iPhone users loathe AT&T
From Computerworld:
Owners of Apple's new iPhone 3GS love the device, but more than half of them hate AT&T, the smartphone's exclusive mobile carrier in the U.S., according to a just-released survey.
A part of it is that the carrier serves as a scapegoat for any problem it can be convincingly assigned. But it does have serious service quality problems, and the benefit of an exclusivity deal (and a marketplace in general) that means it doesn't have to fix them.




Anonymous Anonymous
#1 – 5:55 AM August 20, 2009
Might also be because we still don't (officially) have tethering or MMS while the rest of the world does. Not until 'late summer.' Seriously?
Matt
#2 – 6:50 AM August 20, 2009
They also deserve a lot of the criticism they receive... "MMS late summer" anyone?
exhilaration
#3 – 6:58 AM August 20, 2009
My jailbroken iPhone 2G works amazingly well on T-Mobile. $68/month: unlimited minutes, unlimited 2G data, 500 texts!
Marius
#4 – 8:34 AM August 20, 2009
Scapegoat? Seriously?
Actually I personally don't use either tethering or MMS and I have my Google Talk app already.
So I have zero problems with my iPhone... I still blame AT&T and think they are the worst Evil.
nixiebunny
#5 – 8:59 AM August 20, 2009
The AT&T 3G network is incredibly spotty in major metro areas.
Maybe they'd have better ratings if their network was available in places like my house (right in the middle of town in a progressive neighborhood) so that my wife wouldn't have to walk outside to take a call.
salsaman
#6 – 9:36 AM August 20, 2009
1) AT&T will suffer Motorola-like banishment when iPhone-hooked users are freed from its craptacular network, just like Motorola went down in flames after other handset makers figured out the thin+light thing.
2) When AT&T thinks it's ok to lie to New York Times tech reporter David Pogue about the suckiness of its network, clearly its priorities are out of whack:
http://pogue.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/10/dead-zones-and-the-iphone/
From TFA:
chiefted
#7 – 9:51 AM August 20, 2009
"They also deserve a lot of the criticism they receive... "MMS late summer" anyone?"
Add in tethering and they deserve a lot of criticism
Alan
#8 – 2:53 PM August 20, 2009
Ditto the MMS thing. My three kids all have it on their various phones, including the bottom of the line Samsung. So what's AT&T's foot dragging excuse other than they don't want to mess with iPhone users getting to use it? At first it was converting accounts - obviously my account already accommodates it just fine, thank you.
Add to that the fact that they have iPhones automatically connecting to (painfully slow) public AT&T wifi when available, avoiding data use on 3G that we already paid for, thank you. I'm pretty sure AT&T has a 3G network that just can't handle the traffic and they won't admit it.
Actually, I have better coverage than I did with Sprint. I'd stand down the block from a Sprint store, in the middle of a tech savvy mid-sized city along side a major university and get roaming signals. Gar!
relawson
#9 – 10:33 AM August 21, 2009
i've had att (through all of the name changes) for about 13 years.
i've never had any big problem (or even a medium one) with customer service or the network. they've always been super helpful and get me what i need. but then again, i dont come off half-cocked whenever there is something i need to get changed or fixed.
either i'm lucky, or everyone just likes to complain about them to hear their own voice?