Rich Fiscus
14 May 2009 1:51
When Steve Jobs first demonstrated the iPhone 3G at last year's Apple Worldwide Developer Conference he bragged about the speed of its internet connection. Since then AT&T seems determined to stop people from using very much of that supposedly plentiful bandwidth for anything more than loading web pages or reading email.
Now AT&T officials find themselves on the defensive after the release of the iPhone SlingPlayer, which is only able to use the phone's Wi-Fi connection.
AT&T spokesperson Mark Siegel told Macworld it would be a violation of the company's terms of service for a program to stream video across their 3G network. He said "It’s about making sure all our customers have access to the wireless network,"
He claims it falls under the category of "redirecting television signals for viewing on Personal Computers" which is indeed prohibited under the TOS language, as is any use that causes "extreme network capacity issues and interference with the network."
Siegel suggested that those who want to use the SlingPlayer for iPhone or any other mobile platform such as Symbian or Blackberry should take advantage of the company's Wi-Fi hotspots instead.
Of course that prohibition doesn't seem to apply to AT&T's own Mobile TV service, which does work across their 3G network. Apparently your phone is only a personal computer until they're making more money from it being a phone.