Improving AT&T Network by Using Nearby iPhones?

[aottke]

Why don't AT&T and Apple work together to reduce traffic on AT&T's network? Okay, so they do. But why don't they do something like this:

- Your friend wants an App or Song/Music Video/TV Show, etc. that you have
- You find it and send it to him
- Your friend gets prompted to accept normal charges for the cost of whatever it is
- BUT the app/song, etc., is transferred from one device to the other, rather than over the network.

OR

We make iPhone security rock solid, and your iPhone finds devices around you with the product you want (over bluetooth or PTP wifi connection, etc.), and, in the background (now that we're all friendly living back there), the nearby iPhone transfers the product to your phone after the same transaction prompt. Then anyone is a potential "donor" (well, practically everyone is around someone with an iphone).

Either way, only the minimal transaction data is sent over the AT&T network.

Walk too far away from your random "donor" or friend? Okay, so the remainder of the product downloads over the network.

What do you think? Why isn't this being done. Sounds easy enough to implement....

It's finding solutions like this that I feel no one out there is really working on.......

 

[murdercitydevil]

We make iPhone security rock solid

that's why. Because as JBme 2.0 clearly proves, the iPhone has plenty of very basic security holes, even more so if it has SSH enabled. It isn't up to AT&T to make the iPhone's security rock solid, it's up to Apple. And as long as Apple is making plenty of money and the complaints about network traffic go to AT&T rather than SJ's mailbox, they're not going to change anything.

EDIT: I don't know about anyone else, but I don't want ANYONE I don't personally know sending my phone ANYTHING besides SMS/email, even if I accept it, nor do I want to be bothered to send anyone anything of mine.

 

[saving107]

have you ever tried to use Bluetooth in a crowded environment? the signal becomes so diluted that it's useless for peer-to-peer sharing.

your alternative to reducing strain from AT&T's network is to use WiFi Peer-to-Peer sharing? If I'm on a Wifi connection, I'm already not being dependent on AT&T's network, so I don't see the need to want to download an App from my friends iPhone when I can download directly from the source at Wifi speeds.