APN) is now usable on an iPad data plan.

I've been using this since the iPad first came out a couple years ago and doing so on my iPhone 3GS and now 4/4S. You can use Skype/Facetime/Mumble or whatever you want all over the cell connection.

But yes, you do pay for an 'open internet access plan'. They don't block any sites or services - but they're trying to do just that with FaceTime and should (probably will) be smacked back by the FCC.

Re:Pffftttt...no surprise here

[GameboyRMH]

The calls are standard SIP w/ H.264 codecs (open?) but it uses a proprietary Apple-hosted HTTP-based lookup service to associate your phone number or email with your SIP URI. AFAIK they've released no details - that bit of info was gained from some reverse-engineering done on the Maemo forums.

Re:Relevant Mitt Romney Quote

[PPH]

Obama campaign promise fulfilled on behalf of certain special interests,

Those special interests being customers who don't want to be gouged for services they don't need nor want?

Re:Relevant Mitt Romney Quote

[speedlaw]

A wholly owned subsidiary. Did you miss the Comcast/Verizon split of the market ? he issue is that technology has finally merged data and "voice". This is the same problem your cable company has when you drop their offerings and subscribe to Netflix or Hulu. Much like the various **AA morons, you may expect the communications providers to fight a rear guard action to support the business model of 1980.

I guess FaceTime -is- revolutionary

[QuasiSteve]

I guess FaceTime isrevolutionary after all.

Here I thought all this time that FaceTime is just another video chat technology, similar to ones that have been included with practically every webcam since the mid 90's, and similar to that which is available in practically every IM app (AIM, MSN, Yahoo!, etc.) and even facebook and Google Mail - except that it was only available for iOS devices and so if you wanted to video chat with a friend using FaceTime, they would have to go out and buy a compatible iDevice to make that happen, making it vastly less useful than the aforementioned.

But apparently I had it wrong;

AT&T's actions are incredibly harmful to all of its customers, including the deaf, immigrant families and others with relatives overseas, who depend on mobile video apps to communicate with friends and family.

I had no idea that these groups are unable to use the aforementioned alternatives. I didn't realize they are all forced to use iDevices on AT&T, and then forced to use FaceTime at that.

Seriously, though.. I'm all for filing the net neutrality complaint, but if these groups are so hard-hit, perhaps they should vote with their dollars and 1. not use AT&T where possible, 2. use an alternative video chat tech, perhaps preferably not on an iDevice in the first place unless Apple feels like opening FaceTime up to other platforms like they suggested they would.

Re:I guess FaceTime -is- revolutionary

[jo_ham]

FaceTime is different to those other methods though, since it just works (assuming you have a capable connection).

It's trivial for most tech-savvy people to set up and use video chatting software - like you say, it's hardly new. What Apple did with FaceTime was make it easy for your grandma to be able to video call her grandkids without having to worry about installing a webcam, or making sure the microphone works and is selected as the right input, or have to download an app for her tablet/phone and make an account.

All of those things are relatively trivial (especially if you walk her through them on the phone), but it can't compare to selecting your daughter's name in your contacts and tapping "FaceTime".

Like many of Apple's selling points, you can drop the "U" from the term "USP" since they are hardly unique - they just work well with minimal fuss.

I will take them to task for not opening the FaceTime protocol up though. Jobs announced on stage during the demo that they were running it as a beta for that time being and would then open it up for third parties later (with the release of Lion, which was when the beta ended). As it stands now you can only FaceTime between iOS devices and any Mac running Lion or Mountain Lion (or a Mac running Snow Leopard if you pay $0.99 to get the app from the store).

Re:I guess FaceTime -is- revolutionary

[AK Marc]

I had no idea that these groups are unable to use the aforementioned alternatives. I didn't realize they are all forced to use iDevices on AT&T, and then forced to use FaceTime at that.

Nope, but right now, they are forced to not use it.

Seriously, though.. I'm all for filing the net neutrality complaint, but if these groups are so hard-hit, perhaps they should vote with their dollars and 1. not use AT&T where possible, 2. use an alternative video chat tech,

AT&T didn't announce this before many people bought and tried it. The easy "solution" to this is for the government to step in and invalidate all AT&T consumer contracts. If you want to leave, do so. Any costs associated will be borne by AT&T alone. It's not a free market when your contract is not honored by the other side, and they make it more expensive to get out of when you are right than just pay it off. That's not capitalism anymore. Capitalism is about making a good product people want to buy, ATT is about lying about their shitty product, getting contracts, then announcing the hidden costs.

Rubbish.

[RightSaidFred99]

Go to someone else, AT&T isn't the only choice. People survived just fine on (now) $10 dumbphones, worst case.

People are so fucking entitled. Sorry, there is no "right to use stupid facetime on your hip Apple product".

All that will happen if you win is they'll just jack up prices for everyone to cover it. At least now it's just a tax on stupid people who pay $100+ a month on their cell phones so they can get a "cheap" $199 iPhone.