When your lawsuits sound like press releases, it’s because they probably are (not that we care, the whole case is pretty entertaining). Check out this opening statement from Verizon:
AT&T did not file this lawsuit because Verizon’s “There’s A Map For That” advertisements are untrue; AT&T sued because Verizon’s ads are true and the truth hurts.
YA BURNT, AT&T! Verizon goes on to accuse AT&T of failing to adequately expand its 3G coverage to match demand for its smartphones, which is sort of a hard point for AT&T to argue. Verizon claims that its advertisements are “literally true” (instead of philosophically true? Metaphorically true? True in the sense in which it is used in animal husbandry, as in purebred? What?) and not misleading, and that AT&T has failed to provide customers with an accurate map of its coverage. It’s pretty great, really — if you’ve ever wished the American legal system was more like it is on Law and Order, this whole statement is a gift. [Engadget]
Alex
Wednesday, November 18, 2009 at 8:26 AMAT&T to Verizon: “Yeah, well, your face hurts… to look at! No backsies!”
Mr Cats
Wednesday, November 18, 2009 at 9:16 AMI’m pretty amused by this kind of lawsuit-instead-of-competing tactic found in the USA. However AT&Ts claim here is actually a legitimate one…almost
Verizon use a significantly slower “3G” network whose speed, while theoretically faster than “Edge”, it’s actual performance is pretty much on par with the performance of “Edge”. So sure while Verizon have a very large roll out of their breed of “3G”, the AT&T “3G” is multiple times faster. At the same time AT&T have a very wide roll out of “Edge”. Meaning that the AT&T network is still going to be providing you a comparable browsing speed when on “Edge” and a significantly faster browsing speed when on “3G”.
Additionally AT&T don’t limit their data and voice channels, which Verizon do (e.g. you can’t get your push email while on a phone call on Verizon.)
So while the adverts are clever, in laymans terms Verizon call their slower network “3G” to lead the consumer into thinking that the “3G” they’re using is the same as the “3G” that AT&T provides.
Here is the problem though: because AT&T have been particularly frugal with cranking up the data rates on their own 3G network, they have effectively allowed Verizon’s much slower breed of 3G to have a comparable data speed in most locations.
Maybe this will teach AT&T, not to screw their customers when it comes to data? They would have been able to respond with their average network speed in return, but this is so lacking there isn’t much point.