Latest Post

AT&T Fail and why the iPhone needs to go CDMA

I am an unabashed fan of the iPhone and all of it’s locked down and controlled UX goodness. Sir Steve is right: command and control is necessary to design a mobile user experience that just works.

Only bummer is Jobsco can’t control the crappy network service AT&T is attempting to provide (which is soiling the reputation of the iPhone and hurting it’s growth.) I am a resident of a suburb of New York City. Each day thousands of iPhone users and I struggle through a dark commute. The AT&T service basically is non - usable for 80% of the ride (see image below: the box represents little or no service). This is inexcusable and destroys almost 2 hours a day of productive time.

Sad thing for Apple is there is little utility for a fantastic device if it can’t access the web. FYI: Verizon subscribers have connectivity the entire way. (I tested this myself on a droid for 2 weeks).

Further bad news for Apple: I have watched as many familiar train faces have shown up with new Verizon blackberries or Droids. Folks are to putting down their iPhones for a better network, or even worse, starting to carry two devices (this wastes money and kills the elegance of a single device, charger, platform, etc. Thanks to AT&T, technology has once again made people’s lives more complicated- shame on them). This New England commuter use case demonstrates further why Apple needs to build a CDMA iPhone folks could use on the superior Verizon network. I would pay full price at this point for a CDMA and contract free Verizon iPhone, as I am sure many others would from DC to Boston.

Simply stated AT&T service is horrible on my commute from Fairfield county to New York City. This is an affluent demographic that would likely pay full bullet for a data plan for the forthcoming iPad…but no one will till there is a CDMA version of the iPad or they buy a MIFI. AT&T’s argument that most recent network speed (not coverage consistency!) test that declared them winner (which is suspect in my mind…they clearly test in favorable environments and definitely do not test the common use cases of millions of commuter each day.)

AT&T got lucky with the iPhone. It covered up a glaring wound in their network… and they better bend over for Steve to keep the exclusivity so all the iPhone hardware loyalists theoretically stay locked in to a second tier network. As soon as there is a CDMA iPhone, you can bet on a mass exodus from ATT.

Its too bad amazing hardware doesn’t make up for crappy network coverage. For the love of god, Verizon and Apple, will you please get this deal done, its a no brainer!

Why We Write