AT&T Poised to Charge Premium for Facetime Over Cellular? → The double-dip

I love how carriers want not only to charge you for how much data you use, but on top of that, charge extra for using portions of that data in certain ways.

However, I do have to admit that the throughput on AT&T's network around here is so bad that the thought of a whole ton of people doing Facetime over 3G doesn't exactly instill confidence. I'm sure it'd work fine in Plano, though, where I routinely see seven times the speed that I do in Frisco for whatever reason.

Double? I guess in theory it could be triple or more if you're using the mcell. This is funny.

What gets me is that they keep crying that they need more money because their system is being over taxed...

... okay so let's stop right there.

Generally when you need to collect a higher toll for an over taxed system you're saying one of a couple things.

1) We need to increase capacity so we need more money to build out the system that we rent to you.

2) The over all experience to our customers is being degraded so we're going to refund a portion to our customers for under delivering them what they've already paid for so we're refunding. (This is a joke as it would never happen)

So.. where are all these network performance increases? I don't think they're really increased capacity or improved services to existing customers in which they are charging more. They ARE building out another generation of network at the expense of current users that will also have to spend more money to access it, AND at a premium, because you know, "WE spent and invested in this network" which is pure bullshit. In a sense they have collected a tax on the user in order to build out a new structure. They didn't dip into existing profits, nor did can they claim they went out and raised capital either.. I just find all these extremely bold moves on their part to be gouging the customer. I wouldn't expect any less of any phone company.

Agreed - Down here in Waco, AT&T is awful. My Verizon 4G consistently pulls 20+mbps down and upwards of 13mbps up.

However, in the Fort Worth area, it's fantastic. Not sure about north of Dallas, though..

AT&T is really a mixed bag; whether your phone is usable or not depends on where you're standing. In my experience it gets better the further south I drive toward Dallas. I was drooling the last time I was down in Plano and pulling 8 megabits off the nearest tower. I'm lucky to get 1.5 at home.

AT&T service here in Frisco actually suffered an outage for the entire morning; even calls to 911 wouldn't go through. Apparently they had botched a software upgrade. Fun stuff.

Wow, 8 megabits? On LTE? I guess that's the norm.

I agree, though - certains of the DFW area are great. However, along the interstate its usually awful / george bush / i-30 etc it can really suck.

I just got these results earlier today!!!