It is being reported that the horribly slow Edge network that drives the iPhone has crashed on the west coast.
This goes to prove that you cannot have a multi-media phone that is expected to do Multi-Media functions on a network that was never ever designed to have a bunch of early adopters on the network consuming media.
The fall out on this is going to be severe unless AT&T can get a handle on the data delivery. I live on Sprint EVDO at least 8 hours a day and so do a heck of a lot of people Sprint and Verizon would have been ready.
AT&T knew this tidal wave was coming for months so their is no excuse on their part. They were probably to busy installing the software that is spying on their customers. Be curious to see how they spin this.
We all live in a broadband world and if the carriers cannot deliver enough bandwidth people are going to scream like crazy!
The problem with Sprint EVDO is that a) it’s been crashing recently too (I have not been able to sustain a data connection for longer than fifteen minutes for the past month, both in my home market and in Los Angeles), and b) it’s not available outside of major cities. For example, you can use AT&T’s EDGE network in Beatty, Nevada. EVDO? Nope.
Verizon, BTW, has the same issue. Whereas EDGE is built into all modern GSM equipment thus is a “freebie” from a telco point of view basically being everywhere that GSM is, EVDO is a separate set of equipment and thus isn’t everywhere. I don’t travel to Beatty very often so I live with my Sprint EVDO. But if I traveled to more remote places more often, AT&T EDGE would definitely be my preference. Slow coverage is better than no coverage.