AT&T has just announced that MMS -- a
much-ballyhooed feature of iPhone OS 3.0 -- will finally be hitting AT&T on September 25. There's still no date for tethering, though the company is holding the line that it'll be offered "in the future." Expanding on the logic behind the tethering delay, they're saying that "by its nature, this function could exponentially increase traffic on the network, and we need to ensure that some of our current upgrades are in place before we can deliver the expanded functionality with the excellent performance that customers expect." We're no network engineers, but "exponentially increase traffic" and "AT&T" are two things we don't typically like to hear in the same sentence -- let's hope the 850MHz, 7.2Mbps, and backhaul upgrades they're cranking on right now go a long way toward sorting that out. As for MMS, they're acknowledging that the release "does indeed fall a few days past the official end of summer," arguing that their support of more iPhone customers than any other carrier in the world made a positive launch experience a bit of a challenge. Of course, virtually every other phone AT&T sells (and has sold for the past several years) supports the same tech, so this feels like a pretty active admission that iPhone users blaze through data-rich features at a pace that the carrier has been ill-equipped to handle.
posted Sep 3rd 2009 2:09PM
That's my birthday! For Real!
I have to defend a speeding ticket on that day.
In fact, today at 4:30 I have to defend a stop sign summons.
(and before anyone comments on my driving, I'd just like to say, owning an SRT8 isn't easy)
The day after mine!!
SRT 8 what? Charger? Challenger?
SRT 8 unicorn.
Maybe if you bought a car that weighed less than 5000 lbs, you could have stopped in time.
AT&T,
Free tethering or I wait for Verizon to get the iPhone.
C'mon carriers, where's the competition?!
I *bet* owning an SRT8 ain't easy! Gotta damn near bring the thing to a standstill in order to negotiate a corner.
And I guess that's not as easy as it sounds if the brakes are so bad you can't stop at a stop sign.
http://help.BenM.at/usa.php from your iPhone, and agree, you get tethering.
I have an SRT8 Jeep Grand Cherokee and haven't gotten any tickets. It's a fun SUV to drive, wouldn't take it off road, but on interstate 80 which I drive daily, it's smooth, responsive and passing semi's has never been easier. :)
Dodge: All power, nothing else. No braking, no handling, no cornering, no drivability unless you want to go fast in a straight line everywhere.
all your at&t network are belong to us!
-mms
So this is where we all go on about what stuff we own that has no connection to the product? Just to try and sound cool on the internet? Neato!
xcrunk...uh I hope you don't actually think Verizon would give you free tethering....
Well, we have been using MMS and tethering for awhile in Canada now, really, they are not a big deal. Few people use MMS.
Go KeatMP, it's your birthday!
Lol at all Gran Turismo fanboi's that have no idea what they are talking about. I bet most of you making comments have never even driven a car with more HP then your "massive V6" Honda accord if it wasn't attached to a game console controller.
For your information, since there is an SRT8 Challenger sitting outside I can tell you that they handle extremely well, and are also very stable at speed. Hell, our old 2000 S430 mercedes would probably outhandle the majority of the econoboxes that you "auto critics" drive.
SRT8 comes with Z rated tires, huge brembo brakes, Mercedes derived stability control, Getrag rearend with independent rear suspension, and an excellent gearbox. Believe me, having made several high speed stops in the car during local road course, poker run, and "spirited cruises" through the twisties in North central FL, I can tell you, if this car has a strength, is it's handling compared to the other cars in it's class, in addition to being the only 2+2 you can comfortably fit 4 full sized adults (I'm 6'2 and can sit in the back with a normal 5'10 passenger up front.).
Mine too lol, first thing I thought and first comment I saw.
Thanks, tamp0N-cobra.
@tampa03cobra
brembo brakes.
'nuff said.
If yall are so interested in automobiles you should just go to Autoblog.
Wait, did he just say "twisties" and "Florida" ?
Christmas in September for iphone users
Only if you're an AT&T user with low features expectations. AT&T just decided to honor their rainchecks. Almost all of the rest of the iPhone users around the world had MMS a while ago, almost all other mobile phone users had MMS a long long time ago.
Not just MMS, but tethering. I've been enjoying tethering since I got my 3GS since my country has real 3G networks and not the kiddy networks that they have in the US.
@ Adam Zey: What's with the mystery, what country do you live in?
please suck my, 'in the future'...
@Adam Zey: Because I'm sure your country has nearly 305 million people in it and is close to as large as the US is, so your "real" carriers there have to deal with the same problems that AT&T does.
PS: AT&T really disappointed by delaying MMS, and I will never forgive them. Your comment is just silly and not well thought out.
@Cannonater It's not only size that matters mate. It is true that if you live in a big country then the carrier has more area to cover. But in the same time if you also have a bigger populace then you also have more people paying for that coverage. So all in all that would instead of just being about how big the country it,would be about how many people live in it per square kilometer.
If I take my own country Sweden as an example to put against the USA.We have a quite small population of about 9 million but the country is relatively big for european standards and we end up with a pop/km of 20/km. While the USA (being all that big and all) end up at 31/km (stats taken from wikipedia).Which means that if you hence (as given by the information) have more people per area then you "should" also have better coverage as more people are paying for it.
For some odd reason that is not what's happening if you look at USA coverage right now. Over here there is coverage in over 90 percent of the country.I think we are somewhere in the reaches of 95-99 percent if I remember correctly.
Here we have laws stating that operators need to be able to cover (build to cover) the biggest part of the country to be allowed to operate.So the problem here is not the size of the country but how the operators handle their coverage and how the government handles the operators.
Over here MSS and teethering was instantly enabled and I have been enjoying teethering (I still see MSS as pointless) since the launch.
So I cannot do much but pity how it looks for you over in the states. On the other hand it's also partly your fault for letting the operators slip to that level.
This is just obnoxious.
We are Apple! We innovate! Everyone mimics us! And now, we present MMS!!! (clap track)
Yes, we are behind schedule. Meh. We have so many customers that we don't really care.
This is insulting. I can't wait to ditch AT&T.
HTC Hero on Sprint or iPhone 4G on Verizon in 2010 baby!
Damn right it's obnoxious. I can't WAIT to hear AT&T's real explanation for this.
"The unique capabilities and high usage of the iPhone’s multimedia capabilities required us to work on our network MMS architecture to carry the expected record volumes of MMS traffic and ensure an excellent experience from Day One." ................ will simply not cut it.
@yakapo your idiotic mockery of Apple blatantly reveals your low IQ, for the capability for the iPhone to send and receive MMS has been made available by Apple since at least the release of 3.0. AT&T was the company that dropped the ball and became one of the few carriers WORLDWIDE that didn't have MMS support for iPhone OS 3.0 by launch date.
You meager attempt to put down Apple and discount them as a successful company with a successful piece of hardware has been made quite moot despite your less than glamorous use of cheap sarcasm.
To reference your post in terms your small mind can understand :
FAIL
uh unknown....I think you are a FAIL since Apple WAS really late to the game with MMS, 2 years after the first iphone which was launched 5 years after MMS commercially launched...during a period where just about EVERY phone had MMS (excluding those with crap monochrome or very small color screens), and while standard AT&T messaging packages included MMS...so ya know, his little put down is kinda warranted..it's just that he is a couple months late :)
They'll probably offer tethering when people leave their network in droves after their exclusivity deal is done with apple.
Hmm I thought that was already supposed to be out in August... guess that never went through?
No it wasn't. It was always known that it would be in the fall when ATT will push it out.
Some other carriers implemented it earlier.
not taking it personal, but for some reason Mark, your avatar annoys me
Apple originally said at the 3.0/3GS launch event that MMS would be available worldwide, and on AT&T "later this summer."
Summer doesn't end in August, though I know most people think it does. In fact it ends on September 21st.
But regardless of whether AT&T missed the normal use of the word summer by several weeks, or the technical definition of summer by four days, they LIED and they deserve all the scorn they're going to get.
My Company is holding off on deploying the iPhone as a corporate choice until tethering is available. Based on AT&T's performance in general I'd say it could be YEARS before they enable it on the iPhone.
Hey Apple! Put the iPhone on ANY OTHER NETWORK and many of us will BUY ANOTHER ONE! I would just jump at the chance to dump AT&T.
Is this an added cost or MMS free?
Free, if I'm not mistaken.
The only cost is the inevitable deterioration of AT&T's network speeds due to the combination of rampant MMSing and their insufficient infrastructure.
You can use MMS foe free but please take it easy okay? Please don't kill our fragile network, please pretty please :(
-AT&T
Its free if you have a SMS package. Otherwise it counts at their ridiculous message rate... in other words, send an email.
nothing is for free...you're going to pay for it one way or another
I am going send MMS until my fingers bleed, which may take awhile on the iPhone. Gotta make up for lost time though.
This will kill network :D
Too late!
@geofegg
yeah really lol
way too late...this is from yesterday
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/03/technology/companies/03att.html?bl&ex=1252123200&en=7d0e3cac5b9a733a&ei=5087
@Josh
The best part of that article is this sentence, "AT&T says it has no intention of capping how much data iPhone owners use." Tethering with no data cap? I'll wait for that! :)
Wow they took the whole available this summer to the extreme end of summer
So extreme that it's fall...
With Rogers in Canada I've had MMS and Tethering since 3.0 was released. Now I now why so many AT&T iPhone users complain about AT&T
What took so long? i had this back on my RAZR in 2005, on AT&T!!!
I had this on my candybar Nokia a millennium ago.
summer ends on the 22nd though... can i sue? im thinking $5,000,000,001,00.00 (the 1,000 is for court fees and what not)
Something crazy is going on with those commas...
Pretty sure there is a class-action lawsuit underway already for this exact reason. Some California lady I think? She's suing because the features weren't available at the 3gs launch, and the advertising had print too small to read saying 'some features coming late summer'. Bam. False advertising, to the tune of several hundred dollars for the phone, and several THOUSAND for the contract, I'd sign up for this lawsuit if you can.
owl city concert, now my roommate can actually send pics from it, congrats its only been a decade
"MMS" - its an exciting new technology, brought to you only by Apple.
I think you mean AT&T
Apple isn't in the clear in this. They left MMS out of the first phone on purpose. Had they not done that, this mess wouldn't exist.
So what.
lmao nice network y'all got there
welcome to the year 2002.. oh shit is it 2009 already? no flying cars and shit?
oooh MMS on the iPhone.. snoooze
Welcome to 2002 Apple.
The rest of the world has MMS on their iPhones. This isn't Apple's fault.
Apple chose AT&T.
you mean "welcome to 2002, at&t" right?
Actually, Apple chose Verizon, but Verizon said no. Then Apple chose Cingular, who said yes, but then merged with AT&T.
@ Rollins
Did the rest of the world have MMS on iPhones before 2009?
My mistake, I didn't know Verizon and Cingular were the only two providers.
I don't believe for a minute that Apple was interested in having a CDMA network as their launch partner in the US.
@simon
Yes, Apple was slow to get MMS onto the iPhone. Up until June, it was their fault. Now it's not. :)
@Sisyphus
They're the only two carriers here that mattered to Apple. The others wouldn't have allowed Apple to sell nearly as many devices.
regardless of exactly who is to blame ... i have been sending/receiving MMS since high school in 2002 ... and for a phone that is supposed to be the jesusphone ... shit like this just doesnt sit well.
Dang syphilis, Adam told you.
I do blame Apple for sticking with AT&T only for so long, but at the same time if AT&T wanted an exclusive carrier deal I think they have an obligation to make sure they can handle everything involved. The iPhone has been out for years and AT&T still has trouble keeping up with demand for activations, for voice calls, for data, for basic services like MMS and tethering.
Other iPhone carriers abroad don't seem to have such problems and I will celebrate the day AT&T's exclusivity is dropped.
Actually UnixSystemsEngineer, given the horrid terms Apple offered Verizon when they approached them and then turned around and offered AT&T much sweeter terms, I'd have to agree with you.
Too bad AT&T still sucks. It's hilarious that they still can't offer tethering when Blackberries have had it forever.
Have to say, as a UK 02 iPhone user enjoying MMS since June, i have sent a total of 2 MMS's...
How many have u recieved?
You need to get more teen girls as friends
You need to get more teen girlfriends.
I will notice that the last day of summer this year is september 22nd. That sounds to me like they are not keeping that promise. :)
Innovation at its best! or is it Thinking Different?
Last day of summer is Sept 23rd.
So when AT&T said late summer for MMS rollout I guess they really meant fall (yes, I'm being nit picky since the rest of the world got it back in June or whenever the 3gs was released)? For future clarification, does that make spring late winter or early summer?
Welcome to 1995 iphone users!
How about they work on fixing my visual voicemail so I receive it sooner than 2 hours after i get a voicemail.
iphone killer?
AT&T - the nations most over-hyped and fragile 3G network.
I've had MMS working on my iPhone with AT&T since 3.0 hit... hmm...
Ahhh, the SRT8 "Challenger" is sweet looking and I almost bought one a while back. Now that things have "changed to what we can believe in" I'm soOoo glad I didn't!
Regards,
Hey Apple, you know how to add tethering to the iPhone? Bring it to Verizon.
but then we wouldnt have wifi...
Yeah, because no Verizon smartphones have Wi-Fi. I guess the Verizon Touch Pro in my pocket is just really good at faking a Wi-Fi connection...
I'm not network engineer either, but won't faster speeds (7.2) bog down the backend of the network even more?
I somehow doubt sending (unlimited) videos will be included as part of the MMSing package.
I like how people blame AT&T despite the fact that apple only barely supported mms a few months ago. Way to drink the apple koolaid people