AT&T has cleared the air this afternoon on its policies for FaceTime over cellular, saying that a Mobile Share plan will be required to use it — but it won't incur an extra charge apart from normal data usage. The feature, which is new in iOS 6, had caused controversy several weeks ago when it was revealed that beta builds appeared to block the service on AT&T's network by default, suggesting that the carrier might be looking to buck the tenets of net neutrality by tacking on an extra charge to enable it.
That's not to say the move isn't exceptionally hostile to net neutrality, whose principles mostly aren't enforced by law (and are showing no signs of impending enforcement) on the country's cellular networks. The move is sure to upset some iPhone users who had no intention of moving to a Mobile Share plan — which, in some cases, can be more expensive than the company's existing individual plans — and can only be described as a completely arbitrary distinction that artificially limits the capabilities of the data buckets that non-Mobile Share users have. It's easy to speculate that AT&T is looking to limit additional network saturation by limiting which customers can use the feature, but then again, that's the function that the limited data buckets themselves serve.
Customers who aren't on Mobile Share plans — which launch next week — will be blocked from using FaceTime over cellular (though it'll continue to operate normally over Wi-Fi) and can call into customer service or change their plan online to gain access. We're told that apps that offer similar video calling services like Skype and Google+ won't be affected.
Here's AT&T's full statement:
AT&T will offer FaceTime over Cellular as an added benefit of our new Mobile Share data plans, which were created to meet customers' growing data needs at a great value. With Mobile Share, the more data you use, the more you save. FaceTime will continue to be available over Wi-Fi for all our customers.
Comments
" FaceTime will continue to be available over Wi-Fi for all our customers."
Like AT&T has something to do with that. I don’t know why they still have customers. The only company in the US that’s worse is B of A.
By mrsbelpit on 08.17.12 4:32pm
…and Verizon :) Sadly… Now where will I go when I decide my next phone….?
By zeagus on 08.17.12 4:32pm
Unlocked, and on T-Mobile prepaid or value plan. Do it. :)
By mrsbelpit on 08.17.12 4:33pm
It’s a toss up between T-Mobile’s $30 plan and Ting’s $9 plan.
Decisions, decisions.
By JohnnyRockets on 08.17.12 4:35pm
T-Mobile will give you faster data speeds, Sprint is really quite bad. (iPhones will be able to get HSPA+ on T-Mo by the end of this year)
By mrsbelpit on 08.17.12 4:40pm
Does T-Mobile have 4G unlimited data for prepaid plans?
By manskies on 08.17.12 4:47pm
Up to 5GBs.
By Webran61 on 08.17.12 4:53pm
The best you can do is 5 gigs unthrottled, which is what they call unlimited. I’ve honestly never been throttled, but I don’t do much more that 5 gigs. but for $30 a month, it’s famazing.
There’s a 10 gig unthrottled plan, not sure if it’s prepaid.
By mrsbelpit on 08.17.12 4:54pm
I’ve got the 5gig unthrottled for 30/month, decent speeds in Chicago like 4-8 mbps. The second you reach 5gb your phone might as well be in airplane mode as the ‘throttled’ speeds make the phone unusable.
By BrodyC on 08.17.12 4:58pm
Hmm, I’m on a value plan since I need more minutes, but even with throttling, it’s a great deal. I doubt I’d get to throttling very often.
By mrsbelpit on 08.17.12 5:00pm
Yeha, 60kbps IIRC.
By zeagus on 08.17.12 5:09pm
T-mobile doesn’t have a 4g network.
By Wetzilla on 08.17.12 5:02pm
But multiple carrier HSPA+ is pretty damned fast (though more latent than LTE).
By zeagus on 08.17.12 5:10pm
test title
T-Mobile looks nicer and nicer but their data just cant match Verizons. Thats the one thing that holds me back and i have unlimited LTE and i get between 25-32 mbps which means i tether my laptop when i need to download something quick.
By Litten on 08.17.12 4:46pm
I get a good 10-15 mbps on my Gnex, my husband gets 20-25 on his SGS3. And no battery kiling LTE. I also pay less than $50 per month including tethering, no root required.
By mrsbelpit on 08.17.12 4:55pm
That’s not for both phones, to clarify. We get 1000 minutes, unlimited text, 5gigs data including hotspot for 99.99. When we bought the SGS3, they gave me a $10 data credit. Add a studentrate discount of 10% that anyone can get and with taxes it’s less than $100 per month.
By mrsbelpit on 08.17.12 4:59pm
That’s pretty fantastic! I may need to try that if coverage near me is good.
By zeagus on 08.17.12 5:12pm
Yeah, that’s the only thing. Here in California, I’ve never had a problem with coverage, but it’s not the same everywhere. It’s really great to be in a good T-Mo area.
By mrsbelpit on 08.17.12 5:23pm
Maybe i need to rethink T-Mobile. I go to college in San Deigo which has LTE so i might have to check out T-Mobile.
By Litten on 08.17.12 7:06pm
Let’s see.
This is about iPhones, so T-Mobile will gives us 2G only because of spectrum issues. Great.
If we go to prepaid, we will definitely not get LTE (on the next iPhone). I can’t get a clear answer on whether one will get the most recent HSPA+ performance, or whether one is essentially limited to HSPA performance (which would probably be acceptable for iPhone4, but a shame for iPhone 4S).
A final thing that has never been made clear to me is whether MVNOs get EXACTLY THE SAME priority in a crowded cell, or if they are put at the end of the queue. Given the way ATT, VZW etc treat their OWN customers, I think we can all guess how they’re likely to treat “foreign” customers using an MVNO running on their network.
In addition to performance issues, as far as I can tell, if one goes either of the routes one loses
- visual voice mail
- MMS
Maybe this is all a worthwhile choice to someone. But it is really just wasting everyone’s time to claim that these two options are equivalent to a postpaid plan without pointing out the limitations.
By name99 on 08.17.12 6:14pm
By the end of the year, T-Mo will be operating HSPA+ on the 1900 MHz band. That means unlocked iPhones will get better speeds that they’re getting on AT&T right now. T-Mo’s network goes to 42 Mbps, so if the iPhone 4S is capable of more than 7.2 Mbps it will get HSPA+
I didn’t suggest any MVNOs. T- mobile prepaid is operated by, you guessed it, T-Mobile. The value plan is postpaid.
My sister on T-Mobile with an iPhone gets/sends MMS. I my area, she also gets HSPA (on an iPhone 4)
I hope I didn’t waste your time with this answer.
By mrsbelpit on 08.17.12 6:36pm
Let me also add that I can’t tell if you were actually talking to me, so I’ll be extremely embarrassed and Apologetic if you weren’t. Something’s got to be done about these comment threads.
By mrsbelpit on 08.17.12 6:46pm
This is a great example of how the so called cellular “competition” in the US is very pitiful…
By WhiteNiteLite on 08.17.12 4:49pm
Typical AT&T douchebaggery. Sadly there are no other options if you want a GSM phone.
By bahinke on 08.17.12 6:41pm
no matter how bad AT&T gets, they are still nowhere near as bad as the candian carriers.
By Xaxxus on 08.17.12 4:40pm