Steve Jobs on AT&T Service Improvements and Possibilities of Multiple U.S. Carriers

[MacRumors]

During tonight's All Things D interview, Steve Jobs was questioned about AT&T service as well as the possibilities of multiple U.S. carriers. Not much new information was offered, though Jobs indicated a timeframe for service improvements.

One the possibility of multiple carrier's in the U.S., Jobs remained tight lipped:

Walt: Would there be advantages to having two [carriers] in the US?
Steve: There might be.
Walt: In the near future?
Steve: You know I can't comment on that.

And on the issue of service issues, Jobs said thing should improve by the end of the summer:

Q: Steve, we love our iPhones... but our concern is that we can't make a phone call on it. Is someone working on that?
A: Well, we're talking about it. You can bet we're doing everything we know how to do.
Q: Can we expect something soon?
A: I'm told that a lot of places are getting better certainly by the end of this summer.
Kara: And if they don't get better?
Steve: Then they won't.

Article Link: Steve Jobs on AT&T Service Improvements and Possibilities of Multiple U.S. Carriers

 

[PsyD4Me]

Nice and dry answers

 

[lifeinhd]

I take the "improvement by the end of the summer" remark to mean "new carriers by the end of the summer." Here's to hoping

 

[Decrepit]

I love my 3GS. That said, if AT&T can't get phone service to me where everybody else gets 5 bars, it's going to have to go.

 

[Alisstar]

Other carriers?

Maybe it's just me, but I get the feeling we see another year with the iPhone on just AT&T. Of course, all of this is pure speculation at this time. But, there really hasn't been much evidence of it being otherwise.

 

[JodyK]

Then they won't? Wtf Steve?

 

[Beaumon]

Kara: And if they don't get better?
Steve: Then they won't.

Then we move on to another carrier with or without a new iPhone...

 

[RonHC]

Steve: I have a big ego that is the size of my ****

hmmm

 

[ghostface147]

If they don't, they don't. What can you do? Speak with your money.

 

[McGiord]

Last week I was at the Detroit airport and while on the shuttle bus to pick up the car there was a contractor that works for AT&T, as he saw me using my iPhone he asked me: is that a 3GS? And I told him that was a 3G, and he smiled and said: well, I am working to upgrade the network to work on with the 3GS and increase capacity, so you should be having faster speeds really soon.
So it seems that the end of the summer, at least in this market, will be more 3GS coverage.

 

[samtim]

I think next iPhone gonna be sim unlocked from factory, otherwise -> epic fail (harder to fight google)

 

[acurafan]

those are gawd awful answers.

Kara: And if they don't get better?
Steve: Then they won't.

WTF! i KNOW they won't, that's how my faith is with ATT. it's a good thing i like the toy more then the ^&*%'n network it's on, Steve!!

 

[MacInTO]

I think and hope that this might be good for AT&T. The competition might make them improve the service.

I didn't know what some people were complaining about until this past weekend. I went to WA, OR and northern CA. I used my iPhone (on AT&T) and thought that the 3G service was really slow - compared to Rogers in Canada.

I thought it might be because I used it in San Francisco and Seattle - where there are probably lots of iPhone users. However, the speed issues also persisted in smaller towns that had 3G service.

 

[McGiord]

By they don't, he means:
- I can't do anything more than what I have done with AT&T
- I have some cards under my sleeve to forget about it.
- I don't care, I do have Wi-Fi everywhere I go

 

[opeepingtomo]

I really hope next week it is announced for Verizon. I used to have AT&T and while it did work okay it didn't work as well as my Verizon phone. Now we just recently got a Verizon setup on the water tower about 2 blocks from me so my signal is always peaked out in town while when I had AT&T when you go inside or around you lose signal because even when outside you only get a couple of bars.

Also with Verizon I get a 25% discount which is another benefit.

With Job's comments it seems like the phone is going to come to another carrier relatively soon to me, because if it is not why not just word it a little differently.

I will give until my contract is up with Verizon for the iPhone to come over, hopefully it will be announced, if not i may end back up with AT&T with worse service.

 

[sbrhwkp3]

By saying this stuff, he's doing two things:

Keeping happy AT&T customers happy by claiming service will be improved.

Trashing AT&T publicly so that when they go to verizon this year there's an influx of switchers and new buyers to sell more iPhones.

Genius.

 

[butterfly0fdoom]

Here's another quote the bot left out:

Steve:Remember, they're handling WAY MORE data traffic than all of their other competitors combined.

Given that statement, I'm sure that even Steve would agree that Verizon would've struggled with iPhone exclusivity.

 

[gmcalpin]

Then they won't? Wtf Steve?

What else is he supposed to say? That would be the only other possibility, wouldn't it?

Their exclusivity with AT&T is still on, or it's not. They'll either open things up to other networks, or they won't. A lot of things in life are either one way or another.

By saying this stuff, he's doing two things:

Keeping happy AT&T customers happy by claiming service will be improved.

Trashing AT&T publicly so that when they go to verizon this year there's an influx of switchers and new buyers to sell more iPhones.

He was acknowledging a known fact. That's not the same as "trashing AT&T."

 

[DougB541]

What else is he supposed to say? That would be the only other possibility, wouldn't it?

Sometimes straight talk is not the best answer with issues.

Its if my job asked me to have something for them EOD but someone else needs to provide me with something.

I can't say "oh well, it won't happen" to my boss. I say here is the issue, here is what i'm doing to solve it...i'm trying to make it work.

 

[alexhasfun28]

If you pay close attention when they asked, "Could there be advantages" he then responds to "there might be"
Idk, i still don't believe that was ment to say that there will be a new carrier this summer. But then he later did say that "he's been told that it'd be improving by this summer." OR maybe that's short for at&t-iPhone tethering, more coverage, and more 3G/7.2 areas.

 

[JediZenMaster]

It's nice to see people in this thread have crystal balls. I didn't hear anything confirming the iPhone on another network. So why speculate about something that we have no proof of?

To Quote someone..."Trust but verify" And So far there has been no verification of anything pointing to verizon...

 

[JediZenMaster]

Sometimes straight talk is not the best answer with issues.

Its if my job asked me to have something for them EOD but someone else needs to provide me with something.

I can't say "oh well, it won't happen" to my boss. I say here is the issue, here is what i'm doing to solve it...i'm trying to make it work.

1) This would explain why your not a CEO

2) What do you expect him to say? There are somethings that are suppose to be confidential

3) If he had not straight talked then people would have came on this board and complained about it. Seems like SJ can't get a break either way. Some people are truly never satisfied

 

[alexhasfun28]

It's nice to see people in this thread have crystal balls. I didn't hear anything confirming the iPhone on another network. So why speculate about something that we have no proof of?

To Quote someone..."Trust but verify" And So far there has been no verification of anything pointing to verizon...

Exactly! he talked more about at&t than any other carrier (or as more people like to believe, stinkyVerizon.)

 

[d21mike]

Wirelessly posted (iPhone 3GS: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_0 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8A274b Safari/6531.22.7)

All he is saying is that att is improving their network and it should get better.

 

[mikejfrd]

His comments about the lost/stolen iPhone were interesting!!!

Can't wait for next week!!!!