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T-Mobile Sues Starbucks Over AT&T WiFi Giveaway
Promotion goes against original agreement between the companies
by KathrynV Saturday 07-Jun-2008 tags: legal · business · wireless · trouble · T-Mobile US
Tipped by Romney2012 See Profile
Starbucks just began offering free AT&T Wi-Fi service in their stores based on the condition that Starbucks card membership is purchased. T-Mobile says that this move violates the agreement that Starbucks has with their company and has filed a lawsuit seeking damages. The three companies had worked extensively on an agreement to make the transition from T-Mobile to AT&T in a way that worked for everyone; T-Mobile says this offer of free Wi-Fi was made behind their backs and is in opposition to the agreement that was reached. That agreement allowed T-Mobile to exclusively market its services in each store until the transition to AT&T was complete. Since the transition has only been completed in two of the nation's markets, T-Mobile feels that their right to exclusive promotion was usurped.

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potstir

@omcastbusiness.net

Feel the pain

Gee.. this sounds like the issue between Sprint and those morons at iPCS.. Why do these people get themselves into this mess without having some exit clause..

Dogfather
Premium
join:2007-12-26
Laguna Hills, CA

Look at the contract

If T-Mobile was granted exclusivity, then they should get their dough.

S_engineer
Premium
join:2007-05-16
Chicago, IL

Re: Look at the contract

They will get plenty of dough.
You thought the price of gas was bad....how about 20.35 per gallon of Latte!

Does this mean the price of my wifes Latte will go up even further?
--
"Anything worth having is worth cheating for." WC Fields

Dogfather
Premium
join:2007-12-26
Laguna Hills, CA

Re: Look at the contract

Maybe they'll get money but it seems these days contracts aren't worth the paper they're printed on and are always litigated into a half-assed settlement.

S_engineer
Premium
join:2007-05-16
Chicago, IL

Re: Look at the contract

I agree to a point....the consumer contract is usually held to the point of extortion, with of course the most recent notable exception being mortgages should have never been agreed upon in the first place!
--
"Anything worth having is worth cheating for." WC Fields

SrsBsns

join:2001-08-30
Oklahoma City, OK
when my car starts running on Latte ill start to get worried
jc100

join:2002-04-10
Agreed, HOWEVER the question begs to be answered. Did they hammer out the details regarding what constituted a full transition. By Starbuck's argument, they could market ATT in those areas where the transition had occurred without competing against T-Mobile and their agreement to them. I imagine this is one the lawyers will argue about and get rich over. In the end, it'll come down to a simple solution after millions were spent thinking of it.

McSummation
Mmmm, Zeebas Are Tastee.
Premium,MVM
join:2003-08-13
Round Rock, TX
kudos:2

Exclusive?

How can T-Mobile have exclusive marketing rights if they are transitioning to AT&T?

tiger72
SexaT duorP
Premium
join:2001-03-28
Saint Louis, MO
kudos:1

Re: Exclusive?

as long as t-mobile provides the Wifi, they're the ones doing the marketing. When t-mobile stops providing the wifi, AT&T gets to begin advertising. It's pretty straight-forward.
Austinloop

join:2001-08-19
Austin, TX
kudos:1

Sour grapes

It sure sounds like T-Mobile just bit into a large batch of sour grapes. It is hard to believe that this wasn't discussed during the transition talks.

NY Tel
Premium
join:2004-04-09
Smithtown, NY
kudos:3
Reviews:
·AT&T CallVantage

Been there, used it!

FWIW,

I used the new AT&T service at my local Starbucks. The IP address lookup for the T-1 carrying the Internet connection that I was using was registered to T-Mobile yet I got an AT&T login screen and there were 2 separate SSID's available to me, one said Tmobile and the other said AT&T.
patcat88

join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY
kudos:1

Re: Been there, used it!

Same here. ATT and TM SSIDs, T-Mobile IP and backbone on ATT SSID. ATT Wifi is usually backhauled on ATT Long Distence backbone (12.x.x.x) and gets a IP from that range. There is NAT going on BTW which sucks. Torrenting works fine but upto 1.5mbit/s. I need to bring 2 wifi devices and max out the node and see if its really 1 T1, or your rate limited to 1 T1.

NetFixer
Freedom is NOT free
Premium
join:2004-06-24
The 'Boro
Reviews:
·Vonage
·Cingular Wireless
·Comcast
·AT&T Southeast

Re: Been there, used it!

What I have seen in use is a single T-1 connection to a 17xx Cisco router with a WIC-1DSU-T1 module.

Perhaps there are busy high profile stores with more bandwidth, but I have not worked on the equipment in such a location.
--
History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid.
-- Dwight D. Eisenhower
Test your firewall.
Smell the flowers.
Airwolf7
Premium
join:2004-12-12
Franklin, KY
kudos:1
Reviews:
·Comcast
·AT&T Southeast

1 edit
patcat88 See Profile, Don't you think that it is just a little bit greedy to be running torrents on a connection that is meant to be shared with all of the users at Starbucks.

Hopefully someone will block all P2P applications from running over their Hotspots.

Note: If you were just running your torrent application to see how much bandwidth was available then I'm sorry for getting on to you about it, but you could have just ran a speed test.
patcat88

join:2002-04-05
Jamaica, NY
kudos:1

Re: Been there, used it!

said by Airwolf7:

patcat88 See Profile, Don't you think that it is just a little bit greedy to be running torrents on a connection that is meant to be shared with all of the users at Starbucks.
No, I don't have a cantenna pointed at it from home. I use Starbucks wifi only a couple times a year.
Hopefully someone will block all P2P applications from running over their Hotspots.
What an awful thing to say. Perhaps we should ban myspace, pages can be 700KB-1.5MB long, flash and youtube have got to do, heck, lets add the bucket system (powerboost), if you exceed 3 MB in 5 mins, your throttled to dialup, your bucket refills by you not using your dialup speed punishment's bandwidth.

I VPN it anyways, so you can't block me. TCPIP does a nice job sharing bandwidth, but I dont need it. Nobody else is on this hotspot, 1460 kbit/s upload flatlined for hours on end. Only 1-2 other laptop users at the Starbucks, and they might not have internet, or using free wifi, or using cell phone card.

Its pretty sad that Starbucks' wifi upload speed (1.5) is more than I get at home on TWC's fastest/most expensive residential tier (20/1).

NY Tel
Premium
join:2004-04-09
Smithtown, NY
kudos:3

Re: Been there, used it!

I think people should look to curtail personal expenses by renting an apartment next to or on top of a Starbucks.

ReformCRTC
Support Your Independent ISP

join:2004-03-07
Canada
Well if you steal movies and music you should steal the wifi too! At least you'll be a consistent thief....

StephenT

@charter.com

At&t

At&t also decided earlier this year to not let T-Mobile colocate on any new or upcoming tower where TMO don't already have a lease.

bill jones

@cox.net

tmobile

I'll take tmobile over att any day of the week. Tmobile generally treats customers very well.

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