Got a text message saying I was in the "1% of highest data users" with the text making a suggestion to use WiFi whenever possible. I had a few slow downs but I cannot confirm if it was a throttle act or bad reception. I'm just glad my unlimited plan from AT&T has been grandfathered into my 4 and 4S for the last two years.
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Sprint Throttles Top 1% of Data Users, No "Truly Unlimited" Data For US iPhone Users [Updated x2]
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Got a text message saying I was in the "1% of highest data users" with the text making a suggestion to use WiFi whenever possible. I had a few slow downs but I cannot confirm if it was a throttle act or bad reception. I'm just glad my unlimited plan from AT&T has been grandfathered into my 4 and 4S for the last two years.
This is a trend that will continue. Don't know what the stats are in the UK but here in the States, an estimated 30% of all residence changes are not signing up for any land-line telephone service and keeping their cell phone as their only telephone service. Many are not even bothering with the service bundles of cable / phone / internet and only getting internet feeds with Skype and other VoIP services if they don't use their smartphone.
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With all its flows, Sprint remains the network to use. AT&T are thrives, they stole $45 from me, they charged me full month service for 5 day use, lied and said they will refund me, but never did.
Verizon is just the other axis of evil
With all its flows, Sprint remains the network to use. AT&T are thrives, they stole $45 from me, they charged me full month service for 5 day use, lied and said they will refund me, but never did.
Verizon is just the other axis of evil
With Steve Jobs as a legacy now, I'm very curious where the cards will fall for the iPhone 5 or whatever they call it when released.
Steve was notorious for holding back an entire development effort for one aesthetic to work that made a lot of market impact. Curious to see if John Ive and company are sticking to that doctrine or market pressure will have the corners shaved down (but not cut.)
There was stories of a curved Gorilla glass surface that Corning was having a bitch of a time getting the yeald up as the whole phone was very, very thin to the point of Apple telling suppliers to repackage semiconductors to fit the product shape.
You truly don't need anything but food, water, reproduction etc (just the basics). Just because you can't justify that much data doesn't mean some one else couldn't make use of that. It is really annoying when someone thinks they understand the wants of every user. Their are power users like me expect more out their technology and are willing to pay for it. understand?
My take is AT&T has more incompetence than conspiracy. Your take on Verizon is close.
While they still never comment on it, the best story I was told is that Verizon was the first choice for the original iPhone.
Verizon was quite inflexible in their services to where Steve walked out of the Verizon deal less than a month before the original iPhone launch. He showed up unannounced to the AT&T CEO in New York showing the pre-release iPhone and said, "We need a network and you can **** over Verizon with this." The deal went from there.
AT&T was hard up for a winner and effectively was a whore doing anything Steve and company wanted to make the iPhone work well on the network. Was told some very senior network engineers were fired from AT&T getting in the way iPhone network performance since it was compromising a lot other AT&T network services.
Years later, Verizon owed up and after looking the telecom deal of the decade, has it on their network now.
I guess being higher up on Maslow's hierarchy of needs means a free ticket to excess for some...
Sounds like to me apple is partially to blame with the way they insisted on network changes for the iphone for some of At&ts instability.
You can easily work through that 2GB now with iCloud and iTunes Match, especially if you have a 16GB phone like me. It's actually 14GB to begin with, 1.6GB is my GPS app. So I've got at most 12GB to play with for apps, photos, videos and music. I have 62GB of music in my home library.
I really don't mind throttling or capping people who go really extreme, but you can't run commercials touting "truly unlimited" bandwidth. It's even worse than marketing deciding that your network is 4G because you want it to be called 4G even though real geeks know that 4G = LTE.
This is not true. If my data is slow because of natural congestion then no one is limiting it, thus it is unlimited, and slow. However, if AT&T is limiting my data speed, then it is NOT unlimited.
Moreover, their contract (AT&T) says that they have the right to throttle if you are abusing the network by doing things they do not permit (they have a list of things) and/or if you are compromising the integrity of the network.
I know from first hand experience (they throttled me this month) that they are being malicious and attempting to force people out of their unlimited data plans (or they miscalculated and are making reasonable users [like me] very upset):
a) The speed you are throttled to is too slow to load webpages and other simple internet content. Often you have to reload. AT&T's full speed on an iPhone 4S in Sacramento is 3.5 Mbps. They have throttled me down to about 0.10 Mbps, about 2-3% of the normal speed.
b) I do not abuse the network. I watch half an hour of video during my lunch break at work. That adds up to about 4 GB a month.
c) I was throttled after using 2GB of data in 15 days. This is not compromising their network because they offer a 4GB plan.
d) The point in which you are throttled is a floating, regional rule. If few people in your region do more than check their email, or if they are always in Wi-Fi, you are suddenly an "abusive" user. There will always be a top 5%.
e) It does nothing for other users. I have streamed like this during lunch for a long time. It has always been fast. When testing the speed on friends' phones, they reach the speeds I have always gotten, even though a full 5% of AT&T's "data hogs" have been throttled down.
f) Finally, network congestion doesn't happen by the GB. It happens during congested TIMES. A more sensible policy would be to limit users data who access it at highly congested times. The logical error there is: this already happens, that's what network congestion is, many people get on at the same time, and the network slows down. Think of rush-hour traffic. Just because 1 car drove across the country doesn't mean that they are the cause for slow traffic speeds at 6pm.
Enough said. I'm pretty sure there is a class action lawsuit sitting on the table here...
Take care,
Mr. Frustrated
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How is this any different than listening to Pandora all day at work? Or watching a live news video feed all day? Those things are totally acceptable, NORMAL usage patterns.
The "abusers" are doing things like using the iPhone to tether their laptop and torrent stuff. A difference in magnitude of bandwidth usage.
Exactly.
I can totally see people using only cell phones for telephone services. It just seems silly to call someone's house instead of their pocket... unless they live out in a rural area with no cell coverage.
But for home internet... nothing beats a cable modem or fiber to provide a big fat data pipe to feed all your computers, tablets and Roku-type boxes.
I'd be frustrated too... especially since you're right, you don't appear to be abusing the network. Unfortunately, it's just a few bad apples (no pun intended) who do stupid things like tether+torrent that ruin it for everybody
I completely agree with you here; I even said the same in an earlier post. I'd prefer some fixed limit (ie throttling occurs after X GB). I'd bet that even if all the network abusers stopped, AT&T would still keep the 5% rule.
That would be more sensible wouldn't it?
Even the energy companies in my area now provide you the option of thermostats that stop during the highest energy usage periods (in order to give you a lower rate or something...which is something phone companies should realize too: people respond better to positive reinforcement, not punishments).
They claimed they don't throttle. "You don't get charged extra, You don't slow down"
I'm still puzzled by the existence of "jobs" that can be performed while listening to Pandora or watching NBA games.
If you are complaining that a big company (Sprint) is somehow "ripping you off" by deceptively advertising unlimited data, how do you reconcile that with your accepting a paycheck in exchange for your physical - but not actual mental - presence in the workplace?
If you are complaining that a big company (Sprint) is somehow "ripping you off" by deceptively advertising unlimited data, how do you reconcile that with your accepting a paycheck in exchange for your physical - but not actual mental - presence in the workplace?
I can confirm that the old grandfathered AT&T works the same way. I have gone way over 2 GB on occasion, with nary a complaint from AT&T, but one roaming trip, and I got three SMS warnings within an hour. (Warning only that they would throttle, not charge extra or discontinue service or anything.) What was funny is that I had been MyWi tethering on my iPhone 3G plenty, and never got a complaint - yet on my brand-new 4S (that still isn't jailbreakable,) I got it when just browsing the web...
but its still a lot cheaper. i pay 19 Euro for unlimited 100 mbit/s down internet including unlimited calls to any house and one mobile phone provider of my choosing compared to my cell phone plan which is 29 Euro and only includes 200 mb before they trottle me and unlimited text (granted i got the 4S for free)
Do you seriously think people are incapable of multitasking work and listening to music?
We are not condemning people for using so much bandwidth, just genuinely curious as to how they are doing this. I tried using my iphone quite extensively last month, and just hit over a gig of data usage. I even resisted the urge to switch to my otherwise faster wireless at home. I suppose it "helps" in that my telco caps our speed at 1mbs.
I do CAD work and I would go as far as saying that I get MORE work done while listening to music (Pandora) than when I'm not. When the headphones go on I am extremely focused on my drawings without the interuptions from people around me, mostly the lady in the cube adjacent to me who is on the phone all day.
I knew it...
No surprise. It's not fair that people are penalized for using unlimited at any amount.
Nothing is unlimited any more.
Now if I could get my $332.88 backfrom these pirates for returning my iPhone. Hoping my bank comes through next week after two claims against Sprint (3 months after these bastards got the unopened, unactivated iPhone back).
No surprise. It's not fair that people are penalized for using unlimited at any amount.
Nothing is unlimited any more.
Now if I could get my $332.88 backfrom these pirates for returning my iPhone. Hoping my bank comes through next week after two claims against Sprint (3 months after these bastards got the unopened, unactivated iPhone back).