Hasta La Gadget!

“An iPhone, an iPhone, my carrier’s reputation for an iPhone.” Grab a cup of coffee and get yourself comfortable, fans of behind-the-scenes industry drama. Wired has published an exhaustive and fascinating expose on the “loveless celebrity marriage” that is Apple and AT&T — all from sources familiar with the matters but who cannot (or will not) be named, of course. In other words, don’t take this as gospel, but frankly, none of this sounds too crazy or outside the realm of what we’ve already surmised ourselves. In brief, the two companies have been contentious towards one another since just after the iPhone was unveiled. For AT&T’s part, the carrier was reportedly taken aback when its requests (delivered by Senior VP Kris Rinne) to restrict YouTube’s bandwidth usage (or make it WiFi-only) while the network infrastructure was built up fell on deaf ears in Cupertino. Word has it Apple also refused to allow its devices to be used in campaigns to combat Verizon’s Map for That ads: “It was [effective] because of AT&T’s network. We would have been letting them use the iPhone to put lipstick on a pig,” remarked one anonymous Apple exec.

What’s most interesting to us here is the ongoing reported discussion to drop AT&T in favor for Verizon. That chapter apparently begins just months after the original’s launch, with an investigative team (including Scott Forstall) ultimately concluding that Qualcomm‘s CDMA (or CDMA / GSM hybrid) chips would require a complete redesign of the device, not to mention a nasty lawsuit with AT&T over its exclusive contract (perhaps a minor issue, knowing Apple). Back then, Verizon wasn’t seen as a guaranteed improvement, and according to one executive privy to such meetings, the carrier switch has been discussed at least a half dozen times, with the general consensus always being that it would “cause as many problems as it solved.” We can’t imagine this is gonna help stem the perpetual VZW iPhone rumor mill.

Hit up the source link for the full tale, which does hit on a fundamental issue of the mobile industry going forward: as smartphone makers continue to push their devices’ capabilities, bandwidth concerns will continue to grow and carriers are likely to take the majority of the blame. If you ask us, David Fincher has just found his ideal follow-up to The Social Network — we’d especially love to see someone film the part where AT&T asks Steve Jobs to ditch the turtleneck and wear a suit when meeting with its board of directors.

Apple discussed Verizon switch ‘at least half a dozen times,’ and other stories about its AT&T relationship originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 19 Jul 2010 19:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We were extremely close to cramping our sarcasm muscle with all the faux excitement we had to drum up for the 3.2-inch Acclaim, but US Cellular has now come back with word that it’ll soon count HTC’s Desire among its roster of phones. The Desire, which is mooted to be coming to other smaller carriers like Cellular South, will debut in August alongside the BlackBerry Bold. We’re more excited, however, to find US Cellular promising it’ll offer “a BlackBerry flip smartphone with a full QWERTY keyboard” later this year. That sounds like RIM’s slightly unorthodox 9670 to us, and will probably form the second part of the BB maker’s pledged introduction of two new handsets. US Cellular’s 2010 device lineup refresh will be completed with a pair more Androids, courtesy of LG and Samsung. The former is said to have a “large touch screen and slide-out, ergonomically-designed QWERTY keyboard,” while the latter is only described as “highly-anticipated.” Not too shabby.

Continue reading US Cellular adds HTC Desire and BlackBerry Bold in August, teases BlackBerry 9670 for ‘later this year’

US Cellular adds HTC Desire and BlackBerry Bold in August, teases BlackBerry 9670 for ‘later this year’ originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 25 Jun 2010 05:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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LED data transmission used to be all the rage — we fondly remember beaming Palm Pilot contacts via IrDA. Then we got omni-directional Bluetooth and building-penetrating WiFi, and put all that caveman stuff behind us. But now, scientists the world over are looking to bring back line-of-sight networking, and the latest demonstration has Chinese researchers streaming video to a laptop with naught but ceiling-mounted blue LEDs. The Chinese Academy of Sciences claims to have realized a 2Mbit per second internet connection that transmits data simply by modulating the flicker of the little diodes, and imperceptibly enough to have them serve as room lighting as well. Like Boston University before them, the Chinese scholars see short-range LED networks controlling smart appliances. It’s not quite the gigabit speed you’d get from laser diodes, but this way you’ll get more mileage out of those expensive new bulbs, eh?

Chinese scientists demonstrate 2Mbps internet connection over LED originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 17 May 2010 20:22:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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So this is what all those “yo’ network’s so slow” jokes were about. The Wall Street Journal has today penned a story framing AT&T’s hefty recent investments in building out its network as a defensive move against a “huge exodus to Verizon” when its rival gets the iPhone. These preventative measures include working with Apple on streamlining the iPhone’s network load, and infrastructure spending that is expected to be $2 billion more in 2010 than in 2009. The WSJ claimed yesterday that Apple was working on a CMDA version of its iPhone that could hit mass production as early as September. However, concluding that the iPhone on Verizon is a done deal seems something of a stretch. Sprint has shown a remarkable ability to attract cutting edge phones, and China Unicom’s exclusivity agreement is about to hit its precarious first anniversary about the time this handset is set to roll out. Still, setting aside the analyst blather and extrapolation, the picture that emerges is of AT&T feverishly patching up its service offering in the face of a rapidly expiring exclusivity arrangement.

AT&T building out network capacity to prevent exodus to Verizon’s iPhone? originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 31 Mar 2010 04:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It’s no huge secret that the differences between LTE and WiMAX aren’t exceedingly drastic, and with the right support, the two could theoretically form one big, happy family. During this morning’s CTIA keynote with Dan Hesse (Sprint’s CEO) and Bill Morrow (Clearwire‘s CEO), the latter noted that he wasn’t interested in waging a war with LTE, suggesting that his spectrum is “designed and built so we can add on LTE should we need to.” ‘Course, one would suggest that Clearwire’s in no position to get angry with the standard that boasts larger industry support, but we digress. A few hours later during Verizon’s LTE roundtable, the carrier’s CTO (Tony Melone) responded to an audience question related to LTE and WiMAX becoming one. His brutally honest opinion? It’ll never happen, and the “only big happy family” he can think of is the 3GPP to LTE crew, of which Verizon Wireless is obviously a member. He wouldn’t elaborate on the whys or whats, only noting that it was his frank opinion on the matter from his knowledge in the field, but we can’t candidly say that we’d love for the war to rage on — competition is stellar, but joined efforts to create a larger, more robust 4G network sounds a lot sweeter to our ears than the clanging of swords.

Clearwire CEO mentions that WiMAX could join LTE as one, Verizon Wireless CTO says no way originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 24 Mar 2010 18:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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