AT&T CEO on Enterprise iPad Adoption and Wireless Voice Quality Improvements

[4nNtt]

They probably are investing as much as possible. Freeing spectrum and running backhaul takes time. There are only so many people you can throw at it. The biggest slowdown is probably going through negotiations to run fiberoptic backhaul to the towers. Many of these towers previously used a wireless backhaul, so they need to build from scratch to increase bandwidth. I've noticed big improvements, so they are doing something.

The activation and signup mess with all the iPhone launches should have been done better though. They have had plenty of time to create a backend that scales to this demand.

 

[4nNtt]

I don't know why anyone even pays attention to this kind of BS. It's all profit-motive driven, there will never be anything that comes out of his mouth that is said for any reason other than to drive profits.

The consumer should never sympathize, never side with, and never accept these companies as equals. We should always look at them critically as opponents who's profit motive always puts them in conflict with our goals, which should be to have better products and services in the marketplace.

ATT- your servers suck, your network sucks, and you do nothing about it but suck up profits.

There will be a massive PR and marketing move when the iPhone goes multi-carrier. New pricing, new plan structuring, etc. in an attempt to keep or win back their customers. And the funny thing is, they will of course spin it as some sort of epiphany, technology breakthrough, or some other BS thing as the reason behind it. "Oh no- we had this planned for about a year- nothing to do with losing iPhone exclusivity," they will say.

Large corporations are not inherently bad or evil. They just will never have their interests aligned with the common good. So they should be treated like that. They aren't our friends, they are not our family, they are not our neighbors. They are companies that make money. Period.

If there is one anti-trust related happening I would like to see rectified in this whole thing, is that carrier exclusivity for devices must come to an end. If it were not for exclusivity, we would not have to deal with this crap.

They are owned by the public, so yes they are our neighbors. They should be trying to make a profit. If they didn't make a profit, you don't want to know how horrible your service would be.

There is no "Common Good" argument here. The closest thing you have to that is the exclusivity agreement. The iPhone wouldn't exist without it so it is pointless to argue about that. When the contract expires and Apple is able to negotiate an agreement with other carriers that uphold our needs then you will have choice. If you remember, Verizon wanted power over the iPhone that would have destroyed the platform. For example, there would be no AppStore today. Common Good is a moving target because it is based on compromise. We have Apple working in our/their favor to negotiate contracts and AT&T working in stockholders/infrastructure favor. Sounds like Common Good to me.

The good news is: If you want one-sided common good, there are plenty of Communist countries to move to. ;-)

 

[samab]

They are owned by the public, so yes they are our neighbors. They should be trying to make a profit. If they didn't make a profit, you don't want to know how horrible your service would be.

There is no "Common Good" argument here. The closest thing you have to that is the exclusivity agreement. The iPhone wouldn't exist without it so it is pointless to argue about that. When the contract expires and Apple is able to negotiate an agreement with other carriers that uphold our needs then you will have choice. If you remember, Verizon wanted power over the iPhone that would have destroyed the platform. For example, there would be no AppStore today. Common Good is a moving target because it is based on compromise. We have Apple working in our/their favor to negotiate contracts and AT&T working in stockholders/infrastructure favor. Sounds like Common Good to me.

The good news is: If you want one-sided common good, there are plenty of Communist countries to move to. ;-)

Now, you are just contradicting yourself with your arguments.

Apple isn't doing "common good" either --- they are doing it for their own profit, which is where the FTC is investigating on why apps are arbitrarily not approved.

If Verizon had the iphone from the start, you would have gotten VZ Navigator on day 1 of the original iphone (which would charge the same $10 month as the other nav apps that arrived on the iphone app store years later). Verizon was never investigated on app non-approvals. Hell, Skype showed up on VZ's RIM store years before Apple's iphone.

 

[CFreymarc]

One of the better AT&T interviews I have seen in years. He identified the lunatic fringe "3% using the lions share of the bandwidth" -- probably on tethered and jail-broken iPhones connected to a Linux server on a laptop that is very mobile and hard to physically trace when a warrant it out to find it. While he had a handful of prepared statements, I'm impressed with his frankness. Also he opposes the attempt of censoring broadband under FCC Title 2. He just won a lot of points from me.

 

[samab]

One of the better AT&T interviews I have seen in years. He identified the lunatic fringe "3% using the lions share of the bandwidth" -- probably on tethered and jail-broken iPhones connected to Linux server. While he had a handful of prepared statements, I'm impressed with his frankness. Also he opposes the attempt of censoring broadband under FCC Title 2. He just won a lot of points from me.

He is certainly miles better than former CEO Ed Whitacre (who now heads GM, god help us all) ranting about being the gatekeeper charging Google a toll fee on the internet super-highway.

 

[CFreymarc]

He is certainly miles better than former CEO Ed Whitacre (who now heads GM, god help us all) ranting about being the gatekeeper charging Google a toll fee on the internet super-highway.

Just proof the Old Boys Network is alive and well. It is fun to do background check on guys like this and find what common charities and country clubs are in common membership.

 

[davidgrimm]

I live in Silicon Valley and if anything, it's gotten worse over the last year. It downright sucks wet donkey balls. I want an iPhone 4 but waiting until fall or next year to see if that mythical Verizon model ever appears.

+1

Me too!

To categorize ATT service as getting "less-than-stellar marks" is to understate how most people feel. They have the worse customer satisfaction marks of any US cellular provider. My contract is up in August and I'm going to a no-contract carrier. If the iphone comes out on another carrier, I'd love to have the new phone. I'm certainly NOT going to sign up for another 2 years of big bills and poor service from ATT.

 

[davidgrimm]

One of the better AT&T interviews I have seen in years. He identified the lunatic fringe "3% using the lions share of the bandwidth" -- probably on tethered and jail-broken iPhones connected to a Linux server on a laptop that is very mobile and hard to physically trace when a warrant it out to find it. While he had a handful of prepared statements, I'm impressed with his frankness. Also he opposes the attempt of censoring broadband under FCC Title 2. He just won a lot of points from me.

Really? I'm guessing you don't actually have an iPhone on their network. My service, which was mediocre at best, has now gotten so bad its hard to have a call that doesn't get dropped. The guy can run his lips all he wants, but its clear to most people that the network quality is getting worse, not better. When he starts delivering what I'm currently paying for, then he'll win points with me.