The phases of iPhone ownership, the hazards of love.
Phase Four - Complacence
It happens to the best of us. We sometimes take our loved ones for granted. We don't remember the thrill of exploring the new relationship, and start to get annoyed when we're forcibly reminded that those days are over. We see others walking around arm in arm with their new love and you think to ourselves "enjoy it while it lasts" or "I bet you just play games on that thing, don't you, chump?" Soon, it seems like everyone has an iPhone. The 12 year old brothers across the aisle from you on the plane - why the hell do they need an iPhone? Your entire crew gets them and you just know they're gonna be borrowing your charger. Yes, I've got my charger with me. Jesus...
You've since moved away from actually programming the thing, since object oriented programming is one giant blob of convoluted shit for a 30 year old bass player with a kid to try and pick up in his spare time. Besides, web development really seems like more bang for the buck. Might not pay as well, but this whole iPhone gold rush is pretty much over anyway. You read all the tech blogs by this point - you've turned your manager onto NetNewsWire before abandoning it yourself to try Google Reader but you'll ditch that soon, too - so you know how annoying it would be to try and get your app through the Apple process were you even capable of coding such a thing. You don't even check out the App Store that much anymore, since there's nothing but a bunch of stupid games over there anyway.
Phase Five - Resentment
This began in earnest for me about three weeks ago. In fairness, it's not completely the fault of the iPhone. A good bit of the aggravation is due to AT&T's service. It's just not that good. It was really good (or so I thought) when I first got the thing, but I swear since however many millions of people have bought iPhones the network has gotten noticeably slower and spottier. There was a voicemail outage this past weekend that affected nearly everyone on the network whether they knew it or not. I was in St Cloud MN last night with "full bars" and 3G service, but couldn't get a page to load all night.
This is pretty inexcusable to me. AT&T's one and only job - for which they are well paid - is to deliver the services that they promise. At Rothbury and Wakarusa the service was unusable and the 10,000 or so iPhoners that were at Rothbury (not an exaggeration, they were the only phone I saw all weekend, at least half the phones there it seemed) were reduced to communicating via text. Whaa, whaa you might say, and ordinarily I might agree with you, but you know what Verizon did at both of those festivals? They brought in a mobile antenna to provide service to the festival site for their customers. Does AT&T even have such a truck? Could they be bothered to bring it to the festival site in the middle of nowhere where 10,000 of their customers were going to be savaging their shitty network all weekend? Apparently, no, on both counts. Inexcusable. (The upside is that someone had the good sense to put together a Rothbury App which worked great for me all weekend. The schedule was imbedded so I wasn't reliant on the no-cell coverage and I always knew what band I was watching at the time. Very cool.)
The other thing that I've noticed in the last weeks is that the new OS 3.0 is a good bit slower than the previous version. Boot up time and app launch time, both slower. This is ostensibly because there are new features loaded into the new OS, but many of those features aren't even available to 3G and OG iPhoners. So all we get is copy and paste and a dog of a phone. I'll be getting the new one, whatever version it is whenever I get it, but in the meantime I'm left avariciously playing with Stacy's new 3GS.
In closing
The iPhone is awesome, but if you don't have one - wait. It will most likely be coming to Verizon sometime in the next year. I will be jumping ship when it does. My advice for the meantime - get an iPod touch and stick with your cell phone that works. There will be a new phase for me after the resolution of this current dark period while AT&T gets their act together (I hope), or it goes over to Verizon, but in the meantime it's #attfail for me.
Comments
DAMMIT! My ATT contract
DAMMIT! My ATT contract permits me to get a new device on August 8 after enduring the Motorola Razor for 2 years. I was hankering for a new iPhone, but now ... not so much...
I have always been a stickler
I have always been a stickler for Verizon every since I lost service travelling around country with AT&T years ago. Verizon just has a better service. Granted no Iphone but they do have a better infrastructure not only presently but for growth. Can you hear me now? Can you hear me now? At Rothbury I was like a kid in the candy store. Yah Verizon for stepping up. The LG Dare does me fine for now. Till again Iphone comes to Verizon.
Amazingly, I have been with
Amazingly, I have been with AT&T for 12 straight years, even through the Cingular phase. I'll never forget when they delivered my first cell phone to me.
Verizon had the "test drive" a couple of years back so I went out and cheated on AT&T. I got myself and Sherry two phones and Verizon's service that I heard was so great and so wonderful. I returned both phones within 24 hours. The customer service is terrible (for all Verizon services) and there were a lot of hidden fees that were not disclosed, pertaining to VZ Navigator and Internet usage. Maybe the fault of the salesman, maybe not. When I did return these devices within 24 hours, they tried to charge me hundreds of dollars. What is a "test drive" then? After many calls to Verizon's customer service ("Agent"! "Representative!"), I was finally successful in getting all charges wiped. Needless to say, I am back where I belong, in the arms of my trusty friend - AT&T. I am one of those who may not need an iPhone, but for $99, how could I not? I bought two again, one for me and one for Sherry. Unfortunately, Sherry could not use hers due to fingernails. Maybe the salesman should have told me that this phone is not for the female gender who likes fingernails. But he did not, and when I returned the phone the next day, they did not charge me at all. My bill included an activation charge for the phone, but when I called, I was able to quickly get to a live agent who immediately removed the charge. The iPhone may not be blazing fast and maybe it has slowed down to "old" users, but patience is a virtue, my friend. And in the few extra seconds it takes for the app to load, I take a few extra seconds to look around and ponder the amazement of what I'm actually holding in my hand. A computer, smaller than an old Texas Instrument calculator I had to lug around high school. To make it even better, I never used to have any service in my office, and since I got the iPhone and updated the OS, I have full service. Coincidence? I don't believe so.
Call me a believer, and an AT&T (Cingular) subscriber for life.
I, too, have been a Cingular
I, too, have been a Cingular customer since the 90s. I have a little over a year left on my current contract. That seems like enough time for AT&T to convince me that I should stay.
I still ponder the amazement of the phone I'm holding in my hand, but too often I'm pondering the lack of cell coverage that makes my phone the coolest iPod ever. AT&T could've dealt Verizon a major blow if they'd only put the effort into making sure the service for which we all overpay is as good as it possibly can be. I know they could do much better than they have been lately.
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