We're Already Hyping 6G When 5G Hasn't Even Finished Disappointing Us Yet

from the this-one-goes-to-11 dept

It was the technology that was supposed to change the world. According to carriers, not only was fifth-generation wireless (5G) supposed to bring about the "fourth industrial revolution," it was supposed to revolutionize everything from smart cities to cancer treatment. According to conspiracy theorists and internet imbeciles, 5G is responsible for everything from COVID-19 to your migraines.

Unfortunately for both sets of folks, data continues to indicate that 5G is nowhere near that interesting.

A number of recent studies have already shown that U.S. 5G is notably slower than most overseas deployments (thanks in part to government's failure to make more mid-band spectrum available for public use). Several other studies have shown that initial deployments in many cases are actually slower than existing 4G networks. That's before you get to the fact that U.S. consumers already pay more for wireless than a long list of developed nations, something likely to get worse in the wake of mindless industry consolidation.

While 5G is important, and will improve over time, it's pretty clear that the technology is more of a modest evolution than a revolution, and 5G hype overkill (largely driven by a desperate desire to rekindle lagging smartphone sales) is a far cry from reality.

That's not stopping us from already hyping 6G, though. As carriers begin the fairly mundane process of building the standards framework for the next next-generation standard, the familiar promises of near-magical capabilities are already starting to emerge. Just ask Mazin Gilbert, AT&T's VP of network analytics and automation, who appears to have learned absolutely nothing the last few years, and is already equating 6G to The Matrix:

"Gilbert added that 6G might even support science fiction-type services, specifically calling out the 1999 movie "The Matrix," where the character Trinity learned how to fly a helicopter in minutes. "This is what we see our lives going to be like," he said.

It's worth noting that several of these kinds of use cases have long been touted for 5G, and now appear to be migrating into the 6G discussion as well."

At the same standards meeting, Karri Kuoppamaki, VP of technology development and strategy for T-Mobile US, at least tried to temper enthusiasm, urging his industry colleagues to avoid over-hyping 6G in the same way 5G was:

Kuoppamaki made one clear plea to the thousands of registrants to the event: "It's OK to get excited about 6G, but we have to get excited the right way," he said, warning that the industry should not fall victim to the "shiny objects syndrome." On 6G, "we should focus on getting it right," he said, rather than rushing a new technology to market that doesn't necessarily provide any clear benefits or new or improved use cases.

What carriers like AT&T didn't quite seem to realize, is that while they thought they were just sparking a new wave of handset upgrades by over-hyping 5G, misrepresenting what the standard can do and where it's available (remember, AT&T still uses fake phone icons to pretend 4G is 5G), only creates unrealistic expectations for consumers. As a result, the end user winds up associating what really are useful (if sometimes modest) improvements and standards with bluster and bullshit, the exact opposite of what they were going for.

Filed Under: 5g, 6g, hype, overhype, wireless
Companies: at&t

Verizon Is Still Abusing The Hell Out Of The Word 'Unlimited'

from the beating-up-the-dictionary dept

Back in 2007, Verizon was forced to strike an agreement with the New York State Attorney General for falsely marketing data plans as "unlimited" when the plans had very clear limits. Thirteen years later and it's not clear the company has learned much of anything.

Verizon's 2020 wireless plans still falsely claim that users get "unlimited" data for a premium price point on top of base surcharges. But you're to ignore that things like HD and 4K streaming cost extra. Or the fact that if you're enrolled in something like Verizon's recent "Unlimited Plus" plan, "unlimited data" is defined as up to 15 GB of usage, after which your connection is throttled for the remainder of the billing cycle. Such surcharges of course don't include additional fees to connect additional devices to this so-called "unlimited" connection, be it your Apple Watch or your tablet.

Verizon recently updated this plan, offering double the data allotment (30 GB) when connected to Verizon's 4G LTE network, while providing "unlimited data" while users are connected to its newer 5G network:

"Unlimited Plus gives customers double the 4G LTE premium data for jetpacks, tablets and laptops, and includes unlimited access to blazing-fast 5G Ultra Wideband speeds when connected on 5G Ultra Wideband devices."

While that superficially sounds nice, Verizon's 5G network is barely available to the vast majority of customers. One recent study found that due to coverage issues with the millimeter wave spectrum Verizon is using for 5G, 5G was available roughly 0.4% of the time even in "launched" markets. The other problem? Verizon's "unlimited" plans continue to include not only a ban on faster HD and 4K streaming (unless you pay more), but all manner of additional surcharges to connect additional devices to your already pricey connection:

"As of late last week, Verizon introduced a new version of its “Unlimited Plus” plan, which attaches to existing wireless plans for an extra $30 a month. Then, if you would like to connect more devices to your plan beyond your phone, you can sign up for an unlimited connected device plan and upgrade to Unlimited Plus for another $10 a month. If you have a tablet or hotspot, Verizon will sell you another unlimited plan for those for an extra $20 a month.

The new “Unlimited Plus” offers unlimited-unlimited 5G and up to 30 GB of “premium” 4G LTE data. So it appears you get double the unlimited data as well as an infinite amount of 5G service which is probably not provided in your area (or if you turn the corner, or go indoors in an area that has the service). But if you are connecting a hotspot, laptop, or tablet to your plan, then Verizon redefines unlimited again, this time to mean up to 50 GB of 5G data (almost not available anywhere) and then you get speed throttled to 3 Mbps for the rest of the billing cycle, but just on those devices."

There's simply no way the majority of normal consumers actually understand what most of this means. And that's of course quite by design. One, the complexity and caveats make it difficult to impossible to compare Verizon's pricing to its competitors. That helps mask the fact that U.S. wireless subscribers pay not only some of the highest prices in the developed world for wireless data, but those connections are some both some of the slowest in the world, and inundated with all kinds of murky restrictions on what you can do with your new connection. How innovative!

The other major benefit is that consumers confused by these plans will generally subscribe to the most expensive plan they can afford to avoid headaches. Basically, Verizon and other U.S. wireless carriers adore making their plans intimidating and confusing because they know you'll pay a premium to avoid bullshit surprises and headaches in the middle of your billing cycle. They're effectively intentionally sowing confusion, then charging you a premium to avoid arbitrary penalties. Like the airlines, banking, and other industries, U.S. policymakers treat reining in this kind of behavior as a non-starter.

Which is why it was surprising that net neutrality rules, which mandated transparency and other base-level restrictions on this kind of stuff, managed to get passed in the first place. But not only did the Trump administration eliminate these hugely popular consumer protections based on bullshit data, they effectively lobotomized the agency's authority over telecom at lobbyist behest. Said lobotomized FCC then rubber stamped the T-Mobile Sprint merger (without even looking at the data or warnings by antitrust experts), ensuring less overall price competition over the next few years.

In short if you're an American who likes paying a lot for mediocre, spotty service delivered on a platter of intentionally confusing options designed to nickel-and-dime you into oblivion, things are looking good for you over the next 3-5 years. Enjoy!

Filed Under: fcc, truth in advertising, unlimited, wireless
Companies: verizon

AT&T Whines That The T-Mobile Merger Consolidated Too Much U.S. Spectrum In One Place

from the glass-houses dept

AT&T and Verizon didn't have much to say as T-Mobile was lobbying for Sprint merger approval. In large part because most of the downsides of the merger -- such as lower overall pay for sector employees -- or higher overall prices due to a consolidated lack of competition -- aided the two wireless giants.

Now that the deal's done, AT&T (no stranger to mindless consolidation and monopolization itself) is apparently concerned that the deal consolidated too much spectrum in the hands of one company. Namely, T-Mobile. From a FCC filing this week spotted by Ars Technica:

"The combination of Sprint and T-Mobile has resulted in an unprecedented concentration of spectrum in the hands of one carrier. In fact, the combined company exceeds the Commission's spectrum screen, often by a wide margin, in Cellular Market Areas representing 82 percent of the US population, including all major markets."

This is apparently part of a new trend at AT&T where it engages in bad faith critiques of U.S. policy despite decades engaging in the same or worse behavior (see AT&T's terrible take on Section 230, or its bad faith claim that it wants a real privacy law). In this case AT&T, a company that has benefited for decades from feeble U.S. restrictions on "spectrum squatting" (hoarding valuable wireless spectrum either for sale or simply so smaller competitors can't use it to hurt you), is now just super concerned about the practice when somebody else does it. From a companion blog post by the company:

"Given this unprecedented level of spectrum concentration in the hands of a single carrier, we have entered a new era for the FCC’s spectrum acquisition analytical tools. The Commission must now take action to reaffirm the importance of a spectrum aggregation tool and define a meaningful approach going forward."

Now that another company has abused feckless U.S. oversight to its own advantage, AT&T wants the FCC to do something. Whereas when AT&T, which dominated the wireless sector for the better part of the last two decades engaged in the same sort of hoarding, there was nothing to worry about.

The FCC does have a spectrum screen it uses to determine when accumulation of spectrum raises consolidation flags, but, like so much with U.S. telecom regulators, often isn't accompanied by substantive action. Especially if those triggering the flag happen to be politically-powerful telecom giants all but fused to the nation's intelligence-gathering apparatus. Given reports suggest the Trump FCC didn't even look at the data (or existing complaints about T-Mobile spectrum hoarding) before rubber stamping the T-Mobile merger, it shouldn't be surprising that policy inconsistencies got lost in the weeds.

Perhaps AT&T officials could come testify before Congress about the perils of mindless consolidation and regulatory capture?

Filed Under: competition, fcc, spectrum, wireless
Companies: at&t, t-mobile

Verizon Buys Tracfone As U.S. Wireless Gets Even More Consolidated

from the merge-ALL-the-things dept

As economists and experts had warned, the recent $26 billion Sprint T-Mobile merger effectively decimated the prepaid space. T-Mobile had already laid off around 6,000 employees at its Metro Prepaid division, with more layoffs expected. Many of the "mobile virtual network operators" that operated on Sprint's network now face an uncertain future, with growing resentment in the space among prepaid vendors, who say T-Mobile is already using its greater size and leverage to erode commissions and to renegotiate their contracts for the worse. Many prepaid vendors are calling for help that most certainly won't be coming any time soon from the Trump Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division.

With that as backdrop, another major effort at wireless consolidation has emerged with Verizon's announced purchase of Tracfone, one of the biggest prepaid vendors in the U.S. The $6.2 billion deal will, Verizon insists, result in "exciting and compelling" products in the years to come:

Yes, if there's one word that American consumers have come to associate with major telecom mergers, it's "excitement."

The problem here, of course, is that the direct result of mindless M&A in the U.S. telecom space couldn't be any more apparent. Less overall competitors means less effort to seriously compete on price. And the MVNO space had already been under relentless assault by companies like Verizon that have slowly but surely done their best to elbow out any smaller players that dare seriously compete on price with the major networks they must rely on to survive.

With the postpaid market saturated, wireless players are now forced to eek out growth wherever possible. In this case, via acquisitions, followed by only a superficial continued dedication to prepaid wireless lower-priced offerings. As part of the Tracfone deal, Verizon not only nabs 21 million Tracfone customers, but the company's Net 10, Walmart FamilyMobile, SafeLink, Simple Mobile, Straight Talk Wireless, and Clearway prepaid brands as well.

Fewer major networks means less incentive than ever to negotiate on rates, roaming, or much of anything else. With Sprint (the most friendly company to MVNOs by a wide margin) now out of the picture, things have gotten more treacherous for smaller MVNOs than ever. Of course, if the U.S. stays close to its historical norm, in about five years U.S. wireless data (pre and postpaid alike) will be significantly higher, and everybody will be left standing around with a dumb look on their collective faces wondering what went wrong.

Filed Under: competition, mergers, mvnos, prepaid wireless, wireless
Companies: tracfone, verizon

Yet Another Study Shows U.S. 5G Over Promises, Under Delivers

from the unwarranted-hype dept

It was the technology that was supposed to change the world. According to carriers, not only was fifth-generation wireless (5G) supposed to bring about the "fourth industrial revolution," it was supposed to revolutionize everything from smart cities to cancer treatment. According to conspiracy theorists and internet imbeciles, 5G is responsible for everything from Covid-19 to your migraines.

Unfortunately for both sets of folks, data continues to indicate that 5G is nowhere near that interesting.

A number of recent studies have already shown that U.S. wireless isn't just the most expensive in the developed world, U.S. 5G is notably slower than most overseas deployments. That's thanks in large part to our failure to make so-called middle band spectrum available for public use, resulting in a heavy smattering of lower band spectrum (good signal reach but slow speeds) or high-band and millimeter wave spectrum (great speeds, but poor reach and poor reception indoors). The end result is a far cry from what carriers had spent the last three years promising.

PC Magazine was the latest to put carrier promises to the test and came away decidedly unimpressed. Networks certainly are getting faster, the report concludes, but it's largely due to steady evolutionary improvements being made to 4G networks, not newer 5G networks. As such, PC Magazine is forced to admit they bought into early carrier hype promising an amazing revolution:

"We admit it, we bought into the 5G hype. Carriers, phone makers, and chip makers alike have all been selling 5G as faster and more powerful than 4G, with lower latency. So I was shocked to see that our AT&T 5G results, especially, were slower than 4G results on the same network. This is a crisis for marketing, not for performance. All three US carriers showed significantly higher download speeds and better broadband reliability than they did in our 2019 tests. It's just that these gains, particularly on AT&T, are largely because of improvements in 4G, not 5G networks."

Wireless carriers haven't given much thought to the perils of over-hyping 5G, thereby associating the standard with empty bluster and frustration in the minds of consumers. You'll recall that AT&T has lied repeatedly in trying to pretend that 4G is 5G via misleading phone icons, and Verizon perpetually enjoyed hyping 5G market launches, only to have those looking for an actual 5G signal find that availability is these markets is spotty... at best (one study found that a Verizon 5G signal was available around 0.4% of the time in launched 5G markets).

Not too surprisingly then, PC Magazine routinely found it difficult to actually obtain a 5G signal:

"It's been more than a year since the US carriers launched 5G. AT&T purports to have 5G in 22 of our 26 test cities; Verizon has it in 18; and T-Mobile has it in all of them. But our 5G results were disappointing all around, on every carrier. Often, it was a choice between faux G (we’ll explain this shortly) and no G...most of our current 5G coverage offers people a slightly improved 4G experience dressed up with a shiny new icon. That’s not bad, but to live up to their lofty promises about how 5G will change education, medicine, industry, and home internet, the carriers will need to use more spectrum and better technology than they’re currently giving us.

It's also worth noting that despite all the promises surrounding the T-Mobile and Sprint merger, the initial result has been slower speeds overall as the companies work to integrate discordant networks:

"So far, T-Mobile's absorption of Sprint hasn't shown much advantage for consumers. It's to the contrary, really: In our results, it looks like the rush of Sprint users onto T-Mobile's network has created some congestion that has caused T-Mobile to fall behind in comparative performance. All of the carriers' speeds increased from 2019 to 2020, but T-Mobile's increased less than AT&T's and Verizon's did."

PC Mag's study was mirrored this week by a Washington Post investigation that basically concluded all the same things. Namely that 5G isn't much to write home about, and in many instances U.S. 4G networks outperform 5G in 5G launch markets:

"Your experience with a 5G phone in 2020 is likely to be all over the map. I got searing fast 750 Mbps downloads from AT&T in one corner of downtown. But in the same spot, my 4G phone got an also extremely fast 330 Mbps. Moreover, because of the pandemic, those aren’t places I go very often. As I write this from my home office in the middle of San Francisco, I’m getting 11 Mbps downloads on my AT&T 5G phone. On T-Mobile, I get a laughable 8 Mbps on 5G, which is barely enough to stream HD Netflix."

I regret to inform you that despite a lot of tech policy bluster and carrier marketing, we are most assuredly not winning the "race to 5G." In fact, our broadband maps are so routinely terrible, I'm not sure we'd be able to confirm it if we were.

Again, 5G will certainly offer faster speeds, lower latency, and more reliable networks over the long haul, especially as carriers push new middle band spectrum to market. Even then, don't expect 5G pricing to be particularly innovative thanks to the death of net neutrality and reduced competition due to consolidation. Carriers are also lobbying the FCC to exclude 5G from broadband mapping improvements (meaning don't expect an accurate read on where it's truly available any time soon). The more things change...

Filed Under: 5g, overpromise, wireless
Companies: at&t, verizon

Yet Another Study Shows U.S. 5G Is Far Slower Than Many Other Nations

from the not-the-revolution-we-were-promised dept

Last May, a largely overlooked report by OpenSignal detailed how, despite endless hype, U.S. 5G is notably slower than 5G in most other developed countries. Because U.S. regulators failed to make mid-band spectrum (which offers faster speeds at greater range) widely available, many U.S. wireless carriers like Verizon embraced higher millimeter wave spectrum (which has trouble with range and building wall penetration) or low-band spectrum (which offers greater range but at notably reduced speeds). The result of the study was fairly obvious:

A new updated report by OpenSignal didn't have any better news. According to the wireless network analysis firm, average 5G download speeds in the US is somewhere around 50 Mbps. And while that's certainly nothing to sneeze at, it's a far cry from carrier hype proclaiming 5G is somehow utterly revolutionary, and it's far from the 200-400 Mbps speeds being seen in many other countries:

"When we consider the average download speed using 5G technology we see a very different story. While Saudi Arabia remains in first place, South Korea jumps to second place with average 5G Download speeds of a staggering 312.7 Mbps — over five times faster than South Korea’s already fast 4G speeds. The U.K. moves up the rankings with the U.S., Netherlands and Germany now dropping into the last three positions."

To be clear the U.S. is taking steps toward fixing the problem. The FCC just completed a major auction of mid-band spectrum, though confidentiality means we don't yet know who the winners of the auction were. It's also worth noting that because of the heavy use of low-band spectrum in the U.S. (again, offering slower speeds but at better range), U.S. 5G signal availability and reliability (assuming you've in a launch market and were able to afford a new phone that supports it) has been pretty good, even if our implementation of 5G isn't as fast as many other nations.

The problem is that while 5G is somewhat faster than 4G in the States, a modest evolution is not what's being advertised to the end user. Companies like Verizon advertise 5G as a near-mystical panacea that's capable of revolutionizing everything from smart cities to cancer treatment, even though a closer examination usually shows that's simply not true. Carriers have also been repeatedly misleading the public about where 5G is actually available, which is associating the standard with empty hype in the minds of consumers.

The other problem that will plague the U.S. (but gets largely ignored by firms employed by wireless carriers who don't want the subject talked about) is the cost of 5G in the States. Americans already pay some of the highest prices for 4G in the developed world, and with the triple punch of captured regulators, the death of net neutrality rules (which prohibited non-transparent "creative" nickel-and-diming of users) and an almost mindless lust for competition and job-eroding industry consolidation, Americans will once again wind up paying higher prices for slower service than most developed nations.

That's all a long way of saying that for a country that prattles on endlessly about the importance of the "race to 5G," we're a far cry from ever being able to claim we're actually winning it.

Filed Under: 5g, fcc, mid-band, race to 5g, us, wireless
Companies: verizon

Dish Buys Ting Mobile To Disrupt Wireless, But Questions Remain

from the steep-uphill-climb dept

We've noted repeatedly that not only did the Trump FCC and DOJ rubber stamp the controversial T-Mobile and Sprint merger, they willfully ignored data showing the deal would result in high prices, lower overall sector pay, fewer jobs, and less overall competition. As most objective antitrust and telecom experts predicted, the ink was barely dry on the deal before the pink slips started to arrive. The higher rates will still likely take a few more years to materialize as the remaining three industry players (T-Mobile, AT&T, and Verizon) perfect their ability to pretend to compete on price without actually doing so.

Over at the DOJ, top "antitrust enforcer" Makan Delrahim not only ignored hard data and critics of the deal, he actively helped guide T-Mobile executives to deal completion (if you're unaware, folks tasked with leading the governments antitrust enforcement efforts most assuredly should not be doing that).

To try and justify this grotesque regulatory capture, the DOJ came up with a bad idea: it would require T-Mobile offload some spectrum and its Boost Mobile prepaid brand to Dish Network, which would then, theoretically, try and build a replacement carrier for Sprint over a period of 7 years. For much of that time Dish will simply operate as a glorified MVNO (mobile virtual network operator) on T-Mobile's network and be subject to T-Mobile whims.

The problem: Dish has a long history of hoarding valuable spectrum and promising to build a wireless network and then, you know, not doing that (just ask pre-merger T-Mobile). The other problem: shepherding such a deal to completion requires the current FCC (rabidly proud of "hands off," "light touch" regulation) to aggressively nanny this deal to completion, something that simply isn't in Ajit Pai's ideological nature. The remaining three players in the space (T-Mobile, AT&T, Verizon) have every motivation to try and scuttle the creation of this fourth competitor to avoid having to actually (gasp) compete on price.

Throughout, there have been questions about just how serious Dish is. Again, the company has a long history of buying up valuable spectrum and then doing absolutely nothing with it. Dish's spectrum holdings are extremely valuable, and critics have long wondered if the company is just stringing feckless U.S. regulators along until it can sell its spectrum at a steep premium.

Whether Dish is serious still isn't really a settled question, but the company continues to give every impression it may genuinely want to disrupt wireless as a survival strategy in the wake of its struggling traditional TV business. That manifested this week in the acquisition of Tucows' Ting, a small MVNO that had been making slow inroads as a minor player in the wireless space. In a blog post, Ting insists that nothing will really change at the small operation now that it has been acquired by a major corporation engaged in (hopefully) a massive disruption play:

"DISH enters the mobile market with a well-established, well-loved brand in Ting Mobile, a wonderful customer base in you and a proven platform on which to build its mobile service. It also gets a strong, smart partner (if we do say so ourselves) to support its mobile business moving forward. As for DISH’s big plans in mobile, much has been written on that topic. We’re happy to be a part of these plans.

From the sounds of things this isn't a full acquisition of all Ting assets (Ting's fiber efforts will not be part of the deal). Users in the comments of the blog post were skeptical that selling a small upstart with a focus on consumers to a giant satellite TV company with a long history of obnoxious executive leadership won't result in some obvious changes:

"I will say I'm disappointed and incredibly wary. Ting is a brand I have high confidence in. Dish is a brand I have zero confidence in. "Nothing changes today." But changes will come. Sadly, I will not be surprised if I find myself shopping for a new provider once they start."

Maybe this all ends with Dish Network shifting from the dying satellite TV sector and becoming a major rival to AT&T and Verizon, but I remain wary. AT&T and Verizon play dirty pool in the DC lobbying realm, and both will do absolutely everything in their power to disrupt the creation of a viable fourth replacement price competitor. And if Trump is re-elected, his "light touch" (read: utterly apathetic to all consumer issues, competitive problems, and price gouging) FCC simply lacks the backbone or ideological motivation to hold any of these companies seriously accountable should their promises wind up being little more than hot air.

Pre-merger promises in the U.S. telecom sector simply don't have a great track record, and I remain skeptical that this wasn't just a regulatory stage play by the Barr DOJ to help justify apathy toward reduced competition, resulting in Dish profitably cashing out of its spectrum holdings a few years from now. And while it's certainly possible Dish can become a major replacement fourth competitor for Sprint, it's the sort of thing you should probably believe only once you've seen it accomplished.

Filed Under: broadband, competition, mvno, wireless
Companies: dish, ting, tucows

T-Mobile Is Already Trying To Wiggle Out Of Its Sprint Merger Conditions

from the told-you-so dept

Is it too early to say "I told you so" yet?

Despite countless pre-merger promises that its $26 billion merger would create oodles of new jobs, T-Mobile laid off 6,000 employees at its Metro prepaid division before the ink was even dry. Another 200 Sprint employees were fired during a 6 minute conference call a few weeks ago. T-Mobile and Sprint quietly confirmed the layoffs had nothing to do with the pandemic.

Both the FCC and DOJ ignored all critical data and rubber stamped the deal, because that's what feckless, revolving-door regulators do. The only real resistance T-Mobile saw to its competition and job-eroding deal was the California PUC, which set certain 5G deployment (T-Mobile had to deliver 5G connections of at least 300Mbps to 93 percent of California by the end of 2024) and job (T-Mobile had to hire 1,000 additional employees within three years in California) targets. Given T-Mobile told regulators repeatedly that the merger would dramatically expand 5G deployment and jobs by default, neither should have been a problem.

Yet less than three months from the deal's closure and T-Mobile is already trying to wiggle out from underneath its obligations in California by claiming California regulators lack the authority to enforce them:

"The commission simply does not have the authority to require a wireless carrier to hire a particular number of employees in a given time period," T-Mobile wrote. "The legislature has never granted it such authority and, prior to the issuance of the decision, the Commission has not attempted to impose such a mandate on any other communications provider in any context." T-Mobile also said the condition is "particularly burdensome and unjustified in light of the current COVID-19 crisis."

California state law makes in clear the CPUC has the authority to determine whether or not a merger "maintains or improves" service quality for consumers, and "the quality of management of the resulting public utility doing business in the state." Said law also mandates that mergers much be "beneficial on an overall basis to state and local economies," and be "fair and reasonable to affected public utility employees, including both union and nonunion employees." Telecom megadeals routinely fail that test, but, courtesy of a corrupted Congress, we simply adore rubber stamping them anyway.

Meanwhile, COVID-19 creates the perfect cover for T-Mobile to dodge its already flimsy deal conditions, even if the 6,200 employees who have already lost their jobs were laid off due to the merger, not the pandemic. And in April of last year, former T-Mobile CEO John Legere insisted that the company would easily add 11,000 additional employees within three years of the deal's closing:

"Let me be really clear on this increasingly important topic. This merger is all about creating new, high-quality, high-paying jobs, and the New T-Mobile will be jobs-positive from Day One and every day thereafter."

That's in stark contrast to not only telecom history (such consolidation always causes job losses in support and middle management), but unions, consumer groups, economists, and Wall Street analysts, who all made it very clear the deal could, over time, result not only in upwards of 20,000 lost jobs, but lower pay across the sector overall. That's before you get to the fact that reducing overall competitors from four to three will almost certainly result in less price competition and higher prices.

The T-Mobile Sprint merger was always hot garbage. Countless experts made this clear. US telecom megamergers are routinely terrible for markets, consumers, and employees. It's why everybody spends all day bitching about AT&T and Comcast. Yet time and time again, pre-merger promises by companies looking for regulatory approval are eagerly swallowed and parroted by regulators and the press, and conditions are applied to terrible deals that are either too flimsy to be useful, or simply aren't enforced. US merger mania (especially in telecom) remains a purgatorial game of Charlie Brown and Lucy football, where we see the same outcome time and time again, but simply refuse to alter our behavior because, at least for executives and investors, the broken path forward is the more profitable one.

Filed Under: 5g, california, fcc, jobs, merger conditions, wireless
Companies: sprint, t-mobile

AT&T Says Being Misleading About 'Unlimited' Data Plans Was Ok, Because Reporters Told Consumers It Was Being Misleading

from the ill-communication dept

Back in 2014 the FTC sued AT&T for selling "unlimited" wireless data plans with very real and annoying limits. The lawsuit noted that, starting in 2011, AT&T began selling "unlimited" plans that actually throttled upwards of 90 percent of your downstream speeds after using just two or three gigabytes of data. AT&T spent years trying to wiggle out of the lawsuit via a variety of legal gymnastics, including at one point trying to claim that the very same net neutrality and FCC Title II rules AT&T was attempting to kill, prevented the FTC from holding it accountable.

Nearly a decade after the battle began, the company agreed last fall to a $60 million settlement with the FTC without actually admitting any wrongdoing. Though AT&T has also been attempting to tap dance around several other lawsuits over its not really "unlimited" data plans with varying success. A separate 2015 class action continues to stumble through the court system, and AT&T lawyers continue to engage in... creative efforts to derail it.

The California class action argues, among other things, that AT&T was being secretive when it downplayed the hidden restrictions on its unlimited data plans (which is correct). To try and disprove this claim, a recent AT&T filing (pdf), spotted by Stop The Cap, introduces a dozen media reports (including an old one by myself) critical of AT&T's efforts. The logic being that because news outlets were writing about how sleazy AT&T was being, customers couldn't possibly have been surprised by the restrictions on their "unlimited" data plans:

"One of the news articles cited in AT&T’s May 14 filing was written by former DSL Reports’ author Karl Bode, who has been roundly critical of AT&T’s data caps for over a decade. Ironically, AT&T’s defense team is arguing Bode’s report, “AT&T Wages Quiet War on Grandfathered Unlimited Users” offers proof AT&T was not keeping its speed throttling policy “secret,” as at least one plaintiff claimed. Bode suggested AT&T had engineered its speed throttling plan to push grandfathered unlimited data plan customers off the plan in favor of more profitable plans offering a specified data allowance and overlimit fees."

Nifty.

It's not just AT&T that has now spent the better part of the last fifteen years trying to tap dance around their misleading marketing related to unlimited data plans. Verizon had its wrist slapped by New York's Attorney General as early as 2007 for selling "unlimited" data plans with very real limits, and yet the company still to this day imposes all manner of restrictions on such plans. Verizon's most recent unlimited plans, for example, throttle you back to HD and ban 4K video entirely unless you pony up cash for a more expensive plan.

This is by and large acceptable provided Verizon buries its annoying unlimited data plan limits somewhere in its massive EULA.

Still, you'd think that after so many run ins with regulators and consumers, wireless carriers would simply stop using the word "unlimited" entirely, instead focusing on other metrics like speed or reliability. Instead, they keep engaging in the same behavior, AGs and the FTC keep doling out flimsy wrist slaps years after the fact, and telecom lawyers spend years tap dancing around anything even vaguely resembling accountability. And, thanks in large part to AT&T and Verizon lobbyists, we just lobotomized the one government agency custom built to handle these kinds of issues, while also killing net neutrality rules requiring greater transparency in mobile data plans. Good job, America!

Filed Under: 5g, misleading, truth in advertising, wireless
Companies: at&t