With this new ad, there is a distinctive departure from our existing campaign as Carly’s magenta summer dresses are replaced by motorcycle leathers and a 1000 cc Ducati superbike, which symbolizes the speed and capabilities of our 4G network. Entitled “Alter Ego,” the ad is a metaphor for what T-Mobile is all about – challenging the status quo and taking bold steps in the marketplace as a challenger brand.

Whatever.  What I care about is how are you going to deal with the bleeding of customers, money and recently employees? Well in the past week they have done a few things.  The Federal Communications Commission cleared the way for T-Mobile USA to receive about $1 billion of 3 Billion in cash  it is owed as part of the breakup fee for AT&T Inc.’s  failed $39 billion takeover bid. They also approved the transfer of AWS spectrum licenses from AT&T to T-Mobile USA, agreed to as part of the breakup of the proposed merger.   Also a few days back T-Mobile will give you $100 if you trade in your old smart phone when starting a T-Mobile account.  And finally, they are being more aggressive in trying to get every hot device on their service including the Samsung’s Galaxy Note although this is still under rumor control.  Finally they are starting a new advert campaign asking your to compare the other 4G services to the speed of the T-Mobile service.

So lets see, bandwidth, 3 billion in the bank and knowledge that its now or never to service as a company till they can get the iPhone.  They have to pull out all the stops to try to stop the bleeding and get people excited about T-Mobile as a major player in the cell carrier war.  Yes, I would be hell bent for leather too.  Should be interesting to watch.   Course, they could always just get the iPhone.

Here is the official word from AT&T

Here’s AT&T’s official statement on the matter:

Beginning Sunday, April 8, we will offer qualifying customers the ability to unlock their AT&T iPhones. The only requirements are that a customer’s account must be in good standing, their device cannot be associated with a current and active term commitment on an AT&T customer account, and they need to have fulfilled their contract term, upgraded under one of our upgrade policies or paid an early termination fee.

Here is AT&T’s own description of the company it plans to buy for $39 billion:

• “T-Mobile is not an important factor in AT&T’s competitive decision-making.”
• “As a standalone company, however, T-Mobile USA would continue to face substantial commercial and spectrum-related challenges. It confronts increased competition from industry mavericks such as MetroPCS, Leap, and others; its percentage of US subscribers has been falling for nearly two years; and it has no clear path to LTE.”
• “T-Mobile USA, in contrast to others, does not have a differentiated network position. T-Mobile USA has admitted that it suffered from its late transition to a 3G network, and unlike Sprint, which first promoted a 4G network, T-Mobile USA’s HSPA+ launch appears to have been lost among other carriers’ 4G messaging.”
• “AT&T does not believe that T-Mobile USA has a particularly compelling portfolio of smartphone offerings as compared to AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint.”
• “To the extent that T-Mobile USA’s prices are lower than those received by AT&T and Verizon Wireless for otherwise comparable subscribers, T-Mobile USA’s lower prices have not stimulated growth in its share of retail subscribers. This indicates that other aspects of T-Mobile USA’s service are in some way lacking.”

They go on to claim that their networks Sucks (woh, did they actaually admit this?  Does the marketing department know about this?  And further go on to say just how cool and powerful the rest of the compitions is.  Verizon can fire thier advert department now, AT&T has done the work for them.

Gezz…

I have been debating leaving AT&T since suffered under using the 3G because I did not want to change my contract, I know, I could have bought a 3gs off market, but thats another story.  I struggled between going to t-mobile and Verizon.   I only went with Verizon because I could switch between iphone and android as I choose, but it was a hard choice.  I heard great things about t-mobile customer service, good pricing and they were pushing hard on getting 4g up and running.

And now this…

So AT&T buys T-mobile for $39m.   In the short term, this does not mean anything.  It will take a number of months before we see any effect, and that is assuming this goes through the anti-trust courts in the first place.  But what can we expect if or when this merger goes though?  I would expect more little ‘add-ons’ with billings, those grandfathered in to their current plans should be good, but you could get screwed if you renew your plan, but that is about it.  Voice service may get a bit better now that both networks can share towers more efficiently, not I do not expect any major changes in the larger markets.  In fact, data ‘could’ get worse because more people will be on one data network, but I expect they will not try to integrate the data system for a long time.

So what does this mean to t-mobile users?  Especially if you are on t-mobile because you really hate AT&T like Scott Ramond does?  Sorry Scott my man, life is gunna suck for you.

BTW, yes I know I mixed a Star Wars and Star Trek metaphor.

Something doesn’t sound right about this though… from a legal point of view I mean.  Can AT&T FORCE me to purchase a service I do not want?  We already had the ruling that its not illegal to have jailbroken apps.  Now for a service provider to force me to pay because of how I use my dataplan?  Cue the lawsuits.  When the talk about limiting HOW much data you consume, I was not that riled up.  Yes, if you buy an unlimited account, it should be unlimited, but all future accounts having levels, sure.  But to charge me extra because I’m using the SAME amount of data differently?  No this is all FAIL to me.   I checked the MiWi site and nothing on it yet.

I’ve done some checking around and seems they have been sending text messages and letters.  None of the products are listed by name, but it looks like they are pretty serious about it.  Funny thing, nothing from Verizon yet.

Image from 9to5 mac.

Dear [Name of Account Holder],

We’ve noticed your service plan may need updating.

Many AT&T customers use their smartphones as a broadband connection for other devices, like laptops, netbooks or other smartphones– a practice commonly known as tethering. Tethering can be an efficient way for our customers to enjoy the benefits of AT&T’s mobile broadband network and use more than one device to stay in touch with important people and information. To take advantage of this feature, we require that in addition to a data plan, you also have a tethering plan.

Our records show that you use this capability, but are not subscribed to our tethering plan.

If you would like to continue tethering, please log into your account online at www.wireless.att.com, or call us at 1-888-860-6789 Monday – Friday, 7 a.m. – 9 p.m. CST or Saturday, 8 a.m. – 7 p.m. CST, by March 27, 2011 to sign up for DataPro 4GB for Smartphone Tethering. Here are details on the plan:

DataPro 4GB for Smartphone Tethering
• $45 per month (this gives you 4GB in total, combining both your smartphone data plan for $25 and the tethering feature, $20)
• $10 per each additional GB thereafter, added automatically as needed
• Mobile Hotspot capabilities are included for compatible Smartphones

If we don’t hear from you, we’ll plan to automatically enroll you into DataPro 4GB after March 27, 2011. The new plan – whether you sign up on your own or we automatically enroll you – will replace your current smartphone data plan, including if you are on an unlimited data plan.

If you discontinue tethering, no changes to your current plan will be required.

It’s easy to track your usage throughout the month so there are no bill surprises. For example, we send you free text messages when you reach 65, 90, and 100 percent of your plan’s threshold. If you would like to monitor your account more closely, go to www.att.com/dataplans to learn about other ways to track your data usage.

As a reminder, our smartphone data plans also include unlimited usage of Wi-Fi at no additional charge. AT&T smartphone customers can use Wi-Fi at home or on-the-go at any one of our more than 23,000 U.S. hotspots already included in your data plan.

Thank you for bringing your account up to date. We appreciate the opportunity to continue to serve your mobile broadband needs.

Sincerely,

AT&T

Please update your data plan by March 27, 2011 if you intend to continue tethering

To learn more and update your plan, visit att.com/dataplans

Reach us for assistance during business hours: Monday – Friday 7 a.m. – 9 p.m. CST Saturday 8 a.m. – 7 p.m. CST at 1-888-860-6789

Its a shame really; phone users like me in San Francisco, or New York or other places where there is suppose to be good coverage and 3G would feel the pain a bit less if we could make sure one or key place (like at work or home) was reliable for coverage, I think we could have lived with dropped calls going from place to place.  But that does seem to be happening anytime soon.

Update: I got a tweet for a friend saying they have this and they are STILL dropping calls.  I’ll write that over the weekend.

UPDATE:  I posted a question on Quara to see what people see in the real world vs. my one test I did in a high connection environment and got an interesting answer from David Boreham

In my work I carry both ATT and Verizon phones. I travel around the USA and I always test network speed on both carriers. I have never, ever seen a case where ATT was faster. Often the speed is quite close, but typically upload speed on ATT is significantly slower than VZW, In my experience the big difference between the two carriers is that the probability of service being ‘usable’ is much higher on Verizon. If they’re both working well then the speed difference isn’t noticeable, but often ATT doesn’t work well (either has no coverage, or coverage with poor QoS).

I replied back that it makes total sense that if your connection to the AT&T tower is not strong, you are going to lose data speed because of error correction.  Also if you are moving around and switching towers, you will lose some data rate in the handoff.

First, what is the big difference between the Verizon CDMA and AT&T UMTS system as a user? Skipping the technical details; there are two main differences. 1) UMTS is faster then CDMA.  Almost twice as fast!  Have a look at this graphic from PCW.

AT&T is  twice as fast in both download and upload speed.  If you are doing a lot of surfing or downloading large files, you can really feel the difference.

We have AT&T with 1410 kbps and Verizon at 877 kbps giving 1410 / 877 = 1.6 times faster.

The second big difference is that with UMTS you can both talk on the phone and use the data system.  Now your first reaction (and what they Verizon people at the presentation said when asked) how often is that going to happen?  As an iphone user for near 3 years; he’s right. Its not very often.  UNLESS you are tethering.  THEN it matters. Which brings us to the big condition I talked about in the beginning of this post.

Are the rumors true that you get 5gigs of tether data included with your unlimited data plan? Lets say they are. AND lets say you are not jailbroken and thus do not use PDANet for tethering and creating a wifi spot.  Then this could be an important feature because as we are becoming more and more connected and more loaded with internet enabled devices; this could make the difference.

But; if you KNOW you will never (or almost never) will need to tether or create a wifi hotspot using your phone, then this condition falls away.

So far, it looks like there is no reason to move to Verizon.  Its slower, and will kick you offline if a call comes in.  So why are people so excited?  Because ITS THERE!!!  In other words, a slow 3G CDMA is better then the AT&T edge service which many people are forced to live with.  Also Verizon has a much better coverage in both data and voice.  So if you live somewhere where AT&T 3G is not available or very sketchy, Verizon is you best bet.

Now lets make the question harder.  What if you live in an area with coverage is spotty.  Like the bay area.  THEN which is the best bet?  NOW we are asking the hard question, and the one I’ve been trying answer.

I have not updated my AT&T account because I was not sure if I wanted to stay with AT&T or not. I get lots of dropped calls at home, sometimes at work and only 30% uptight at my girlfriends. So now how does the math work?

The answer depends on how much data burst speed you need on your phone, and when I say data burst speed, I mean when you need to make a ping to the internet and get some sort of reply quickly.  For example, maps.  If you want to quickly pull up your maps and see where you are, you want the map tiles to download as fast as possible.  If you are panning around quickly, then every time you move the map off the current tiles set, you need new tiles.  I did a side by side test and I could feel a slight difference between ATT and Verizon.  I tried downloading a web page. NYT.  The speed difference is noticeable.  Tried sending an tweet with an attached image; although it was only about 2 -3 seconds slower, I could still feel it … and yet I’m leaning on going with Verizon.  Why?

Because I would rather have slow then no connection at all.  And as I said above, in 18 months there will be a new phone using the 4G network.  Here is the twist though.  I’m going to get the iphone 4 with the two year plan.  Then sell it and get a 4g phone running android and wait for the 4G iphone.  At least; that is the plan.  I’m going to let the Verizon phone live in the wild for a month before I do anything.

So why would Verizon put out the bucks to keep the iphone to themselves and AT&T?  Well according to Wu, Verizon is feeling the slip on Android and has little faith in Blackberry to really content with iphone popularity.  Not sure I agree with the Android analysis given all the data I’ve seen over the last few months, but I do agree with the Blackberry call. Unless Apple is asking for some insane deal, it would still make sense for Verizon to have some sort of control over the iphone market regardless of how other phones are doing. But why would Apple go with this?  well…

So when I saw the new antenna layout for the iphone 4, which places the antennas outside as part of the iphones structure, I wondered if this could help the situation.  Unfortunately, as I look around, I have not seen any data on whether or not this new antenna has been tested to make any significant improvement on radio transmission and reception.  It ‘should’ be though.   When it come to antenna’s, the bigger the better.. in general. However, this antenna is exposed, so how will human contact over time affect the antenna’s performance?  It could actually make it better in some cases.  Remember, these are radio waves were are talking about here and the body can serve as a type of antenna depending on the freq and other environmental factors.

But the Antenna was not the only reason we have been dropping calls on AT&T.  There is the network itself. If you have ever been to a conference where there are lots of iphones, and in the tech / socMed world that is the rule, AT&T’s performance tends to degrade.  Although its gotten WAY better, its still an issue.

So can we expect better performance with the iphone 4?  I would say yes.  Enough to change my mind from leaving AT&T at the end of this month??  I guess we will just have to see.

If you have been trying to order the new iphone 4, I’m sure you have been frustrated with the errors messages you have been getting back from AT&T.

“There was a problem with your request,” the error message reads. “P1015: We’re sorry, but we are experiencing a system error that prevents us from completing your request….

Which begs the question, is there REALLY that much demand, that Apple and AT&T just cannot keep up?  The first reports I say coming over Twitter, when twitter was up, seemed to point to insane demand.  Then as time when on, the arrow moved from ‘too much demand’ to ‘AT&T AGAIN was simply not prepared’.  Remember when the first iphone came out?  I do.  You could go to Apple and pick up a phone (when the lines went down) but its was anyone’s guess if you could get it to register with AT&T.

So here we are a few years later and STILL AT&T cannot seem to predict and deal with demand.  What is it with these guys???  They already have a reputation for dropping calls (mostly in area’s with difficult coverage and high demand usage), heck even John Stewart bangs on AT&T now. So the fact that again, failure is hanging on AT&T neck just propagates the reputation of AT&T not being able to support a network with high demand.

</rant>

Now to be fair, the Twitter Fail Whale has been spotted more times the moby-dick on the last few days, so its not like AT&T is alone in this regard, but then again, I do not depend on Twitter for my phone calls.