So, what do you do when you, eg, want to download something big and aren't sure whether you are still in WiFi range or even just merely connected to WiFi successfully while in landscape mode? Whether your phone switches to cellular once it reaches 1 bar of WiFi or once it reaches 0 bars of WiFi (or if it fails to properly connect to WiFi), if you want to be sure, you have to check regardless of this setting.
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Apple Hit With Class Action Lawsuit for New Wi-Fi Assist Feature
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That's why you posted about it way ahead of the thread? By the way, where is that post?
I've seen people on this forum who are willing and happy to create lawsuits over small things that doesn't even matter.
Who you ask? Anyone who's lives depends on funding their lifestyle from lawsuits and the court system. I'm not just talking about judges and lawyers. All those millions has to go into someone's pocket, and it isn't yours.
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Well, that already happens once we hit 0 bars of WiFi. Now it happens with 1 bar of WiFi. What's the difference? Is there something that would alert us when we hit 0 bar that wouldn't alert us when we hit 1 bar? No, nothing will alert us in either situation. If we stream music (eg, Spotify et al.), and we go to a part of our house where the WiFi cuts out (hits 0 bar), it'll switch to cellular (if we have allowed Spotify to use cellular) without our knowledge, it now switches to cellular when it drops down to 1 bar.
The only thing we can do is either make sure we restrict anything potentially large (in particular anything particular large that runs in the background) to cellular only or to manually check before we initiate something big. And this feature already is restricted to foreground apps and doesn't allow for music or video streaming nor the downloading of files.
I'm a nice guy.... You're a nice company with a lot of money... Why don't you share a little? Eh Eh?
For reals though, I can see where this lawsuit is coming from, but $5 million dollars?
Right. Because William Scott Phillips and Suzanne Schmidt Phillips have a limit of 100 MB of data usage each month.
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Did they not pay attention to the texts from their carrier that warned them that they were approaching their data cap?
Apple should show a message when it switches to cellular for the first time. But otherwise I'm with bigjinfla, far more people will benefit from having this feature that they would have never learned about otherwise than those that will be harmed by it.
The only thing that changed is signal strength value below which the phone disconnects from WiFi. It already disconnects when the signal strength drops below a certain level, every kind of radio does this. Now, that level can be optionally raised. People know that WiFi can cut out once the move away too far from the access point, now it just cuts out a little bit earlier. If people need to pay attention to their WiFi signal, they now just have to recalibrate their habits of where WiFi might start to cut out. You neighbour getting any kind of RF device could change where your WiFi cuts out due to interference at any moment. If something is mission-critical, one has to be alert about it regardless of this feature.
I'd like to understand this better. The first step when being faced with a much-increased cellular data usage is to check which apps are causing it, and then if this isn't enough to figure things out is to keep taps as to when the data usage goes up, in as much as checking even multiple times per day what the tally is. I would have thought that this should give a good idea within days.
That fact hasn't changed either, if you see a WiFi icon in the status bar, you are connected to WiFi, if you don't see one, you are not. So what is new?
You agreed to the data cap when you signed up. That's not their fault. My data use is way up since iOS9. Almost 50%. My office and house contantly roam between different wifi hotspots and I bet Apple is switching to LTE a lot. I turned the feature off and my data has gone back down considerably. I have 6 phones on my family plan, so it was really eating up the data.
I will sue apple if it's off by default. Seriously, why created something that increase the smoother user experience but make it off by default? Which idiot who came out with this idea?
I agree to the lawsuit, mostly because the wi-fi assist was in default turned on and I didn't know it existed like anyone else. I have my Facebook only use wi-fi....so when I connect to somewhere like panera and start checking Facebook, then the internet.....I use it thinking I have connected to the wi-fi....I don't monitor if I am still connected to wifi....so I used a good chunk of my data limit in a few days before I realized there was something going on. I had to pretty much turn off my data on my cell phone to make sure I didn't go over my cap at the end of the month.
While I wasn't unfortunate to have an overage I could see how it could happen, and I would hold apple responsible for changing how I was connecting to the internet without explicitly letting me know.
While I wasn't unfortunate to have an overage I could see how it could happen, and I would hold apple responsible for changing how I was connecting to the internet without explicitly letting me know.
I checked just when leaving my house - Usually when I’m at my driveway, it gets down to two bars of Wifi. Today it was already on LTE.
Again, I personally don’t really care, but there you go.
Yes, I’d agree people should be turning off cellular for apps they don’t use when outside.
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How small is your data limit for this to be a problem? I do speak form a smug place - unlimited 4g - but I knew about this from day one and did turn it off on my mums phone after swapping over her sim as she has a limit - didn't they mention the feature at wwdc keynote? Also don't people use data monitors - I put one on my mums phone - took her monthly limit divided by 31 and set the alert with some rounding down
You absolutely do realize you're using cellular. Before iOS 9, my iPhone would show the wifi icon and refuse to switch to cellular while in my house (or even a half a block away). Now I see it switching to LTE/3G all the time depending on where I am in the house.
So what if it dropped wifi because of a bad connection like it would before iOS 9 as well?
Data charges can be significant ... I understand the plaintiff's concerns.
Besides people on this forum and other techies, most people don't watch WWDC keynotes. The feature is buried under several menus and there is no warning that the feature is enabled.
As for data monitors - no, most people don't have those installed.
And as for data caps, they're generally quite low and expensive in North America, and if you roam, it can cost a bundle.
Wow you really got me. I have been destroyed and beaten. Why so angry? Let me explain. The common phrase "saw that coming a mile away" does not literally mean you predicted the future. It means something happened and you COULD have very easily guessed it. In this case someone takes advantage of the system by suing over something dumb. Why so angry? It's a common term most people are familiar with. But you are correct sir. The post of me saying this will happen does not exist. Are you a lawyer? Is that why my innocuous post seems to have affected you so?
Does Apple profit from this?
Let me guess...you stayed up all night waiting to preorder an ATV. Grab your blanket and lie down. There'll be plenty left after your nap.
Let me guess...you stayed up all night waiting to preorder an ATV. Grab your blanket and lie down. There'll be plenty left after your nap.
Wow. What's your issue? Didn't preorder but wanted to. Actually at hospital. Wife is about to have our baby but playing the waiting game right now. Hopefully soon!! Try to calm down buddy. Not sure why you're so angry.
My carrier shows the data I use. There's even an app on my device. I check my usage almost daily. It's MY responsibility to check on my usage.
It's called being a responsible consumer.
I can actually create a report to show usage for last three bills. And it shows me that WiFi Assist was not the greatest contributor to my data usage; rather, Apple Music was, when I streamed music. So I opted to have everything made available offline.
These are tools available to any consumer who takes responsibility for his/her own actions rather than go on a money grab through any excuse.
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