while this suit is shite- ATT&T is a crock. people who defend att should just stop being a patsy custy.
The lawsuit that should come out is how utterly ridiculous their service is. The real world service level is hardly 3G, barely works, and you're fucked if you are in a any structure outside of a windowed fishbowl type house. You can't use the phone for business because the calls drop consistently, or you get a notice of a voicemail from a missed call you never even got an hour ago. the best is when you cant even listen to the VM to boot.
AT&T has gotten a home run with the iphone- and basically they aren't doing jack shit with the opportunity. as soon as another carrier becomes available AT&t can suck my ass. I know many people that feel the same way. AT&T's customer base will collapse as soon as that happens. i'd gladly pay a termination fee on the contract just so i could get to a carrier that is somewhat competent with their infrastructure. att is a god damn joke.
As far as MMS, yes it will be awesome to have. Anyone with an active social life finds value in having that capability... necessary? no. but it is pathetic as fuck that we don't have that right now. I know why that is.. because their network is already taxed to the gills and MMS would make an already shitty spotty service worse.
who wants ot bet once they get MMS online they will have severely misjudged how much it will tax their system again and we'll end up with shitty service with failed MMS messages 60% of the time? that's when this lawsuit should be busted out. but fuck it- let the lawsuits roll at&t into a shithole where they deserve to be so apple makes moves to ditch them even faster.
(Click on the "Messages" icon to view the marketing on SMS/MMS.)
Unless the consumer "digs around" they aren't going to see the disclaimer you posted. Again, it's AT&Ts fault that this isn't available yet, but Apple's marketing seem to have designed their web content to avoid drawing any attention to the limitation.
Right, but Apple website is not a U.S. only resource, it's worldwide.
But, since we have Smart Phones how are those SMS + MMS better than email, which is much more widely used, and is more flexible!?!
Can SMS + MMS messages be offloaded to computer, and shared as easily as email?
iChat, on iPhone or any other device, during a meeting etc. - that might be easier than email, but a Chat via SMS + MMS, that seems silly!
Can't wait for someone to explain that to me!
Email is great but most non smart phones dont handle email all that well. Additionally in order to send a quick photo to all you friends ho have smart phones, I would need to have their phone numbers and email information which isnt a big deal but MMS is standard way sending pictures when it comes to phones, so why wouldnt an advanced phone support this standard. And what i dont get is how can ATT say they are concerned about increased data traffic from MMS when every other non iphone can send picture messages.
No, you'te not. Since you have to pay extra for sending text messages, I assume you'll also pay extra for MMS. So unless you have a separate line on your bill for MMS messages, you aren't paying for it.
The lawsuit isn't about paying for features you didn't get. It's about false advertising. As such, the central question will likely be if Apple did enough to warn customers that MMS was to be delivered at a later date. Everything I've seen includes that disclaimer. So is this another case of the customer being too lazy to read the clearly spelled out footnotes and is now filing a lawsuit because of their own incompetence? At what point are people going to be held responsible for their own negligence?
Actually (and clearly I am not one of the people who thought they were getting MMS right away), AT&T announced that MMS, when available by late summer, would be at no extra charge beyond that for the normal messaging plan.
But clearly, as you can see from our respective responses, reasonable people can disagree on whether there is possible liability here, so the label "frivolous lawsuit" does not apply.
And, this whole "frivolous lawsuit" thing is, generally, nonsense. Frivolous lawsuits are routinely tossed out by judges and never come to trial. The idea that judges actually allow cases without any merit to proceed is nothing more than urban legend
It's also an urban legend (as repeated by at least one poster to this thread) that medical malpractice suits have any significant impact on healthcare costs. Study after study has shown that this is false and, in fact, that the single greatest determinant of malpractice insurance rate increases are insurance company losses in financial markets, that they cover by jacking up insurance rates where they can.
For anyone who thinks you are not being charged for MMS and not getting it on ATT ponder this. I like many have been with the company for many years. I had family messaging BEFORE the iPhone and continue to have it. The cost before was 30 per month and cost since I have two iPhones is 30. ATT does not sell Family messaging as separate products for SMS and MMS. Family messaging includes both. Look, I am satisfied with ATT where I live. I love the iPhone and it even swayed me to become a Mac household. But ATT and Apple have some screwed up practices. ATT's seem to be with billing and money for their services. Apple's seems to be control. Henry Ford once said "you can have any color you want as long as it's black" Apple seems to follow that strategy. As for ATT would people who pay for Video conferencing, complain if I was getting it for Free and they had to pay for it? Sure they would. Same deal... I was paying for 3G from the time the 3G phone came out and i got one until we got 3G in our area. Again, a service I had to pay for but did not get. I did not think it was right as I don't think paying for MMS and not getting it is. My issue is the MMS feature has been around and ATT knew it was going to be offered back in June on the phone so why not have it up then. ATT seems to be a follower not a leader as is evident in Verizon's 4G network rollout versus ATT to mention one. ATT and Apple's customer service are very good as far as I am concerned when you need help but ATT slows down Apple because while they could put much of their resources to making their network the best for the iPhone they continue to just do what's necessary.
But, since we have Smart Phones how are those SMS + MMS better than email, which is much more widely used, and is more flexible!?!
Can SMS + MMS messages be offloaded to computer, and shared as easily as email?
iChat, on iPhone or any other device, during a meeting etc. - that might be easier than email, but a Chat via SMS + MMS, that seems silly!
Can't wait for someone to explain that to me!
Understand, not many people have the opportunity to send emails through their phones. The majority of all non-smartphone users have the ability of MMS, which makes it very convenient to send photos, audio, or video to each other. The market is changing. I'm convinced everything sooner or later will go mobile (and I mean, phone mobile). Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe, Apple was the first to introduce SMS texting as a chat interface. I personally love this. You'll see, in a near future there WILL be a way to download pictures, audio, or video from MMS to a computer. I don't think it seems complex, to be honest. I never texted before, until I got my iPhone.
Wow, now you can sue for not delivering features fast enough. What a crazy world we live in.
Totally. Every bit of advertising Apple came out with regarding MMS (even advertising in other countries) stated that MMS is not available emmediately in all markets. Not to mention at the Keynote the SPECIFICALLY said it is not available in the US yet.
Apple made this info readily available.. a person can't sue them because THEY didn't take the time to research their purchase.
i hope this puts a little pressure on at&t to take their heads out of their arses. no tethering - i can understand if the network cannot handle the amount of bandwidth it requires to allow this for all iphone users.
but MMS? give me a break. i bet Apple is extremely pissed that this feature is left out. im really beginning to dislike AT&T.
Yes and to me the issue is that every other phone on the AT&T network gets MMS.
Marketing a feature and then not delivering is false advertisement.
But how long did it take for Push to get implemented? 1 year?
So Summer ends in late September. Let's see if MMS rolls out. If not, oh well, I'll still use their stupid "viewmymessage.com/1" page until they roll it out.
Hard to believe anyone would purchase an iPhone prior to the 3GS with the expectation that unannounced features would be available, or guaranteed to be included. It strains credulity.
(Click on the "Messages" icon to view the marketing on SMS/MMS.)
Unless the consumer "digs around" they aren't going to see the disclaimer you posted. Again, it's AT&Ts fault that this isn't available yet, but Apple's marketing seem to have designed their web content to avoid drawing any attention to the limitation.
While I see your point on the 'messages' screen, it still seems pretty obvious that this is an upcoming feature. If every company had to list every disclaimer, warning, and other legal CYA on every location they discussed their product - that's all we would see. There must be an inherent understanding from consumers that marketing by it's nature utilizes 'spin'. Further - many products advertise and market "upcoming" features.
Let's be honest - this is nothing more than an attempt to bring a lawsuit over a technicality in hopes of a payoff. Not to get all religous on the forum, but those who pursue these types of frivolous lawsuits will squirm when asked to justify their actions in the afterlife.
God: "So, Tim Meeker, do you feel you led an honest life? Free of theft, lies, etc?"
Tim: "Well sure, I never stole anything except when I took a pack of gum when I was like 12 years old. And I tried not to lie."
God: "Well, help me understand this lawsuit you filed. You knew the iPhone didn't have MMS, yet you pretended that you were misled claiming a legal technicality."
Tim: <backpeddles> "errr... well, umm, see, it was Apple and AT&T that lied, yeah, that's it."
God: "Tim, we both know Apple was fairly forthright about this feature as being upcoming. And we know you certainly knew this. And the issue is that you pretended not to claiming you were misled. How was that honest Tim?"
Tim: "Well, err... <panics> umm... yeah, oh no. WAIT! No, no - the lawyer made me do it! He said Apple would just pay us to go away. Where is he? Ask him?"
God: <chuckles> "Oh, we won't even see him up here. But, if you'd like to speak to him, please take the down escalator to your right. Move along now. Next!?"
And lets be fair here. Dont charge us for stuff we are not getting.
A discount by ATT would have been in order, but noooooooooooo, they don't wanna loose a dime!!!. I don't care about ATT's infrastructure, if u are gonna charge me for a product DELIVER!!!
Dumb consumers like u are the reason these corps. are running all over us..
You ARE NOT being charged for MMS! The plans you get don't even include SMS texting for christ sakes! Can you not read what you're getting when you buy it?
SMS and MMS are NOT the same thing! SMS is for texting, MMS is for sending multimedia messages. That would be like saying a text ichat is the same as a video ichat, both represent chatting so they must be the same!
While I see your point on the 'messages' screen, it still seems pretty obvious that this is an upcoming feature. If every company had to list every disclaimer, warning, and other legal CYA on every location they discussed their product - that's all we would see. There must be an inherent understanding from consumers that marketing by it's nature utilizes 'spin'. Further - many products advertise and market "upcoming" features.
It might be obvious to those who already know that it is an upcoming feature, but I don't think it is at all obvious to the average consumer looking at that web page. (I went there specifically looking for the disclaimer and at first thought it wasn't there at all. It took me a while to find it.) The design of the page draws your eye everywhere but the "fine print", which is literally, "lurking in the shadows."
The usual practice in similar cases is to "asterisk" the marketing claim and then explain the details in a footnote somewhere, the asterisk alerting the consumer that there are exceptions or limitations explained elsewhere. I think Apple's marketing screwed up on this one, making the disclaimer a little too non-obvious. And the sales environment in the stores (Apple, at least, and I imagine AT&T hasn't exactly been touting the unavailability of this feature in their stores) compounds the problem.
And, where exactly is the boundary between spin and false or deceptive (intentionally so or not) marketing? Consumers understand that features are hyped, but they shouldn't be expected to "understand" that advertised features may not be there, the advertiser has an obligation to explicitly state this in an obvious way.
The world is moving so fast that there's no point not to be using email. SMS, MMS aren't worth the price you pay. Some will say they like the push notification. I say, it won't matter next year. Some say, but I need it now. I say, How the hell did you make it through the 80's?
I disagree with you in that you say people have no need for SMS or MMS. I know many people that either don't check email till they are home or their phones support for email sucks. I hate receiving images from people and then having to go to a separate site on my iphone to see the image.
I don't blame Apple at all and Im pretty pissed that AT&T has yet to allow use to send MMS. The only thing I would hope that comes out of this lawsuit is that AT&T would get off its *** and allow us to send MMS.
while this suit is shite- ATT&T is a crock. people who defend att should just stop being a patsy custy.
The lawsuit that should come out is how utterly ridiculous their service is. The real world service level is hardly 3G, barely works, and you're fucked if you are in a any structure outside of a windowed fishbowl type house. You can't use the phone for business because the calls drop consistently, or you get a notice of a voicemail from a missed call you never even got an hour ago. the best is when you cant even listen to the VM to boot.
AT&T has gotten a home run with the iphone- and basically they aren't doing jack shit with the opportunity. as soon as another carrier becomes available AT&t can suck my ass. I know many people that feel the same way. AT&T's customer base will collapse as soon as that happens. i'd gladly pay a termination fee on the contract just so i could get to a carrier that is somewhat competent with their infrastructure. att is a god damn joke.
As far as MMS, yes it will be awesome to have. Anyone with an active social life finds value in having that capability... necessary? no. but it is pathetic as fuck that we don't have that right now. I know why that is.. because their network is already taxed to the gills and MMS would make an already shitty spotty service worse.
who wants ot bet once they get MMS online they will have severely misjudged how much it will tax their system again and we'll end up with shitty service with failed MMS messages 60% of the time? that's when this lawsuit should be busted out. but fuck it- let the lawsuits roll at&t into a shithole where they deserve to be so apple makes moves to ditch them even faster.
Understand, not many people have the opportunity to send emails through their phones. The majority of all non-smartphone users have the ability of MMS, which makes it very convenient to send photos, audio, or video to each other. The market is changing. I'm convinced everything sooner or later will go mobile (and I mean, phone mobile). Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe, Apple was the first to introduce SMS texting as a chat interface. I personally love this. You'll see, in a near future there WILL be a way to download pictures, audio, or video from MMS to a computer. I don't think it seems complex, to be honest. I never texted before, until I got my iPhone.
When you say "chat interface," I assume you mean threaded text? Threaded text has been around for a few years on many different handsets.
FYI, MMS can be had without much difficulty on iPhones through T-Mobile US (It's included in their $5 300 message package as well as the others). Here are the settings, should anyone with an unlocked phone happen to be reading this:
Email is great but most non smart phones dont handle email all that well. Additionally in order to send a quick photo to all you friends ho have smart phones, I would need to have their phone numbers and email information which isnt a big deal but MMS is standard way sending pictures when it comes to phones, so why wouldnt an advanced phone support this standard. And what i dont get is how can ATT say they are concerned about increased data traffic from MMS when every other non iphone can send picture messages.
So, as hinted in the next quote, once everyone is on Smart Phones, there wont' be need for MMS and SMS? But till then, might as well be compatible with the Rest of the World which can't afford Smart Phones, right?
As to why ATT say no MMS on iPhones, but OK to others, that does seem strange, unless one is on the inside of that corporate kabal and knows the real story, with all the NDA's!!!!!!
Quote:
Originally Posted by ecaballerojr
Understand, not many people have the opportunity to send emails through their phones. The majority of all non-smartphone users have the ability of MMS, which makes it very convenient to send photos, audio, or video to each other. The market is changing. I'm convinced everything sooner or later will go mobile (and I mean, phone mobile). Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe, Apple was the first to introduce SMS texting as a chat interface. I personally love this. You'll see, in a near future there WILL be a way to download pictures, audio, or video from MMS to a computer. I don't think it seems complex, to be honest. I never texted before, until I got my iPhone.
Backup text messages to your Mac and extract information, like addresses and phone numbers, into Address Book.³
among other things...
So, the PUNCHLINE is that MMS + SMS on iPhone makes it compatible with most other phones, that are not Smart, which is most of the world!!!
As to APPLE + ATT, I'd love to see more clarity, so that there are less Conspiracy Theories (Google Voice etc...) Looks like a poorly masked greed thus far! There should be a mad rush towards 4G, so that bandwidth and speed are less of an issue, if at all... Maybe they are working on that like crazy, but why drive the customers crazy with all the games - billing, coverage etc. All that doesn't help good will, which, in addition to the PERFORMANCE, is what the carriers should be competing on, instead of BS TV ads: anyone can make claims, and since they can't be easily verified, beyond rumors, and 2nd hand info, those TV ads are probably useless!!!! That ad $$$ should be spent on 4G Upgrade, which will hopefully end the GSM - CDMA Divide and will Unify the WORLD, for global roaming and REAL CONNECTIVITY! When that happens, more Smart Phones will be sold, the prices will come down, and no more exclusive deals -- that's my fantasy! Hope all live that long
As to how well it works, this may depend on the network's implementation of MMS, but iPhone doesn't seem to recompress anything before sending, and on T-Mobile's non-3G network (they have a proprietary frequency for 3G that the iPhone doesn't support) it takes several minutes for an image taken with the camera to be transmitted. I haven't verified whether people receiving images get the original, nor have I received any MMS on my iPhone.
Comments
I'm going to sue the state of Indiana. My car can go 150 mph but the state won't allow that. Damn speed limits...
I thought you could drive as fast as you wanted on I-65. Or at least, you used to be able to. Have they finally started cracking down?
The lawsuit that should come out is how utterly ridiculous their service is. The real world service level is hardly 3G, barely works, and you're fucked if you are in a any structure outside of a windowed fishbowl type house. You can't use the phone for business because the calls drop consistently, or you get a notice of a voicemail from a missed call you never even got an hour ago. the best is when you cant even listen to the VM to boot.
AT&T has gotten a home run with the iphone- and basically they aren't doing jack shit with the opportunity. as soon as another carrier becomes available AT&t can suck my ass. I know many people that feel the same way. AT&T's customer base will collapse as soon as that happens. i'd gladly pay a termination fee on the contract just so i could get to a carrier that is somewhat competent with their infrastructure. att is a god damn joke.
As far as MMS, yes it will be awesome to have. Anyone with an active social life finds value in having that capability... necessary? no. but it is pathetic as fuck that we don't have that right now. I know why that is.. because their network is already taxed to the gills and MMS would make an already shitty spotty service worse.
who wants ot bet once they get MMS online they will have severely misjudged how much it will tax their system again and we'll end up with shitty service with failed MMS messages 60% of the time? that's when this lawsuit should be busted out. but fuck it- let the lawsuits roll at&t into a shithole where they deserve to be so apple makes moves to ditch them even faster.
I don't think it does. This is what most consumers will see:
http://www.apple.com/iphone/
(Click on the "Messages" icon to view the marketing on SMS/MMS.)
Unless the consumer "digs around" they aren't going to see the disclaimer you posted. Again, it's AT&Ts fault that this isn't available yet, but Apple's marketing seem to have designed their web content to avoid drawing any attention to the limitation.
Right, but Apple website is not a U.S. only resource, it's worldwide.
Am I understanding this correctly?
SMS = text only
MMS - text + audio and or video attachment?
But, since we have Smart Phones how are those SMS + MMS better than email, which is much more widely used, and is more flexible!?!
Can SMS + MMS messages be offloaded to computer, and shared as easily as email?
iChat, on iPhone or any other device, during a meeting etc. - that might be easier than email, but a Chat via SMS + MMS, that seems silly!
Can't wait for someone to explain that to me!
Email is great but most non smart phones dont handle email all that well. Additionally in order to send a quick photo to all you friends ho have smart phones, I would need to have their phone numbers and email information which isnt a big deal but MMS is standard way sending pictures when it comes to phones, so why wouldnt an advanced phone support this standard. And what i dont get is how can ATT say they are concerned about increased data traffic from MMS when every other non iphone can send picture messages.
No, you'te not. Since you have to pay extra for sending text messages, I assume you'll also pay extra for MMS. So unless you have a separate line on your bill for MMS messages, you aren't paying for it.
The lawsuit isn't about paying for features you didn't get. It's about false advertising. As such, the central question will likely be if Apple did enough to warn customers that MMS was to be delivered at a later date. Everything I've seen includes that disclaimer. So is this another case of the customer being too lazy to read the clearly spelled out footnotes and is now filing a lawsuit because of their own incompetence? At what point are people going to be held responsible for their own negligence?
Actually (and clearly I am not one of the people who thought they were getting MMS right away), AT&T announced that MMS, when available by late summer, would be at no extra charge beyond that for the normal messaging plan.
But clearly, as you can see from our respective responses, reasonable people can disagree on whether there is possible liability here, so the label "frivolous lawsuit" does not apply.
And, this whole "frivolous lawsuit" thing is, generally, nonsense. Frivolous lawsuits are routinely tossed out by judges and never come to trial. The idea that judges actually allow cases without any merit to proceed is nothing more than urban legend
It's also an urban legend (as repeated by at least one poster to this thread) that medical malpractice suits have any significant impact on healthcare costs. Study after study has shown that this is false and, in fact, that the single greatest determinant of malpractice insurance rate increases are insurance company losses in financial markets, that they cover by jacking up insurance rates where they can.
Am I understanding this correctly?
SMS = text only
MMS - text + audio and or video attachment?
But, since we have Smart Phones how are those SMS + MMS better than email, which is much more widely used, and is more flexible!?!
Can SMS + MMS messages be offloaded to computer, and shared as easily as email?
iChat, on iPhone or any other device, during a meeting etc. - that might be easier than email, but a Chat via SMS + MMS, that seems silly!
Can't wait for someone to explain that to me!
Understand, not many people have the opportunity to send emails through their phones. The majority of all non-smartphone users have the ability of MMS, which makes it very convenient to send photos, audio, or video to each other. The market is changing. I'm convinced everything sooner or later will go mobile (and I mean, phone mobile). Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe, Apple was the first to introduce SMS texting as a chat interface. I personally love this. You'll see, in a near future there WILL be a way to download pictures, audio, or video from MMS to a computer. I don't think it seems complex, to be honest. I never texted before, until I got my iPhone.
Wow, now you can sue for not delivering features fast enough. What a crazy world we live in.
Totally. Every bit of advertising Apple came out with regarding MMS (even advertising in other countries) stated that MMS is not available emmediately in all markets. Not to mention at the Keynote the SPECIFICALLY said it is not available in the US yet.
Apple made this info readily available.. a person can't sue them because THEY didn't take the time to research their purchase.
i hope this puts a little pressure on at&t to take their heads out of their arses. no tethering - i can understand if the network cannot handle the amount of bandwidth it requires to allow this for all iphone users.
but MMS? give me a break. i bet Apple is extremely pissed that this feature is left out. im really beginning to dislike AT&T.
Yes and to me the issue is that every other phone on the AT&T network gets MMS.
Well, you are paying for each month. You're not getting a discount even though they're not providing one of the advertised features.
Not so. The lack of MMS with AT&T was widely reported prior to the 3GS release.
Marketing a feature and then not delivering is false advertisement.
But how long did it take for Push to get implemented? 1 year?
So Summer ends in late September. Let's see if MMS rolls out. If not, oh well, I'll still use their stupid "viewmymessage.com/1" page until they roll it out.
Hard to believe anyone would purchase an iPhone prior to the 3GS with the expectation that unannounced features would be available, or guaranteed to be included. It strains credulity.
I don't think it does. This is what most consumers will see:
http://www.apple.com/iphone/
(Click on the "Messages" icon to view the marketing on SMS/MMS.)
Unless the consumer "digs around" they aren't going to see the disclaimer you posted. Again, it's AT&Ts fault that this isn't available yet, but Apple's marketing seem to have designed their web content to avoid drawing any attention to the limitation.
While I see your point on the 'messages' screen, it still seems pretty obvious that this is an upcoming feature. If every company had to list every disclaimer, warning, and other legal CYA on every location they discussed their product - that's all we would see. There must be an inherent understanding from consumers that marketing by it's nature utilizes 'spin'. Further - many products advertise and market "upcoming" features.
Let's be honest - this is nothing more than an attempt to bring a lawsuit over a technicality in hopes of a payoff. Not to get all religous on the forum, but those who pursue these types of frivolous lawsuits will squirm when asked to justify their actions in the afterlife.
God: "So, Tim Meeker, do you feel you led an honest life? Free of theft, lies, etc?"
Tim: "Well sure, I never stole anything except when I took a pack of gum when I was like 12 years old. And I tried not to lie."
God: "Well, help me understand this lawsuit you filed. You knew the iPhone didn't have MMS, yet you pretended that you were misled claiming a legal technicality."
Tim: <backpeddles> "errr... well, umm, see, it was Apple and AT&T that lied, yeah, that's it."
God: "Tim, we both know Apple was fairly forthright about this feature as being upcoming. And we know you certainly knew this. And the issue is that you pretended not to claiming you were misled. How was that honest Tim?"
Tim: "Well, err... <panics> umm... yeah, oh no. WAIT! No, no - the lawyer made me do it! He said Apple would just pay us to go away. Where is he? Ask him?"
God: <chuckles> "Oh, we won't even see him up here. But, if you'd like to speak to him, please take the down escalator to your right. Move along now. Next!?"
Well, that's how I see it.
And lets be fair here. Dont charge us for stuff we are not getting.
A discount by ATT would have been in order, but noooooooooooo, they don't wanna loose a dime!!!. I don't care about ATT's infrastructure, if u are gonna charge me for a product DELIVER!!!
Dumb consumers like u are the reason these corps. are running all over us..
You ARE NOT being charged for MMS! The plans you get don't even include SMS texting for christ sakes! Can you not read what you're getting when you buy it?
SMS and MMS are NOT the same thing! SMS is for texting, MMS is for sending multimedia messages. That would be like saying a text ichat is the same as a video ichat, both represent chatting so they must be the same!
While I see your point on the 'messages' screen, it still seems pretty obvious that this is an upcoming feature. If every company had to list every disclaimer, warning, and other legal CYA on every location they discussed their product - that's all we would see. There must be an inherent understanding from consumers that marketing by it's nature utilizes 'spin'. Further - many products advertise and market "upcoming" features.
It might be obvious to those who already know that it is an upcoming feature, but I don't think it is at all obvious to the average consumer looking at that web page. (I went there specifically looking for the disclaimer and at first thought it wasn't there at all. It took me a while to find it.) The design of the page draws your eye everywhere but the "fine print", which is literally, "lurking in the shadows."
The usual practice in similar cases is to "asterisk" the marketing claim and then explain the details in a footnote somewhere, the asterisk alerting the consumer that there are exceptions or limitations explained elsewhere. I think Apple's marketing screwed up on this one, making the disclaimer a little too non-obvious. And the sales environment in the stores (Apple, at least, and I imagine AT&T hasn't exactly been touting the unavailability of this feature in their stores) compounds the problem.
And, where exactly is the boundary between spin and false or deceptive (intentionally so or not) marketing? Consumers understand that features are hyped, but they shouldn't be expected to "understand" that advertised features may not be there, the advertiser has an obligation to explicitly state this in an obvious way.
The world is moving so fast that there's no point not to be using email. SMS, MMS aren't worth the price you pay. Some will say they like the push notification. I say, it won't matter next year. Some say, but I need it now. I say, How the hell did you make it through the 80's?
I disagree with you in that you say people have no need for SMS or MMS. I know many people that either don't check email till they are home or their phones support for email sucks. I hate receiving images from people and then having to go to a separate site on my iphone to see the image.
I don't blame Apple at all and Im pretty pissed that AT&T has yet to allow use to send MMS. The only thing I would hope that comes out of this lawsuit is that AT&T would get off its *** and allow us to send MMS.
while this suit is shite- ATT&T is a crock. people who defend att should just stop being a patsy custy.
The lawsuit that should come out is how utterly ridiculous their service is. The real world service level is hardly 3G, barely works, and you're fucked if you are in a any structure outside of a windowed fishbowl type house. You can't use the phone for business because the calls drop consistently, or you get a notice of a voicemail from a missed call you never even got an hour ago. the best is when you cant even listen to the VM to boot.
AT&T has gotten a home run with the iphone- and basically they aren't doing jack shit with the opportunity. as soon as another carrier becomes available AT&t can suck my ass. I know many people that feel the same way. AT&T's customer base will collapse as soon as that happens. i'd gladly pay a termination fee on the contract just so i could get to a carrier that is somewhat competent with their infrastructure. att is a god damn joke.
As far as MMS, yes it will be awesome to have. Anyone with an active social life finds value in having that capability... necessary? no. but it is pathetic as fuck that we don't have that right now. I know why that is.. because their network is already taxed to the gills and MMS would make an already shitty spotty service worse.
who wants ot bet once they get MMS online they will have severely misjudged how much it will tax their system again and we'll end up with shitty service with failed MMS messages 60% of the time? that's when this lawsuit should be busted out. but fuck it- let the lawsuits roll at&t into a shithole where they deserve to be so apple makes moves to ditch them even faster.
I wish there was a rep button on this site +1
Understand, not many people have the opportunity to send emails through their phones. The majority of all non-smartphone users have the ability of MMS, which makes it very convenient to send photos, audio, or video to each other. The market is changing. I'm convinced everything sooner or later will go mobile (and I mean, phone mobile). Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe, Apple was the first to introduce SMS texting as a chat interface. I personally love this. You'll see, in a near future there WILL be a way to download pictures, audio, or video from MMS to a computer. I don't think it seems complex, to be honest. I never texted before, until I got my iPhone.
When you say "chat interface," I assume you mean threaded text? Threaded text has been around for a few years on many different handsets.
Settings->General->Network->Cellular Data Network
Under both Cellular Data and MMS enter:
APN: wap.voicestream.com
Under MMS enter:
MMSC: 216.155.174.84/servlets/mms
MMS Proxy: 216.155.165.50:8080
All other fields leave blank.
oooh, hacking!
Email is great but most non smart phones dont handle email all that well. Additionally in order to send a quick photo to all you friends ho have smart phones, I would need to have their phone numbers and email information which isnt a big deal but MMS is standard way sending pictures when it comes to phones, so why wouldnt an advanced phone support this standard. And what i dont get is how can ATT say they are concerned about increased data traffic from MMS when every other non iphone can send picture messages.
So, as hinted in the next quote, once everyone is on Smart Phones, there wont' be need for MMS and SMS? But till then, might as well be compatible with the Rest of the World which can't afford Smart Phones, right?
As to why ATT say no MMS on iPhones, but OK to others, that does seem strange, unless one is on the inside of that corporate kabal and knows the real story, with all the NDA's!!!!!!
Understand, not many people have the opportunity to send emails through their phones. The majority of all non-smartphone users have the ability of MMS, which makes it very convenient to send photos, audio, or video to each other. The market is changing. I'm convinced everything sooner or later will go mobile (and I mean, phone mobile). Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe, Apple was the first to introduce SMS texting as a chat interface. I personally love this. You'll see, in a near future there WILL be a way to download pictures, audio, or video from MMS to a computer. I don't think it seems complex, to be honest. I never texted before, until I got my iPhone.
I just remembered that http://www.markspace.com/iphone/mac/ does offer:
Backup text messages to your Mac and extract information, like addresses and phone numbers, into Address Book.³
among other things...
So, the PUNCHLINE is that MMS + SMS on iPhone makes it compatible with most other phones, that are not Smart, which is most of the world!!!
As to APPLE + ATT, I'd love to see more clarity, so that there are less Conspiracy Theories (Google Voice etc...) Looks like a poorly masked greed thus far! There should be a mad rush towards 4G, so that bandwidth and speed are less of an issue, if at all... Maybe they are working on that like crazy, but why drive the customers crazy with all the games - billing, coverage etc. All that doesn't help good will, which, in addition to the PERFORMANCE, is what the carriers should be competing on, instead of BS TV ads: anyone can make claims, and since they can't be easily verified, beyond rumors, and 2nd hand info, those TV ads are probably useless!!!! That ad $$$ should be spent on 4G Upgrade, which will hopefully end the GSM - CDMA Divide and will Unify the WORLD, for global roaming and REAL CONNECTIVITY! When that happens, more Smart Phones will be sold, the prices will come down, and no more exclusive deals -- that's my fantasy! Hope all live that long