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Sorry, you are generalizing like crazy. I get great signal and service in my area with AT&T. I have NEVER had a dropped call that I can recall in 4 years with AT&T.

Key words being: "your area"

I've travelled all over the US with my iphone, and I can say that AT&T in fact, blows. Dropped calls all over the place, and 3G/EDGE that constantly fails.
 
Anyone notice the math problems here? ATT activates 3.2 million- a RECORD number (whoo hoo!). Yet Apple sells 7.4 million over the same period. So of all iPhones sold, ATT cannot even pull HALF as customers.

Looks like an epic fail to me over at ATT. Maybe the headline should be that even as the exclusive providor, over half the customers have to hack their phones to AVOID ATT....
 
Anyone notice the math problems here? ATT activates 3.2 million- a RECORD number (whoo hoo!). Yet Apple sells 7.4 million over the same period. So of all iPhones sold, ATT cannot even pull HALF as customers.

Looks like an epic fail to me over at ATT. Maybe the headline should be that even as the exclusive providor, over half the customers have to hack their phones to AVOID ATT....

Not true.

A lot of iPhones are sold in Europe and Canada, so the bulk of those should be legally activated devices.
 
Key words being: "your area"

I've travelled all over the US with my iphone, and I can say that AT&T in fact, blows. Dropped calls all over the place, and 3G/EDGE that constantly fails.

Have someone check your iPhone. I travel all over too....very few issues....not any more than my previous provider.
 
I love how we make AT&T so much money and bring so many people to them but yet they have horrible service EVERYWHERE and they can't even upgrade their systems for Tethering like they promised.
Here's the breakdown of the math behind your statement:

$18 billion = what AT&T is spending on network improvements in 2009

If the average iPhone user "makes" AT&T $100/month, then AT&T is spending the equivalent of everything that they'll make from 15 MILLION iPhone users in 2009 .... just for 2009 network improvements.

Do you even know if AT&T has 15 million iPhone users?

There's no denying that AT&T has some serious service issues in some areas. But I don't see how you can try to flip this around that they're sitting there, getting rich off of iPhone users, when it appears that they're spending more in yearly upgrades than the total of what they make from iPhone users?!
 
No wonder the network is stressed...

Not true.

A lot of iPhones are sold in Europe and Canada, so the bulk of those should be legally activated devices.

....if you do the math, in this past quarter AT&T accounted for 43% of all the iPhones sold. Think about it....one network provider in one country (out of how many providers in 80+ countries that sell the iPhone?) accounts for this much volume.
 
Anyone notice the math problems here? ATT activates 3.2 million- a RECORD number (whoo hoo!). Yet Apple sells 7.4 million over the same period. So of all iPhones sold, ATT cannot even pull HALF as customers.

Looks like an epic fail to me over at ATT. Maybe the headline should be that even as the exclusive providor, over half the customers have to hack their phones to AVOID ATT....
AFAIK, the 7.4 million iPhone sales for Apple were worldwide, not just AT&T.
 
....if you do the math, in this past quarter AT&T accounted for 43% of all the iPhones sold. Think about it....one network provider in one country (out of how many providers in 80+ countries that sell the iPhone?) accounts for this much volume.

And that's the point I was trying to convey to carfac...
 
No wonder Verizon's so desperate.

Yeah, those guys at Verizon are some kind of geniuses all right....

AT&T had a strong quarter --- thanks to Tracfone. AT&T Wireless gained 1.385 million postpaid subscribers, lost 176K prepaid subscribers and gained 817K of MVNO (Tracfone) subscribers. When Verizon Wireless announces its result, they will probably say that they gained 1.3 million postpaid subscribers --- iphone fanbois will say that Verizon is a massive fail, but in reality VZW is at a virtual tie with AT&T Wireless on a full iphone launch quarter.

AT&T's total ARPU ain't going to move a lot upward because 1.28 million new iphone subscribers at $100 each month gets combined with 817K of Tracfone subscribers with $15 ARPU each month.

Yes, AT&T's postpaid churn has reduced to Verizon Wireless' level --- but it is less impressive because AT&T has 20 million fewer postpaid subscribers than Verizon Wireless.
 
AT&T had a strong quarter --- thanks to Tracfone. AT&T Wireless gained 1.385 million postpaid subscribers, lost 176K prepaid subscribers and gained 817K of MVNO (Tracfone) subscribers. When Verizon Wireless announces its result, they will probably say that they gained 1.3 million postpaid subscribers --- iphone fanbois will say that Verizon is a massive fail, but in reality VZW is at a virtual tie with AT&T Wireless on a full iphone launch quarter.

AT&T's total ARPU ain't going to move a lot upward because 1.28 million new iphone subscribers at $100 each month gets combined with 817K of Tracfone subscribers with $15 ARPU each month.

Yes, AT&T's postpaid churn has reduced to Verizon Wireless' level --- but it is less impressive because AT&T has 20 million fewer postpaid subscribers than Verizon Wireless.

Hhmmm, interesting way to explain... Considering there's a MAP for that!?! :eek:
 
It just goes to show how significant the iPhone was/is to those companies that got exclusive deals.

In the UK, o2 (which got the exclusive deal) became the larges mobile operator in the last 2 years because of the iPhone!
They took the crown from the Vodafone.
If the merger of tmobile & orange is allowed, they will become the largest operator but that will be simply be from two large companies merging, not from growth as in o2's case.

I don't think a lot of people realise sometimes just how big of an impact Apple has made with the iPhone.

Its also probably why Nokia are now going after Apple for patent infringement now, whilst Nokia is a huge company, they are hurting from all this make no mistakes. They are strong and will survive, they have good products coming out all the time to compete with touch screen technology, but I think their survival instincts is telling them, if we can claw something back from Apple, why not!
 
It means the same lousy company that assisted the government in illegally eavesdropping on U.S. citizens makes even MORE profit providing inferior service.

Are you referring to the Echelon Project that monitors all foreign and domestic traffic of every person going back to the 70's or FISA that monitors traffic between known terrorists?

AT&T is so evil. I guess Google is evil too.
 
It just goes to show how significant the iPhone was/is to those companies that got exclusive deals.

It's the chicken and the egg problem. The carriers that got the iphone exclusive deals are the carriers that were most desperate in the first place (desperate enough to pay a king's ransom for the iphone exclusivity).
 
I think it's for AT&T letting the NSA setup shop on its backbone, to allegedly illegally wiretap and data-mine.

http://www.eff.org/cases/att

So is this under Echelon, FISA, or neither? If we are talking about the NSA, this has been done under Echelon going back to the 70's.

I mean I guess everyone got all worked up over FISA so the timing makes sense but Echelon is MUCH farther reaching and has been going on MUCH longer.

I'm just trying to understand which one we are demonizing. Or is it just AT&T because they won't give us free stuff?
 
So is this under Echelon, FISA, or neither? If we are talking about the NSA, this has been done under Echelon going back to the 70's.

I mean I guess everyone got all worked up over FISA so the timing makes sense but Echelon is MUCH farther reaching and has been going on MUCH longer.

I'm just trying to understand which one we are demonizing. Or is it just AT&T because they won't give us free stuff?
As I understand it, this was something that the NSA unofficially asked of telecom companies. Many told the NSA to pack sand, but AT&T was one of the companies that went along with it. AFAIK, it's not part of anything "official", like Echelon or FISA.
 
As I understand it, this was something that the NSA unofficially asked of telecom companies. Many told the NSA to pack sand, but AT&T was one of the companies that went along with it. AFAIK, it's not part of anything "official", like Echelon or FISA.

I'll admit that I'm not familiar with AFAIK because it's really pointless when you have Echelon. Unfortunately, it's not like a double negative canceling each other out though. To complain about AFAIK or FISA is hardly scratching the surface. It's convenient that people either don't know about or completely dismiss Echelon.

But I'm sure that guy wouldn't care too much if he got free tethering, free text, and service through 1,000 foot thick lead walls. I mean Superman definitely can't so why would AT&T work? But if it did for only $30 a month than it's worth it. Right?
 
Key words being: "your area"

I've travelled all over the US with my iphone, and I can say that AT&T in fact, blows. Dropped calls all over the place, and 3G/EDGE that constantly fails.

No....actually...the key work was "EVERYWHERE" in the post I was replying to. If my area is great then "EVERYWHERE" doesn't apply. :cool:

Steve
 
AT&T had a strong quarter --- thanks to Tracfone. AT&T Wireless gained 1.385 million postpaid subscribers, lost 176K prepaid subscribers and gained 817K of MVNO (Tracfone) subscribers. When Verizon Wireless announces its result, they will probably say that they gained 1.3 million postpaid subscribers --- iphone fanbois will say that Verizon is a massive fail, but in reality VZW is at a virtual tie with AT&T Wireless on a full iphone launch quarter.

AT&T's total ARPU ain't going to move a lot upward because 1.28 million new iphone subscribers at $100 each month gets combined with 817K of Tracfone subscribers with $15 ARPU each month.

Yes, AT&T's postpaid churn has reduced to Verizon Wireless' level --- but it is less impressive because AT&T has 20 million fewer postpaid subscribers than Verizon Wireless.


So...what you're saying is that Verizon would never have benefitted at all had THEY been the ones to make the iPhone deal with Apple?

:D:D:D:D:D
 
Do doubt, would be nice to see them reinvest some of this into the network

They spent 19 billion last year and they are supposed to be spending 18 billion this year.

Is that enough? I don't know, but they are reinvesting money in their network.
 
Good for AT&T as a corporation.

But people are being ripped off. I lived in France for a year and a half until this month when I returned to the US and I had an iPhone over there with Orange and my plan was €39 a month which included 240 minutes talk (keep in mind ALL incoming calls are free) a €3 a month discount for being under 26, unlimited texts and the unlimited data. Everything worked, always had service because european GSM is more developed than AT&T's. Oh and tethering and MMS worked ON THE DAY it was released. Not only that but the phone at the time cost me €99 when the same 8GB 3G was going for $199 under contract by AT&T. It was actually affordable to own an iPhone. And after competition was allowed with the iPhone opened to the 2 other carriers SFR and Bouygues the plans were lowered in price.

The cheapest plan you can get here is $70 minus taxes and if you want unlimited texts that's an extra $20. So for a similar plan in the US I would have to pay over $100 a month after taxes. That's pretty outrageous, which is why I decided to sell my legally unlocked iPhone here (see Orange did it once I left, but AT&T won't even do that even after your 2 years are up) and stay with Verizon. I did not want to give up using my iPhone because it is the best phone I have ever used, but I cannot justify paying over $100 a month for the plan and living in New York I know how awful coverage is by AT&T here. Yes Verizon has similar data plans etc, but at least they work most of the time. With AT&T you are getting ripped off and charged for a service that doesn't work.

Glad for all of you who can afford $100 a month and get get good coverage but really the iPhone would be much better served if it was allowed in other carriers for some price competition. Why does it have to be so expensive in the US and so cheap in Europe?

Solution: Move back to France.
 
That explains why Verizon staged that big press release/conference with Google about a Google phone that they WILL bring out.

I handle Cell contract for my work with Verizon. We have quite a few employees on the contract. Some times the employees want iphone so I call into Verizon to set it up. When the rep asks why the switch to ATT, I tell them iphone and the rep goes 'oh no another one?!'

Verizon is losing customers due to iphone. And they are finally noticing it and reacting to it.
 
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