AT&T Digital One Rate a Dud?

from the smile-though-your-calls-are-dropping dept

Article in the WSJ today about the AT&T DigitalOne Rate (cellular) plan that casts aspersions on my faithful companion. Mossberg (the WSJ tech writer) makes a comparison of AT&T to AOL's service woes of 2 years ago, saying that AT&T has underestimated demand for their low prices and should immediately make the technology investment to fix it because "the service ought to work all the time". Sure there are deadspots for AT&T, but CellOne in SF was much worse and they've had 3 years to build out their digital network vs about half the time for AT&T. 100% uptime for cellular isn't likely soon (municipal restrictions to cellular towers in many cities), and isn't a reasonable expectation, IMO, given the number of variables involved in each connection. Mossberg is just off the mark here. My experience is that one call in 30 gets dropped, and at 7 cents a minute, I'll hit redial -- BFD. Knowing that the rates are so low induces you to stay much more connected; to make that call now that you might otherwise stave off until you hit a land line. It has changed my commute, if not my life.