The date has arrived.  Existing Verizon Wireless customers are now invited to “pre-order” The Precious.

Strangely, Verizon’s website gave more prominence to the phone before they could actually accept orders for it:

Verizon Website 2/2/2011

Verizon Website 2/3/2011

Verizon wants you to think of its Apple iPhone as a fine wine, offering “exclusive” access to “our reserved quantity, while they last.”

When they’re gone, they’re… will be more on the way.  The Keebler Elves at Apple will certainly make more, plenty more, to sustain pent up demand for the phone on Verizon’s network.

AT&T is doing all it can to keep customers from switching.  In addition to earlier efforts to lock customers into those two-year contracts with early termination fees, lots of AT&T customers are also getting e-mail from the company reminding them AT&T is the only network that lets you talk and surf the web at the same time (with your iPhone).  They ignore T-Mobile, which also accepts unlocked iPhones and works the same way.  AT&T and T-Mobile utilize GSM technology while Verizon (and Sprint… and Cricket… and MetroPCS) use CDMA.  The latter technology, at least in its current implementation, allows users do one or the other, not both.

That probably won’t keep too many disenchanted AT&T customers from leaving, but some other factors might:

1. Apple will release the iPhone 5 in less than six months, if things run according to schedule.  The new phone might work on Verizon’s new LTE network, something iPhone 4 does not.  Is there a hurry to upgrade now when something better is around the corner?
2. AT&T Retention Agents are giving away the store to customers warning of their intention to depart.  Restoration of unlimited data plans, free upgraded phones to qualified customers, free accessories, and even credit for a month of service have all been offered, even as the company publicly announces it is pulling back from some of those giveaways and specials.
3. As potentially millions of AT&T customers leave, those remaining may find improved performance from the lighter load on AT&T’s network.  Plus, the impact of the iPhone on Verizon’s 3G network remains unknown.  AT&T customers could parade themselves into new headaches on Verizon’s network.

Verizon will allow new iPhone customers access to its “unlimited data” add-on plan “for a limited time.”  Verizon plans to join AT&T in officially ending the unlimited option sometime this year, but exact pricing and plan details remain unavailable.

Customers can begin booking their departure from AT&T Feb. 9, when Verizon begins taking orders from new customers and those intending to drop their current carrier.

A snake in the grass?

You used 50 kilobytes of data visiting a web page on your iPhone, but AT&T claims the site actually consumed six times that — 300 kilobytes, for which the carrier overcharged you for access.

A major point of contention for consumers facing Internet Overcharging schemes is that the same company with a vested interest in maximizing revenue from such schemes also administers the meter that measures how much you used.  There is no oversight or independent verification.

In a lawsuit filed this week, AT&T Mobility faces accusations it is systematically overcharging iPad and iPhone users for data services many never used.

Patrick Hendricks claims AT&T’s Internet Overcharging “was discovered by an independent consulting firm retained by plaintiff’s counsel, which conducted a two-month study of AT&T’s billing practices for data usage, and found that AT&T systematically overstate web server traffic by 7 percent to 14 percent, and in some instances by over 300 percent.”

The lawsuit compares the company’s billing system to a gas pump that charges for a full gallon when it only dispenses nine-tenths into your tank.

Hendricks’ suit also claims the same independent testing firm confirmed AT&T charges for data usage even when phones and iPads were disabled for data sessions, push notifications, location services, and other data features.  After 10 days, the firm found AT&T had billed 35 data transactions totaling 2,292 kilobytes of usage, akin to being billed for gas when you never even pulled into the station.

The complaint admits the individual overcharges are relatively small for most consumers, but collectively they earn massive profits for AT&T.

“AT&T has 92.8 million customers. In the fourth quarter of 2010, AT&T reported its wireless data revenues increased $1.1 billion, or 27.4 percent, from the year-earlier quarter, to $4.9 billion,” the suit claims. “A significant portion of those data revenues were inflated by AT&T’s rigged billing system for data transactions.”

The lawsuit is seeking class action status and refunds of alleged overcharging for impacted customers.

The firm handling the case, Bursor & Fisher, has tangled with cell phone providers before, winning cases against Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile.  The firm is also exploring a lawsuit against Sprint on behalf of Evo owners who paid a $10 surcharge on top of an “unlimited” data plan.

NY City Council members are reviewing an application by Time Warner Cable and Cablevision to offer Wi-Fi services in 32 New York-area parks… for a fee that could bring the companies as much as $10 million dollars a year in new revenue.

The controversial proposal would frustrate efforts by the nonprofit group NYCWireless to find free Wi-Fi providers to deliver service in New York’s public parks.

In September, the city of New York renewed franchises for both Cablevision and Time Warner Cable that included a commitment to spend $10 million to install Wi-Fi service in area parks.  But nobody said the companies had to provide the service for free.

Instead, users will only get free samples — up to three ten-minute sessions per month.  Additional time on the network will cost 99 cents per day.  Cable customers will get unlimited access for free.

Dana Spiegel, executive director of the nonprofit NYCWireless, says handing over the wireless space in public parks to private fee-based providers is “absolutely unconscionable.”

City council members don’t have a final say over the deal — a state commission does — but intends to investigate the deal and its fairness to New York residents.

Verizon FiOS has a growing presence in New York City, and those customers would be locked out of free Wi-Fi access on the proposed park network.

NYCWireless offered the council several reasons why relying on cable companies to deliver public park Wi-Fi was not a great deal:

First, the plan does not establish any form of “Free Public Wi-Fi”, an amenity of New York City parks since NYCwireless began our work, and one replicated by the Parks Department and many other organizations around the City. Free Public Wi-Fi Hotspots were a very significant recommendation of the Diamond Consulting “Broadband Needs Assessment Study,” and the “Free” part of these public hotspots are exactly the part of these amenities that make them so valuable and essential for local residents.

Make no mistake: DoITT’s plan establishes a $1 per day fee for internet service in parks. There may be a few free 10-minute blocks per month, and there may be ways to hide the $1 per day charge in a resident’s cable service internet bill, but with DoITT’s plan, NYC won’t have Free Wi-Fi. We’ll have $1 per day Wi-Fi, delivered to public spaces that are maintained by our tax dollars, paid to a couple of huge private corporations.

In fact, Cablevision and Time Warner Cable stand to make tens of millions of dollars per year providing this service. Central Park gets about 25m visitors per year, and if we ignore all other parks, and figure that fewer than half of those visitors buy one day of internet service per year, Time Warner Cable and Cablevision get paid $0.99 x 10 million visitors = $10,000,000.

Second, the industry standard for gaining access to such types of subscription service as are contemplated by DoITT and the cable companies requires that a prospective user of a fee-based Parks Hotspot will need to create an account and enter their billing information. This requires the submission of identity, address, and credit card information into a web form prior to gaining access to the hotspot. Essentially, by promoting this solution, DoITT is pushing NYC citizens and visitors to hand over deeply personal and secure information to a private organization over which neither the user nor DoITT has any control.

Contrast this to the way that NYCwireless offers free Wi-Fi to citizens: we do require registration of a user account so that we can track agreement to our Acceptable Usage Policy. However we require only a valid email address. No billing address, no credit card, no other identity information.

Personally, I am fearful of handing over such information to such private organizations, though I have in the past. But I am more fearful for the harm that will be done to those that depend more significantly upon Park Hotspots. How many city residents don’t have a credit card? How many children in playgrounds who couldn’t get a credit card even if they wanted to? Adults? How many city residents live in neighborhoods that are otherwise safe, but in which they would prefer not pulling out their wallet and a credit card just to get what should be Free Internet Access? How many city residents depend upon Free Wi-Fi because they live below the poverty line, and because they can’t afford or don’t want cable internet, cannot afford the $5 it would cost them to get internet access in a city park during the week?

Lastly, because of DoITT’s “whole package solution”, most NYC residents and visitors won’t see any Wi-Fi, for free or for fee, for years, since local organizations that would otherwise have sponsored the creation of a Free Public Wi-Fi Hotspot say “oh, well, the city is going to do this someday, so we won’t bother doing this now for our community.” If past experience is any predictor of future performance, it will be years before the first Paid Wi-Fi Hotspot is opened, and many more before many others are opened, if at all. Meanwhile, DoITT’s actions will have stopped in its tracks any plans for more hotspots that local organizations may be contemplating.

[flv width=”640″ height=”500″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/NY 1 Time Warner Cable Offers Free WiFi Hotspots For City Customers 3-26-10.flv[/flv]

NY1 reported on Time Warner Cable’s expanded Wi-Fi hotspots in New York in this story from last March.  (1 minute)

Netflix today released statistics showing Frontier Communications was America’s worst ranked wired Internet Service Provider, ranking at the bottom for quality and speed when using Netflix’s streamed content.

Only Clearwire, a heavily-throttled wireless provider scored worse than Frontier Communications.  This says nothing good about Frontier considering they are a wired provider.

Charter Cable scored highest — a surprise from a company that scores near the bottom in Consumer Reports broadband rankings:

Charter is in the lead for US streams with an impressive 2667 kilobits per second average over the period. Rogers leads in Canada with a whopping 3020 kbps average.

Canada’s higher speed performance comes even as providers claim they need to implement Internet Overcharging schemes to handle congestion on their networks — congestion not apparent from Netflix’s online video performance. Perhaps Canadians have been already grown accustomed to avoiding too much online video.

Netflix promises to release their streaming performance statistics on a monthly basis. Track your ISP from the charts below:

Netflix USA Speed Rankings

Netflix Rankings for Canada

(Our reader Paul sent us a news tip about this story.  You can send yours using the Contact Form linked above.)

Rogers, one of Canada’s largest telecom companies, will do anything to sell you their 3G wireless broadband Rocket Stick, even if it means scaring you away from using their own Wi-Fi hotspots.

Michael Geist, a popular columnist in Toronto, called Rogers about another matter, but the customer service agent soon began asking if Geist’s family used a laptop to access public Wi-Fi networks.

When I said that I did, he asked if I knew the dangers of using public Wi-Fi, which I was told included the possibility of hackers accessing my data or inserting viruses onto my computer.  Given the risks, the agent continued, might I be interested in the Rogers’ Rocket Stick?

Geist was completely unimpressed with Rogers’ attempts at upselling through scare tactics.

“Mobile internet services are good products that can and should be sold on the basis of the convenience they provide, not by scaring consumers into thinking that alternative access services are unsafe,” Geist wrote.

More importantly, the irony of Rogers’ statements can’t be missed, as Geist notes:

• Rogers operates hundreds of public wifi hotspots across the country. When promoting its hotspots, it describes them as providing “high-speed, secure access to the Internet.”
• Rogers permits Internet tethering from many smartphones. Many users may find that tethering provides a more cost effective solution than purchasing yet another mobile Internet device.  The agent did not mention this alternative.
• There are risks with public wifi, but those can be mitigated through a variety of steps on users’ computers. Advice on what do include Microsoft’s advice on public wifi networks, Lifehacker on how to stay safe on public wifi networks, and Ars Technica on staying safe at public hotspots.

Stories about the risks of Wi-Fi are not limited to Rogers.  Several media outlets have been running stories ranging from the plausible:
[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/CTV British Columbia – How to secure your Wi-Fi surfing 10-7-10.flv[/flv]

CTV in Southwest Ontario reports some area residents believe Wi-Fi causes diabetes and other ailments and wants Wi-Fi pulled from schools.  (7 minutes)

Also not to be missed are Rogers’ impenetrable “Flex Rate Plans.”  Would it not be easier to just say customers will be charged the amount of the rate plan that corresponds with their actual usage?

Flex Rate Plans
Rogers unique Flex Rate service automatically adjusts the monthly fee based on your actual monthly usage. As you use more or less data, Rogers Flex Rate Data Plan will automatically roll up or down to the next best rate available. This guarantees you the best rate based on actual usage.
Tier	Monthly Fee	Data Included**	How Rogers Flex Rate Works
1	$35	500MB	You will start each month at Tier 1. If your monthly usage exceeds 500MB, then you move up automatically to Tier 2 and will be charged $40.
2	$40	1GB	If your monthly usage exceeds 1GB, then you move up automatically to Tier 3 and will be charged $55.
3	$55	2GB	If your monthly usage exceeds 2GB, then you move up automatically to Tier 4 and will be charged $70.
4	$70	5GB	If your monthly usage exceeds 5GB, $0.05 per additional MB will be charged.

Monthly prices above do not include the Government Regulatory Recovery Fee*