Apple, AT&T, and Google Voice... here comes the FCC

I've hung back on this for a few days. Mostly because it pissed me off so completely that I was afraid I'd make some sort of terroristic threats if I talked about it. A few days ago it came out that Apple rejected the official Google Voice app from the App Store, and pulled all third-party apps. The claim was that it "duplicated iPhone functionality". That's crap, it doesn't.

Google Voice is a free service that allows you to have one number that rings multiple phones. It also provides full call screening, call recording, cheap international calling, transcription of voicemails, and free SMS. In short, it is the coolest thing to happen to cell phones since their inception. On the Blackberry and Android platforms it is possible to install apps that integrate the phone with Google Voice and make it useful away from a computer.

Now iPhone users cannot get Google Voice apps. Some users (myself included) were already using "GV Mobile" by Sean Kovacs on the iPhone when it was pulled. Now we're left twisting in the wind, not knowing when a change in Google Voice or the iPhone OS will break the app, leaving us with poor access to the service.

What they are doing is removing consumer choice. There is no reason to reject these apps. At least before when something was rejected there was some sort of rational. It was usually the concern that AT&T's network would collapse if people started using too much data. But this... this is just AT&T being scared to death that empowering consumers will hurt their bottom line. They hate the idea that you could have a number that isn't tied to them. None of that messy number porting, just one number for life that they can't control.

So... cut to today. The FCC sent letters to Apple, AT&T, and Google asking a lot of questions about why the official and unofficial Google Voice apps were rejected. They seemed particularly interested in exactly how much say AT&T had in the decision. This gives me hope that someone will decide it's not worth it to block this service everyone clearly wants.

The FCC also wants to talk to the devs of third-party apps that were banned, like the aforementioned Sean Kovacs. It would be great if the FCC gave these people a chance to explain how this decision hurts all involved; customers and devs. Banning GV apps from the iPhone is only good for AT&T.


Update: Word has spread that Apple expects devs of banned apps to cover the cost of refunds to people that bought the apps. All this despite the fact that they no longer have any connection to the app store. This is sort of beyond the pale, Apple. Not only do these people spend weeks or months developing apps only to be told they can't sell them anymore, but they have to cover the cost to refund people that are upset with Apple for pulling them.

I find myself really watching upcoming Android handsets. It's too bad. The iPhone is a great piece of hardware with a great platform. If they'd open it up a little, nothing else would stand a chance.

AT&T blocks 4chan? *Updated*

No confirmation as of yet from the AT&T side of things, but the internet is starting to freak out. AT&T is apparently blocking access to the img.4chan.org domain for its DSL customers. This means no access to the fabled (infamous?) /b/ message board.

4chan is a bulletin board system based around posting images and anonymous messages. Almost every meme you've ever heard of came from the depths of 4chan's /b/ board. LOLcats? Started as "Caturday" (posting of cat pics on Saturdays) on 4chan. Facepalm? 4chan. Rickrolling? Oh, you better believe it came from 4chan.

This may seem like nothing... not a big deal. I'd say it a huge deal. Whether or not you've ever heard of 4chan, ISPs shouldn't be blocking websites because they don't like the content. This is contrary to the concept of Net Neutrality. Access to, or traffic from a website should not be given preference one way or another.

AT&T doesn't really have any good will to burn after the ongoing iPhone shenanigans. So going up against 4chan seems like a terrible idea. Perhaps you remember the recent Scientology protests? All came from 4chan. Under the collective moniker, "anonymous", 4chan users have a history of pranks and hacks designed to punish those they feel need punishment. AT&T may have a real problem on its hands if this is a real policy, and not just a mistake.

Like they say... 4chan: Because none of us is a cruel as all of us.


I'll update this post as things progress.

Update: AT&T has issued a statement:

Beginning Friday, an AT&T customer was impacted by a denial-of-service attack stemming from IP addresses connected to img.4chan.org. To prevent this attack from disrupting service for the impacted AT&T customer, and to prevent the attack from spreading to impact our other customers, AT&T temporarily blocked access to the IP addresses in question for our customers. This action was in no way related to the content at img.4chan.org; our focus was on protecting our customers from malicious traffic.

Overnight Sunday, after we determined the denial-of-service threat no longer existed, AT&T removed the block on the IP addresses in question. We will continue to monitor for denial-of-service activity and any malicious traffic to protect our customers.

A Customer was DDoSed? Who? Seems fishy to me that this was coming from the img domain. I choose to believe that AT&T had some other reason for doing this. I imagine after realizing that this would be a PR disaster they reevaluated the block.

4chan says:

For the past three weeks, 4chan has been under a constant DDoS attack. We were able to filter this specific type of attack in a fashion that was more or less transparent to the end user.

Unfortunately, as an unintended consequence of the method used, some Internet users received errant traffic from one of our network switches. A handful happened to be AT&T customers.

So AT&T overreacted and blocked the domain for everyone? Interesting. So the war is off. For now at least.

Logitech comes through... eventually.

Thought I'd relate a story to you about a neat customer service experience I had on twitter (I know, I'm sick of hearing about it too). In early July, my bluetooth Logitech MX Revolution mouse (part of the MX5500 set) stopped taking a charge. The charge indicator just flashed red every time I put it on the cradle. After searching around, it became evident that the mouse was going to need replacement.

I contacted support by email on July 8. Within the next day I was informed that my replacement request would be granted. I supplied the information (including a scan of the receipt) that they requested. Here's where things went off the rails. I didn't hear anything back. No shipping confirmation, no tracking numbers, nothing. I emailed once a few days later to make sure that everything was progressing. No response. On Monday the 13th I called the customer support line. They told me it was listed as in the warehouse and ready to ship. The fellow on the phone said he didn't know why it was held up, but it should go out soon.

A week passes, I call again, I get the same story. I was sort of concerned at this point. It shouldn't take almost 2 weeks for something to be shipped (I'd had a replacement once before and it only took a few days). I could live without it for a while, I just wanted to know that it would actually be shipped at some point. The people on the customer service line had no more information about it. So, dejected I did what everyone is doing these days, I complained about it on Twitter. I made some sort of snarky comments about how Logitech's warranty exchange systems was a bit ridiculous. The next day I had a reply from @Logitech asking for my case number, which I immediately supplied.

The very next day @Logitech explained that the MX5500 was on back-order. No one in the actual customer service department knew this. Not only that, but they were going to pull one from their "stash" in California and ship it to me overnight ( I assume retail stash?). So here I am today with my replacement mouse courtesy of @Logitech on Twitter. After waiting 2 weeks on Logitech Proper, it only took Logitech on Twitter 2 days to get me taken care of.

Verizon Says, "Use our app store, and only our app store."

Recently, Verizon came out and said they were finally getting into this centralized app store business. This is a cool idea for them. Verizon has a lot of reasonably cool feature phones. It would be nice to have apps for them. Some people might like to just have app purchases charged to their bill. But Verizon isn't just talking about feature phones. They say that no smart phones will come with any other app store portal on them.

So BlackBerrys (BlackBerries? whatevs) and WinMo phones won't have their standard OS app stores out of the box. Conceivably, devs could submit their content to Verizon's store as well... but who wants to deal with two approval processes? RIM and Microsoft could figure a way to allow users to install their clients after the fact, but how many people would?

What does this say about a possible iPhone on the big V? It seems like the masses are clamoring for it. AT&Ts exclusivity is up next year, and it's entirely possible that they'll just back a dump truck of money up to 1 Infinite Loop in Cupertino. But if not, Verizon might have a shot. However, Apple is so big on their branding that I have a hard time believing they'd even allow a carrier badge on an iPhone, let alone have a carrier change the included apps. Allowing a carrier to remove the App store portal itself, and include its own instead? Unlikely. A lot of app purchases are made from that phone portal. It would be a big risk to let the carrier muscle in on that business. Would Verizon just forget their new rules in order to get an iPhone? They'd be stupid not to.