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AT&T to Restrict or Charge for FaceTime Over 3G/4G in iOS 6? [Updated With AT&T Statement]
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Well, I can't speak for the US, but in Germany you cannot sign an electricity/phone contract that runs more than two years. So if I sign an unlimited electricity/data plan and it turns out that the company miscalculated the actual use of electricity/data, they could simply not prolong the contract (both sides have this right after two years). This would be okay for me, as it is totally understandable from the company's cost viewpoint.
What is not okay, is if a company charges you differently for the same service. 100 MB of HTTP-surfing cause the same costs for my carrier than 100 MB of FaceTime. The only difference is that FaceTime potentially decreases a different revenue stream in the same company, namely normal voice calls. This gives the company the incentive to prohibit or double-charge the use of data for anything that contests their high profit margin services (voice and SMS), including VoIP, FaceTime, iMessage, WhatsApp, maybe even E-Mail.
However, from an economic viewpoint this is not acceptable, because customers could substitute traditional voice and SMS services by data/IP services that are a lot cheaper, given that the data usage is a more precise measure of the actual costs caused. Just compare the actual data use of SMS and voice minutes to the prices of 1 MB of data transfer.
If this would be two separate companies, one offering data only and another one offering voice only, the voice only company would loose customers unless they lower their prices. In an ideal world you would pay the same amount of money for 1 MB of data, no matter if you send an SMS or E-Mail. But this is what carriers are afraid of. They had high revenue streams with traditional, overpriced services (SMS was a free service once because the costs caused are negligible - until it became popular) and try to preserve those by disallowing/blocking or extra-charging for VoIP and instant messaging wherever they can. This needs to end and only regulation can do this at the moment.
I believe that in five years, carriers will discontinue traditional voice and SMS, disasembling the old transmission technology and will go 100% over 3G/4G/5G data networks. It's up to the customers and regulators whether we will be paying for the actual costs per 1 MB or still for outfashioned "voice minutes" and "160 character text messages".
To be fair here, Facetime does have an enhanced need for lower latency over other data.
If you download a file and you get 10 seconds of 4Mbit/sec, then 4 seconds of 512Kbit/sec, then 10 seconds of 5Mbit/sec, you wouldn't mind at all ( or likely even notice )
If you got that quality of service while using face time you'd be really ticked off.
So I can see an argument for charging a tiny bit more to people who want to use this. I would prefer a charge per "call", but I imagine Apple doesn't permit that.
Not that I like being charged more!
I can agree with that. But again - how would you know if ATT was throttling to prevent video calls, etc just "because" of if they were really being taxed. Same problem - it comes down to "trusting" them. There's no reporting/auditing that is public. There's no place on their website where you can view via a graph or dashboard what the network congestion at any given moment....
Let's Not Forget about iPad tethering!
I wish that Verizon had made their announcement about iPad tethering one day earlier before I bought my iPad 3. I would never have bought the AT&T iPad 3 and I should have swapped it out. I can't believe that Verizon is giving iPad tethering for free and AT&T isn't even offering the service months later (let alone the years that tethering has been on iPhone)!
I too have been a longtime customer and defender of AT&T, but I think I'm just about done. Charging multiple fees to use the same data is unbelievable. It is like Exxon charging me different prices for gas depending on whether it goes in my lawnmower or my car. Who cares, you sell gas for a profit, don't you want to sell me more gas? When Shell across the street is not charging me extra to put gas in my car vs lawnmower, guess where I am going to start buying gas?
I wish that Verizon had made their announcement about iPad tethering one day earlier before I bought my iPad 3. I would never have bought the AT&T iPad 3 and I should have swapped it out. I can't believe that Verizon is giving iPad tethering for free and AT&T isn't even offering the service months later (let alone the years that tethering has been on iPhone)!
I too have been a longtime customer and defender of AT&T, but I think I'm just about done. Charging multiple fees to use the same data is unbelievable. It is like Exxon charging me different prices for gas depending on whether it goes in my lawnmower or my car. Who cares, you sell gas for a profit, don't you want to sell me more gas? When Shell across the street is not charging me extra to put gas in my car vs lawnmower, guess where I am going to start buying gas?
AT&T unfortunately, Only data game in Town (in US)
I complained about AT&T during my 3 year-iPhone stint with them.
I was looking forward to switching carriers. I now miss my AT&T unlimited data plan and my iphone is less useful.
I"m on Verizon now, and while the voice service is an improvement, their data plan should be illegal!
1. Can't use data while on a call (they should take a 33% cut on their fee)
2. Verizon data drops your audio streaming (when it gets around to finally picking up a stream) Can't trust it. I have done a ton of streaming audio all over the US while driving, even with iPhone 1G over EDGE and it was more reliable. cut 18% off Verizon's fee.
3. Sprint bit off more than they can chew by offering the iPhone 4S w Unlimited. (my friend regularly sends me screenshots of his speedtests in frustration!) it's comparable to fast dial-up speeds. remember 28.8 went to 56k and we were happy. Oh, 1997!
4. AT&T as much as I hate to say, is the only US carrier that has offers a data plan suitable for iOS .
tl;dr (too long; didn't read) you must jailbreak, as others have said and get the apps that hide tethering and look up 3G unrestrictor. i use Facetime in the car , but it's not safe actually...so I dont'. But I can.
I complained about AT&T during my 3 year-iPhone stint with them.
I was looking forward to switching carriers. I now miss my AT&T unlimited data plan and my iphone is less useful.
I"m on Verizon now, and while the voice service is an improvement, their data plan should be illegal!
1. Can't use data while on a call (they should take a 33% cut on their fee)
2. Verizon data drops your audio streaming (when it gets around to finally picking up a stream) Can't trust it. I have done a ton of streaming audio all over the US while driving, even with iPhone 1G over EDGE and it was more reliable. cut 18% off Verizon's fee.
3. Sprint bit off more than they can chew by offering the iPhone 4S w Unlimited. (my friend regularly sends me screenshots of his speedtests in frustration!) it's comparable to fast dial-up speeds. remember 28.8 went to 56k and we were happy. Oh, 1997!
4. AT&T as much as I hate to say, is the only US carrier that has offers a data plan suitable for iOS .
tl;dr (too long; didn't read) you must jailbreak, as others have said and get the apps that hide tethering and look up 3G unrestrictor. i use Facetime in the car , but it's not safe actually...so I dont'. But I can.
Apple charging ATT
Does it anything to do with Apple charging the provider for using Apple features based on the bandwidth used? May be too many Facetime calls cost bomb for ATT since there was an agreement with ATT & Apple that Apple to get some pie of the internet charges for using iPhone equipment.
Does it anything to do with Apple charging the provider for using Apple features based on the bandwidth used? May be too many Facetime calls cost bomb for ATT since there was an agreement with ATT & Apple that Apple to get some pie of the internet charges for using iPhone equipment.
Agreed, but some things strike me as more plausible and easier to trust. Given their precedent I have a hard time trusting anything AT&T says. But absent reporting/auditing, there is nothing one can do other than accept things as they are.
One more reason...
I have a feeling I'm not the only one, but the only reason I've stayed with AT&T is because I have gradfathered in on unlimited data. I honestly don't think if the next iPhone offers 4G they will let us continue having the unlimted plan. So there will be many people who no longer feel tied to them...so if they continue with these kind of policies, I think many of us will switch to a new carrier. Seriously, are they actually trying to get rid of the iPhone customers?
I have a feeling I'm not the only one, but the only reason I've stayed with AT&T is because I have gradfathered in on unlimited data. I honestly don't think if the next iPhone offers 4G they will let us continue having the unlimted plan. So there will be many people who no longer feel tied to them...so if they continue with these kind of policies, I think many of us will switch to a new carrier. Seriously, are they actually trying to get rid of the iPhone customers?
Uh, Skype. Has worked since the 3Gs. Also... pretty much all of them.
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Rollover minutes would be another reason. Verizon's sucky 3g would be another. With Verizon it's either super speed or super slow. AT&T at least has Edge, 3G, HDSPA+, LTE
Verizon is more akin to Edge+ and LTE. There's just no decent in-between.
And don't forget, on anything but LTE you don't get Talk and Internet.
Thankfully I use my Verizon LTE unlimited plan for anything I want... but AT&T customers are getting so hosed if this is true. I smell class action lawsuit at least... surely there is a judge in the US that has not had his pockets padded by corporate lobbyist/donations etc... that can see this is a total scam.
It's clear they only want to sell 5gig plans and have people use 100mb, but they keep bending people over like this and someone is gong to twist off in an AT&T store with a very large boom stick... soon.
It's clear they only want to sell 5gig plans and have people use 100mb, but they keep bending people over like this and someone is gong to twist off in an AT&T store with a very large boom stick... soon.
But you're not going to get that when they charge. The service will still suck over 3g. Just get charged for.
Not sure about that!
You're experience with Verizon is nowhere near anything I have ever experienced with them, or anyone I know! As for #1, yes, you can't browse and talk at the same time... but that will be fixed in the next version of the iPhone. #2, never seen anything like this happen. I had AT&T for many years, and I couldn't get anything to stay connected and most of the time I couldn't get a simple web page to come up unless I was on 3G... Edge sucks!
Here is a comparison you need to look at, look at the 3G map for AT&T and compare that to the 3G map for Verizon. What you will see is that AT&T has a little dots here and there all over the country, and what you will see with Verizon is that their 3G map looks like AT&T's voice coverage map... it's everywhere!
What good is AT&T unless you live in the city and never venture outside of it? I have friends who won't switch from AT&T because they have the unlimited plan... BUT, we live outside of the city and there is no AT&T 3G here. I tell them, what good is unlimited if you are browsing at the speed of a dialup modem? (and, they aren't coming near 1 or 2Gb of usage that the Verizon plan would be)
If you are experiencing those types of issues I think I would go back to the Verizon store or call support and have your settings looked at, because that certainly is not typical.
You're experience with Verizon is nowhere near anything I have ever experienced with them, or anyone I know! As for #1, yes, you can't browse and talk at the same time... but that will be fixed in the next version of the iPhone. #2, never seen anything like this happen. I had AT&T for many years, and I couldn't get anything to stay connected and most of the time I couldn't get a simple web page to come up unless I was on 3G... Edge sucks!
Here is a comparison you need to look at, look at the 3G map for AT&T and compare that to the 3G map for Verizon. What you will see is that AT&T has a little dots here and there all over the country, and what you will see with Verizon is that their 3G map looks like AT&T's voice coverage map... it's everywhere!
What good is AT&T unless you live in the city and never venture outside of it? I have friends who won't switch from AT&T because they have the unlimited plan... BUT, we live outside of the city and there is no AT&T 3G here. I tell them, what good is unlimited if you are browsing at the speed of a dialup modem? (and, they aren't coming near 1 or 2Gb of usage that the Verizon plan would be)
If you are experiencing those types of issues I think I would go back to the Verizon store or call support and have your settings looked at, because that certainly is not typical.
When I was a kid I had to trudge through miles of snow just to see my buddy. *That* is real FaceTime and I had to work for it! You ungrateful bastiage youngsters don't know how easy you got it.
I have used Facetime many times over 3G on AT&T's network while jailbroken, it works just fine. They are just trying to come up with more ways to nickle and dime their customers because they know they can. FU AT&T, if you do this I am going to another cell phone company. You lost your exclusive rights to the iPhone thankfully and you deserve to die as a company if you keep doing these things.
My guess would be that they will tell those of us with unlimited plans we have to switch to their capped plans in order to use FaceTime. The excuse will be so we don't abuse it.
Personally I think its bull but as I rarely use FaceTime I can't get too upset about it.
Personally I think its bull but as I rarely use FaceTime I can't get too upset about it.
No, that's most certainly *not* the only difference. Facetime, according to some estimates, uses approximately 4MB/minute of bandwidth. Typical web-surfing uses significantly less than 4MB/minute of bandwidth, like on the order of 40-100KB/minute. That's 1/100th-1/40th of the data rate for web-surfing vs. Facetime use.
For a reasonable analogy, let's stick with electricity because Data and Electricity both share some common traits:
1) Over a long-enough period of time, availability is essentially limitless for a single user.
2) There are limits to minute-to-minute availability which can be impacted by things outside of the direct control of either the user in question *or* the provider. (That is, other people, by using too much of either all at once can result in not having enough available for our sample user.)
So, we have our wonderful, unlimited plan before the advent of Facetime or the washing machine. (Two things which consume larger-than-typical loads of their respective resources over significant, but not indefinite periods of time.) Everything is good so far, because typical loads are kept fairly even by the nature of the devices using the resources and the law of large numbers.
Now, suddenly, we have Facetime and the washing machine. Both of these gobble up comparatively large amounts of our time-limited resource, drastically increasing the minute-to-minute demand of a single user. If only a few people do this at once, it's not a terribly big deal. If they become popular (like the washing machine did), then suddenly there's the potential for a real problem.
In the case of the washing machine, it's a usage-pattern problem. Back when it was introduced, the hubby went off to work in the morning, and the kids off to school. The wives, would then start their daily chores, and housekeeping. If many washing machines are run at the same time, then suddenly there isn't enough minute-to-minute juice in the lines to keep everything running, and you get brownouts and blackouts caused by the sags and surges involved.
The same thing can happen with data networks. If a high-bandwidth-demand service becomes popular, it has the potential to cause the same issues related to over-demand. Now, bandwidth availability can be improved by upgrading tower back-hauls and adding towers, but there's significant lead-time (often more than 6 years) involved in getting a new tower approved, and built. Most of that time has to do with finding good sites, negotiating leases or purchases, and getting the required permits. Once all of that is done, the actual install can take place over the course of a month or two. Little of the delay involved in improving the networks is attributable to the network operators. Instead, most of the delay comes from dealing with bureaucratic red tape.
To combat this problem in the US (and to aid with getting as much area covered as quickly as possible in the beginning), the network build outs used as few towers as possible to get the job done. This is different than in most of Europe, where they built towers more densely.
Now, the US networks are in a tight spot. Overall demand has recently increased by better than 2 orders of magnitude, and some available services go another 2 orders of magnitude above that. To combat this they're upgrading their existing infrastructure as quickly as possible, but they also need to add towers. Unfortunately, adding towers takes *years*, instead of months, so this process is slow.
Remember the existing physical network infrastructure was largely designed and built around *just* voice transmission, using technologies chosen because they covered as much range as possible with as few towers as possible. Most of the newer voice/data protocols use frequencies which *don't* travel so far at the same power level. This means new towers have to be built. And those towers *are* being built, but the network providers actually don't have the final say for when and where towers can be added, so it's going slowly.
I'm lucky. I live in an area with decent tower coverage for our population density. There's a few stray dead- or weak-spots, but by and large things work well, and they've been able to keep up with overall demand pretty nicely. My sister lives farther from a major city, and only recently got 3G service *at all* because new towers had to be built to provide it, and it took 3 years longer than the network provider's initial estimates to get all of the red tape cleared away so they could build the dang things.
Thats because Apple is charging so much money for their phones that ATT needs to make money some how. Android phones have Google Chat and its free for video calling.