Two new studies have shown that pedestrians using mobile phones are significantly more likely to get smacked by a car than anybody else. A simulation indicated that older people are especially likely to be distracted, even more so if they’re unsteady on their feet to begin with (so maybe think about getting Grandma a nice large-print novel for Christmas instead of a Droid).

Interestingly, listening to music was found to have no effect on pedestrian safety, which I’d like to personally refute. I can say without a doubt that while listening to certain music (Spank Rock, I’m looking at you), I am noticeably more cocky and likely to get hit by a car while strutting across a busy street. But then, I’m not a scientist; thus, I trust the results of these studies and will continue to blare loud, filthy rap music while disregarding all pedestrian laws and guidelines. [LabSpaces]

Channels: COR, DMDR, LD, and NR Internal
Roles: Reps & Above
Markets: All
Contact: Your Manager

AT&T filed a lawsuit on November 4, 2009 against Verizon’s “There’s a Map for That” advertising campaign. Independent research shows that the maps in the advertisements mislead consumers into believing that we do not offer any wireless service in the vast majority of the country. In fact, AT&T’s 2.5G EDGE network covers 1.75 million square miles of the United States, reaching some 296 million people, roughly the same number reached by Verizon’s network. This network supports popular services like e-mail, surfing the Web, texting, and voice calling, including the activities shown in the Verizon TV advertisements. In addition, our 3G service, the nation’s fastest, is available in more than 9,400 cities and towns.

We filed the lawsuit in Federal District Court in Atlanta and asked that Verizon be prohibited from misleading consumers regarding the scope of our wireless network.

How should I respond to customers who ask about the lawsuit?

While we cannot speculate on the complaint filed, it is a great opportunity to remind customers of AT&T’s many advantages that over 81 million customers enjoy, including:

* Best Network
* The best coverage worldwide (More Bars in More PlacesTM).
* The nation’s fastest 3G network and the only national 3G carrier providing simultaneous voice and data usage.
* The most devices that work in the most places including Japan and South Korea (3G 2100 MHz device required).
* The nation’s largest wireless and wireline broadband provider.
* The nation’s largest company-owned and operated WiFi network with more than 20,000 hotspots, including Starbucks, McDonald’s and Barnes and Noble, as well as access to over 120,000 hotspots around the world.
* The leading provider of local and long distance voice services.

Greatest Value – The fairest value with Rollover® allowing customers to keep their unused minutes month to month.
Best Products – The most innovative exclusive devices such as the iPhoneTM 3GS.
Most Convenient Services
* The most customer friendly free self-service tools with *Services for checking usage, paying bills, and adding features.
* The most convenient and cost-effective way for customers to manage their accounts with Combined Billing for wireless and wireline products.
* Industry leading 30-day satisfaction guarantee.

As always, if you have an inquiry from the media, please refer them to your local media relations team member.

I guess that if you’ve made a mockery of the court system with a ridiculous lawsuit, then you might as well use the attention for a bit of spin. [Mobile Crunch]

Succinctly, it’s the new BlackBerry to buy if you’re on T-Mobile or AT&T. Doubly so on T-Mo, since it’s their first 3G BlackBerry.

It’s not very much like the original Bold at all, which was the Escalade of BlackBerrys: big, obnoxious, but seriously comfortable to drive because it gave you tons of room to spread your legs (err, thumbs). If you’re used to that, at first the 9700—which is even smaller and lighter than the Tour on Sprint and Verizon—feels like you’ve been shoved inside of a clown car because the keyboard and screen, while retaining the same shape and resolution, respectively, have been shrink-rayed. (Note: In the gallery, the T-Mobile one is the Bold 9700, the AT&T phone is the original Bold.)

But, then you realise you’re not typing any slower, or less precisely. The 9700’s keyboard isn’t as flat out comfortable as the original Bold—purely a matter of physics—but it’s a minor marvel of ergonomics that RIM has recession-sized the keyboard this effectively. They’re simply brilliant at building keyboards. The screen has the same resolution as the Bold’s, but in a smaller size, meaning it has a higher pixel density. Despite that extra clarity, I felt a bit constrained by it, especially browsing the web.

It’s the second BlackBerry to ditch all-too-easily-slain-by-lint trackball for an optical trackpad, and the first that’s not built for Walmart. You’ll miss the trackball for about 15 seconds. Like I said before, the trackpad’s 90 percent as good as the ball. You might miss the physical feedback, and it sometimes doesn’t totally accurately interpret a diagonal swipe that you know wouldn’t be a problem with the ball but it’s good enough, and by far the most accurate and responsive trackpad I’ve used on a phone.

It’s running BlackBerry OS 5.0 which isn’t tons different than the OS that shipped on the original Bold or Curve 8900, but it’s definitely springier and it has a few brushstrokes of added polish here and there. One place you notice is the browser—while not as fast as the iPhone 3GS or Android, it has some extra zip to it, and it even sped past the Storm 2 loading pages, despite racing on T-Mobile’s 3G network vs. Verizon’s.

Basically, barring any major bugs that pop up over the next couple of days, this is the BlackBerry you probably wanna bug your corporate overlords to handcuff to your pants if you’re on AT&T or T-Mobile, since it’ll slide into them easier than any BlackBerry yet. I just hope you enjoy the feel of faux leather. [BlackBerry]

I sincerely doubt many cares about the Tap as its feature set is nothing to write home about, but with a lower-end touch screen phone like that, a shiny new Android-based gadget, and whatever mysteries Project Dark will bring, T-Mobile looks like they’ll have a very merry, early Christmas. [TmoNews via Engadget]

Touch sensitive menu keys? Check.

And there’s our pal Android, and a camera of indeterminable mega pixelage. [The Unlockr via BGR]

This 30-second Droid spot started airing last night during the ALCS. Dan may not like it, but even so there’s no denying that Verizon, in the words of Matt Buchanan, has gone totally balls in with an Android phone.

An Android 2.0 Motorola phone, to be precise, which we’ll officially get to see sometime in November.

Until then, we can feast on rumours and speculation, revel in the broadside Verizon fired against Apple (not AT&T, it should be noted), and of course dissect the actual marketing itself, as was done at Daring Fireball:

1. The whole site is Flash.
2. The animation is pretty close to the commercial they showed during tonight’s Yankees-Angels game, which (I’ve heard) will be in heavy rotation during football games tomorrow.
3. Those “iDon’t”s, with the straight primes instead of proper apostrophes, make the commercial look slapdash.
4. Seems pretty clear that Verizon isn’t getting the iPhone any time soon.
5. The small print notes that “Droid” is a registered trademark of Lucasfilm Ltd., licensed to Verizon.
6. It’ll be running Android 2.0.

All interesting stuff, yes, but is it weird that the biggest bit of news out of all this, to me, is that George Lucas controls the word droid? [Verizon, Daring Fireball]

Obviously T-mobile is attempting to expand their customer base through Project Dark, and part of the approach is to entice customers who would normally be forced to prepay monthly dues as well as full retail for a device:

“Even More Plus” will give those who would otherwise qualify for FlexPay the option to finance a phone. [...] Our sources tell us that the phones will not be subsidised and so there won’t be contracts for the devices, which means you pay the full retail price over the course of a set amount of time (up to 20 months is what we’re told). Not bad – for a $US500 device over that time is just $US25/month, as an example.

The next step appears to be offering the “Most Affordable Unlimited Rate Plans” in three flavours:

[U]nlimited voice, unlimited voice and text, and unlimited voice/text/data all priced at $US40, $US50 and $US60, respectively.

All unconfirmed rumours, of course, but moves like this could help T-mobile leap up from fourth place in the Great Battle of the Carriers. [Boy Genius Report]

I really dunno about these. Even without Tamara Hope speaking directly into the camera, those looks are still creepy and ineffective. Seems the ad team still isn’t getting the message.

And I agree with the guys at Pre Thinking: She really, really, seems like she wants to say something at the beginning, before the ad cuts to a close-up of the synched contacts functionality. It’s the same story with the second video, which showcases calendar linking.

Sorry Modernista, even with a shorter run time and less soul-sucking dialogue, these commercials still fail to market this phone effectively. [YouTube, YouTube via Pre Thinking]