It’s pretty easy these days to think of AT&T as a giant corporation of demons sent to Earth to destroy iPhone users’ productivity. But apparently, it is a company just like any other, with humans working for it. How do we know? There is video evidence.
Apple 2.0’s Philip Elmer-DeWitt posted a video of Seth Bloom today, an AT&T rep that is also know as “Seth the blogger guy.” In this video, Bloom explains AT&T’s iPhone MMS service, which was finally announced the other day (set for September 25), as well as some of the issues that plague AT&T’s network due to his smartphone usage (read: iPhone usage).
We’ve actually been working with Bloom for a number of months as AT&T issues have continued to mount. He’s quite helpful in answering the questions that he’s allowed to answer, which we appreciate. The problem Bloom has is that he can only answer questions, he can’t actually solve AT&T’s problems. And while the network is trying, it’s still not where it needs to be in many regards.
But that’s why these videos are good, they humanize AT&T. Rather than having us cite an AT&T spokesperson talking about the issues they’re facing, it’s good to put a face to the problems. Again, this doesn’t solve them, but hearing them explained from AT&T is a smart play. Certainly smarter than saying nothing.
Of course, as Elmer-DeWitt notes, Bloom has actually been doing these videos for a while, but when AT&T starting running into some reason problems over the summer, he went silent. Now he’s back that AT&T has some good news to offer (MMS). If anything, we could use these videos more when AT&T is having issues.
Speaking of those issues, PC World has a rather ridiculous headline today, “Network Woes? Hate the iPhone, Not AT&T.” The main idea is that it’s the iPhone fault for AT&T’s service issues because it’s so popular and is overloading their network. That’s undoubtedly true, but it completely skirts around the fact that we’re all paying a large amount of money for a service that is completely unreliable.
It would be much easier to cut AT&T a break in that regard if they were to say, offer up discounts to paying customers for poor service performance. It’s simply hard to feel bad for a company you’re paying in excess of $100 a month to, for a service they’re failing to provide.
It’s certainly a fair point that the massive success of the iPhone likely would have overloaded any company, including Verizon. But if anything, that speaks to why we need to get rid of the exclusivity agreements.
Watch Bloom below:
“The airwaves are kind of like a highway.”
Or a “series of tubes.”
Ted Steven’s reference?
This guy’s good at staring into the camera the whole damn time. Most consumers won’t care about this video, they don’t wanna know the ins and outs, they just want it to work.
And based on this explosion of smart phone usage, and how it’s a bog on the network, why are they now requiring new customers with a smart phone to get a data plan. True, it makes little sense to buy a smart phone without one, under utilizing features, but why force customers to use more of an infrastructure that’s not ready for all that usage.
P.S. what happened to the custom short urls?
Requiring a data plan has nothing to do with trying to get people to utilize the network. It’s protecting AT&T from having customer service issues.
When I worked for Sprint I personally got hundreds of calls per month from people “accidently” using the internet and getting charged 4-5x the cost of the monthly fee for a data plan.
By requiring the data plan it eliminates this possibility. The people may not use it all the time but for the times that they do use it, they won’t be calling in asking for a refund because “I didn’t know (insert obviously internet related feature) used the internet!”
lol point well taken.
False premise. If you have no data plan, they could ALSO simply provide you with no data service, rather than charging per-kB/min/etc rates.
In an “everything ala carte” world, they make lower profits, but are able to better gauge usage on the network, and required future expansion.
By requiring everyone to get a data plan, they have over the years gotten used to “charging without providing”, as most smartphone users have not had a lot of reason to use the cell data plan as constantly as do iPhone users, and that’s including MMS…
Obviously, they were caught pants-down once they realized that EVERY iPhone user was going to be making significant use of data services, all the time. And by that point, they had already spent all the money they charge for the data plans on yachts and hookers, rather than network upgrades.
So, no, it’s NOT to avoid a small customer service issue with overages, it’s simply the same old monopoly power issue again – they want to own the pipes, make steady profits, AND get paid/subsidized by the govt to reluctantly make improvements.
Everywhere there is real competition, this issue does NOT exist – and not just in tiny countries, but also in places with huge rural expanses that have still somehow managed to get built out properly.
i work for AT&T and when you say small customer service issue with overages, you are sadly mistaken…90% of the calls i take are for people lookin for refunds due to overages….make sure you know your facts before you make claims….the overage issue is HUGE
Well the flipside to not having a data plan is getting stuck with crazy overage charges. It’s better for everyone to have a clear cost/value proposition per month.
Don’t forget, you would be paying around $600 for your beloved iPhone if ATT were not picking up most of the tab. In retrospect, they probably should not have subsidized them so heavily.
That PC World article – have they not been to any other country which has the iPhone? I don’t personally have an iPhone, but I think that O2 handles the extra traffic reasonably well.
I don’t think there’s any other country with the iphone that has a single provider covering the same number of people or coverage area as AT&T.
It’s easy to say “Orange doesn’t have this problem, or O2 doesn’t have this problem” but france is 640,000 SQ KM in area, the united states is 9 million SQ KM in area.
It’s a whole hell of a lot easier to provider a strong network when you have less than 1/10th the area to serve.
And a lot of those square kilometers in the USA are empty deserts, tundra, mountain ranges, and farmland. Alaska alone is triple the size of France and has 1/100th the population. The overall USA population density is less than 1/3 that of France!
Here’s hoping Seth gets his own reality show. I mean, right now he and Brad Mays have a couple of the toughest jobs around. Good luck, guys!
All I ask from ATT is one more bar of service (normal is two for me) and no more dropped calls.
I’ll stay with them if they do that, plus up the minute plans.
No offense to Seth, but his attire in this vid seems like a stereotypical nerd. Is that how AT&T views us tech folks/bloggers – all those pesky nerds, we’ll make a video with one as their spokesperson.
Sorry us tech folks run all gamuts. It’s good you are getting word out, probably better you did a blog post. Keep trying & can you tell me when I’ll be able to get a Verizon iPhone? thnx
That’s probably their logic, but I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s what Seth wears on a day-to-day basis. And it’s much better than seeing another guy in a suit.
Yes again no offense to Seth, but I’m a bit offended by their choose of spokesperson for their blogger rep. Seth’s look in this video says to me AT&T thinks we are all nerds. They need to take a page from Google http://www.yout...h?v=4jP3dVzJrFc . Were just regular people of all types of life who enjoy who enjoy creating & talking about technology. Don’t pigeonhole us!
If they were really targeting this video at technology nerds, they would not have compared their wireless network to cars on a highway.
what’s even worse, it looks like he bought this shirt specifically for this interview.. it still has the never worn/washed packaged shirt lines in it.
Oh, you mean those pesky lines you get when you iron a shirt?
>.>
How much do you want to bet that it will suck
Does he actually have a blog?
What Seth did not say was that AT&T has no choice in improving their service because customers are highly annoyed and some are leaving and more will leave when Verizon gets the iPhone. As we all know AT&T would like to keep the iPhone to themselves. Seth also talks about how much AT&T has spent on improving its infrastructure and how much they intend to spend moving forward, but he does not say how much they’ve made on all those customers that bought into AT&Ts promises.
I switched to ATT for the iphone. Turns out i didn’t like it, but i stayed for the customer service. Don’t get me wrong — 1 out of every (10?) calls actually goes through. But for someone who uses their phone to txt more than anything else, the att website (as compared to the verizon monstrosity) and the fact that I never, ever (ever) have to go into the verizon store again more than compensates…
Jeez are you guys a bunch of whiners…eeeww I can’t get enough bars, eeewww, when can I have my iPhone on Verizon, eeewww, why can’t they give me MMS yet, eeewww why does he have to dress like a nerd? We are not all nerds, don’t “pigeonhole us!”
You all just shut your pie holes and man-up! You all use and have access to the best piece of technology ever created on earth.
All you can do in return is sound a like a bunch of pussies?
When I can buy a mobile Internet device (iPod Touch or Andriod like) with built in 3G/4G free of restrictions I will be a happy consumer! I’ll pay a premium to the carrier who allows me to connect such device to their 3G/4G network.
This is the Internet experience we are use to. I only wish for the same experience on my mobile net device!
Sounds like it’s somebody’s first visit to the TechCrunch comments
I do like this guy more than Verizon guy.
The Verizon guy always reminded me of the Adam Kesher character from Mulholland Drive… only better able to bring reliable mobility.
MG;
As you point out, the “exclusivity” aspect of the iphone arrangement is the key aspects in being able to be sympathetic to ATTs issues or not.
Had ATT been simply over-run by people who chose them to be their carrier, sympathy could be in order. But ATT signed up for it, and demanded it, even after the demand was able to be determined, so to demand “customer understanding” in the face of them knowing how much demand there is, knowing what their network is capable of, and continuing to sign up customers in the face of not being able to deliver, is quite “unsporting” to say the least.
On top of it, the current ATT is an amalgam of numerous bureaucratic edifices (Bell South, Cingular, etc), and the amount of hoop jumping I have had to go through to get a “family” account set up with numbers from different area codes has been excruciatingly painful.
The sad thing is that none of the carriers have exemplary service, except maybe Verizon in terms of coverage, and then you are stuck on CDMA, so perhaps ATT WILL eventually build out the network and increase their coverage, though to be honest, I think they are way too big, poorly organized, and understaffed with competent knowledgeable people to really deliver “world class” service…
Seth may not be wearing a suit, but he’s only saying what the suits told him to say. Saying “we’re on it” and talking about how many billions AT&T has spent on its network doesn’t answer the important question: Why does your iPhone suck wind?
Little cartoons about cars on highways may help those from a place where the Internet is still a mystery, but people who spent money on what is supposedly an advanced wireless device deserve more respect and answers with actual information, instead of Soviet-style spin. Surprised that TC thinks this is worthwhile, I see it as a colossal waste of time and an insult to folks who want real answers from someone with real technical knowledge, not just glasses and a two-day growth.
Seth #fail
I thought the video was excellent.
what I do not understand..
FI AT & T ad MMS problems since MMS deployment to AT&T networks why wait until 2009 almost 3 years to finally solve them?
In other words folks and to iphone users AT&T would prefer to go FU to you all rather than use money paid them by you the iphone user to fix problems as other iphone deployments on other networks had MMS act first instance.
This is the mobileoperator BS that Apple claimed to stand for getting rid of as the iphone innovation.. I guess that nice profit from AT&T via subsidy paid to Apple kept their mouth shut for 3 years huh?
I had three dropped calls this morning and had to call AT&T. I got the usual rap: We’re aware of the problems and working on the issues. I’ve been hearing that for years. They know that there’s not enough capacity and because they keep adding new subscribers (millions of new I-Phone users), this will only get worse. The only solution is for Apple to allow new carriers–Sprint, Verizon, etc. to enter the game. That will force AT&T to spend the money and build out their network. They don’t have to do it right now because of a monopoly. Apple should realize they’re sullying their brand by working with AT&T.
Here’s my analogy:
AT&T overbooked their San Francisco flight.
I actually think that the Bay Area should subsidize cell towers like some cities subsidize baseball stadiums.
I’m on Tmo/Android but don’t really hear much complaining about AT&T in Miami. Most of the iphoners get better signal than I do.
So… what’s a “reason problem?”
As for putting a human face on a corporation… That seems like a contradiction in terms. Some corporations are more human than others because the people who run them are more human than others.
In my experience, it comes to communicating on an issue, whenever a human prefers to speak instead of put their thinking in writing, it’s usually because the ideas they are trying to push somehow conflict with and devalue the humanity of the intended audience. This video is no exception.
Calling him “The blogger guy” is already condescending, as if we hip techno kids are supposed to identify with him because he’s called that… The guy in the video is dripping and oozing with faux empathy, but none of that changes the fact that AT&T is still AT&T, the products and services they offer are still the same products and services they offered before I watched the video, and yes, of course AT&T will make improvements here and will innovate there, but only when pushed by external circumstances and pressures… Like many corporations, AT&T’s idea of innovation and creativity is figuring out new and better ways to pick the customer’s pocket. As MG pointed out in another blog post today, “This all boils down to money.” http://www.tech...n-of-broadband/
” But apparently, it is a company just like any other, with humans working for it. How do we know? There is video evidence.”
#Fail: This guy looks like a Robot, speaks like a robot, acts like a robot, no face espressions, no emotions, I mean even those Japanese Robots smile sometime. Seth is a “Humanoid” not yet a Human, but it’s actually a good try from AT&T to let people know what they’re doing, how and why.
38 billion invested and all I read about on the web is “my calls are dropped” and “I can’t get 3G service in downtown NYC”. AT&T really screwed the pooch with this one – their stupid car/highway analogy begs the question “why not add more lanes?” are they saying that in certain areas the number of users is > the number of available frequency spectra? Or just that they don’t have enough cell towers to service that spectra? If their land-line network can’t handle the drain from content-heavy web traffic why were they given exclusivity w/ apple in the first place for an heavy internet-traffic device? Thank you for the response, AT&T “we heard you and we’re working on it” is a very nice gesture. My father spent some time with AT&T for family contracts and spent hours each month calling them to inform them of some erroneous billing material. After making numerous calls over many months he simply had his fill and quit the contract. No more waiting on the phone to argue with some idiot that some other idiot charged him for some unused service. When all is said in done with regard to network build-outs or customer service “the proof is in the pudding” and I won’t be getting an iPhone (or any other phone) on AT&T. Ever.
I think that AT&T when hiring this guy requested a picture resume. In which the applicant was to make the most innocent and sad face possible.
it’s not the data they cannot handle they cannot even get voice to work.
Them using this awkward looking geeky type guy really shows they don’t care how their network is, and that they don’t really understand. Is that what they think the typical iPhone user looks like? They need to go bankrupt.
AT&T *DID* have humans working for them. I worked for AT&T in the West Michigan market as a Major Account Executive until earlier this year. I was terminated and told that I had done something wrong that I was approved to do by my boss. That said, I left and found a job immediatly elsewhere and continued on with my career, which by the way, was a big pay increase so I’m not bitter by any means. Well, when I seperated I requested my personell file given the amount of resume worthy accolades were contained in there. When I received the file, I found 3 write ups predating my termination date that I never received, was talked too about, or had any amount of reality to them. However my signature was forged. That is not the shocker, the shocker is, upon reading I found the reason my boss said I was terminated is NOT what he terminated me for in the system or told my director (his boss) but he toasted me for something completely different, that undoubtedly no matter how successful I was, I would have been terminated. I am considering legal options at this point…. because to top it off… I found out 3 weeks after I was terminated his golf partner was hired on to take my spot.
So, they did have humans.
-The Last Human.
Is Seth the face of the corporation that is financially raping me? I might not sleep tonight…
You are totally right. The only thing the iPhone needs is diversity. The NYT article had a great quote and I think it’s true, even as much as I hate big corporations like ATT. They basically said they are the first to come across a problem like this, this being the HUGE amounts of data that iPhone users use. This video does give me hope, at least they are listening.
New firm to add to the #fail list Fleishman-Hillard home to “seth the blogger” AKA Seth Bloom Sr. Vice President of lame videos and excuses, now if I could just troll his “blog”.. hoping @jasonkincaid has fun with this.
“Kind of like a highway”… you know… the kind like you pay taxes that go into the highway system… yet you find yourself sitting in traffic wondering what exactly is being done about the traffic. Or, in this case, like paying for what is thought to be a high capacity toll road and still finding yourself sitting in traffic — only this time you paid a premium to sit in traffic.
anyone who enters into a contract with AT&T is an idiot, starting with Steve Jobs…
If he’s ‘the blogger’ where is his blog and why is this the first time we’ve heard from him? Where’s the blog?
I actually give them credit for doing this, although it is totally contrived in presentation. But a step in the right direction.
Hope they’re prepared for a lot of next steps.
I first heard the name of this company AT & T in my first C language class. Really this company is one of the most powerful company of the world.
Right! and where where you AT&T guys few years ago when all Europe had 3G? US Carriers all suck, they are greedy and always behind in technology.
AT&T are evil.
http://news.sla...7/08/26/1642210
Never forget that.
dude im in saudi arabia at the moment, and the carriers here are a THOUSAND times better than POS AT&T. Faster 3g, no dropped calls, reliable service, and its cheap as fuck. Ive been tethering the data connection day and night no probs. My iPhone works better here than it did in the States which is saying something considering i live in San Antonio where AT&T service (data wise atleast) is actually half decent. I was in Egypt a couple weeks ago, and service was even better than saudi. They even have these things called data sims which are like a normal sim card, except they only work for 3g data, not phone calls.
What i dont get is how are carriers in these third world countries waaaayyyy more advanced than the US, the most powerful nation in the world. haha. 3G is old news in this part of the world, its been around for over 5 years. Not only that, but the networks here are 3.75G, which is better than 3G, and that is after they already bulit and upgraded 3.5G networks. The US is way behind, and the obvious reason is lack of competition. There is no such thing as locked cell phones or contracts, or exclusive agreements here, you buy your cell and service seperately, and service is still waaayyy cheaper.
Anyways, i guess what im trying to say is FUCK AT&T. Take ‘Seth the blogger guy’ and shove him up your lying, greedy, full of shit corporate asses
and oh yea….in case someone from AT&T reads this, YES i am using my JAILBROKEN and UNLOCKED 3Gs that i bought from your POS company so go suck a big one. I really really hope Apple lets t-mobile get in on the iphone action because im droppin ma bell the same day
MediaCurves.com just conducted a study on 601 mobile phone users viewing the recent YouTube video posted by AT&T which addresses common issues with the iPhone. Results showed that the majority (92%) reported that the video helped the phone carrier. The study also found that the majority (87%) of viewers reported the YouTube video was effective but that the video had no affect on favorability ratings for AT&T or the iPhone. More in-depth results can be seen at:
http://www.medi...1-ATT/Index.cfm
Thanks,
Ben
ATT is probably a decent corporation. However, when it comes to residential phone & dsl service, it sucks. It’s automated customer service is a form of customer torture. When i try to add a simple feature,(voice mail) it is sheer torture designed to drive people mad. Some of these mysterious suicides that occur from time to time need to be investigated in relation to the victim’s ATT phone service. It looks as though the break-up of Ma Bell sure worked. Now we have super ATT. If anyone can find a way to talk to a live person at ATT Customer service, I sure would like to know. Disgusted!
In my opinion AT&T is too expensive and not reliable enough.