iPhone Video Apps Should be Good Netizens. But, Apple Really Needs to End the AT&T Monopoly
When I think of AT&T’s 3G network, I sometimes imagine its network control centers looking like something out of steampunk anime, giant valves and pipes everywhere, steam spurting from random points, and network engineers screaming at the top of their lungs trying to work together to somehow keep 3G data moving through ancient creaking sputtering pipes. This may not be too far from the truth based on this news from TechCrunch:
Some iPhone Video Apps Won’t Be Approved Unless They Can Adapt To AT&T’s Lousy Network
To be fair, any network manager would like to data heavy software to be good netizens and adjust their behavior based on network traffic and constraints. But it seems to me that the real solution for Apple’s U.S. customers is to end AT&T’s sole provider status. If all four major carriers were able to sell iPhones to their customers, it would reduce AT&T’s network congestion issues (and their revenue) by spreading out the now well known insatiable iPhone users’ data appetite.
It was a wise move on both Apple’s and AT&T’s part not to heavily market the 3G iPad model. iPad users will be even more data hungry than iPhone users and would bring AT&T’s 3G network completely to its knees on a daily basis.
