May be total BS, but this is what an AT&T rep told me (FWIW)

[fjrabon]

Just got off the phone with business customer care (usually they're better than normal customer service with AT&T). He said the problem is iTunes servers where they connect with AT&T are overwhelmed and keep crashing. That Apple gave all three US carriers basically separate channels to access the iTunes servers, and that since AT&T has by far the most iPhone users of the three carriers, they're hammering their portion. He said that if it was a problem on their end that other phone types wouldn't be able to activate, but that's not the case at all. That any phone except an iPhone will activate.

FWIW.

 

[stooley]

Just got off the phone with business customer care (usually they're better than normal customer service with AT&T). He said the problem is iTunes servers where they connect with AT&T are overwhelmed and keep crashing. That Apple gave all three US carriers basically separate channels to access the iTunes servers, and that since AT&T has by far the most iPhone users of the three carriers, they're hammering their portion. He said that if it was a problem on their end that other phone types wouldn't be able to activate, but that's not the case at all. That any phone except an iPhone will activate.

FWIW.

Makes sense when you think about it..especially if any non-apple product is activating just fine.

 

[fjrabon]

Makes sense when you think about it..especially if any non-apple product is activating just fine.

yeah, though there's really no way to confirm that's actually true unless you know somebody activating a non iPhone AT&T phone right now.

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he also said that they couldn't help me over the phone, because the only way that he could try to activate my iPhone would involve deactivating my current sim first, and he couldn't guarantee he'd be able to get my new iPhone up and running, and they're no longer allowed to risk leaving people without a working phone, so they can't help try to activate your iPhone for you right now.

 

[sesnir]

Based on my experiences today, and after calling AT&T and having them activate my phone the old fashioned way, I believe what the support rep told you.

Better luck next year, Apple