More Bad iPhone Press for AT & T

Demiurge

Spent millions on Super Bowl ads, but the Super Bowl Champion just cost them millions:

Earlier today, Superbowl winning Green Bay Packers Quarterback Aaron Rodgers sent out a tweet complaining about his terrible iPhone connection, saying that he’d like to call in to the sports radio talk segment the Jim Rome show, but couldn’t because he kept hearing voices. Not the voices of ghosts, mind you, but of his AT&T iPhone which he said kept telling him “I will drop ur call.” Someone over at Verizon wireless who has a good eye for opportunity has just replied a few minutes ago with an offer for Rodgers that appears to be no less than a free Verizon iPhone 4.

This all began a couple of weeks ago when Aaron Rodgers was asked to do a phone interview with the Jim Rome show, only to be cut off by a terrible connection more than once. A transcript of a couple of the more important interactions:

ROME: “I’m going to give it a shot. Same phone, same deal. I’m going to hope for the best. We go back to it. Aaron Rodgers joins me once again. Aaron, sorry about that. The connection wasn’t good. Good to have you back though. Thanks.”

RODGERS: “Yeah, you bet, man. I love the iPhone, but sometimes AT&T doesn’t work around here.”

ROME: “That’s the truth. Around here also…”

A few moments later:

RODGERS: (Unintelligible)

ROME: “Aaron, my man, I just can’t do it. I hate that. AT&T and the iPhone. Too bad it hasn’t come to Verizon yet, but that’s February 10th. Great phone, spotty service. AT&T, thanks for nothing. Hate that. You got a guy coming off the best game of his career in demand, tough to get the interview, commits to it, probably in a place where it’s got to be a cell phone shot. iPhone. I mean, you got apps. But what good is it if we can’t do a freaking interview? Yeah, but the apps are great. Yeah, it’s great if you can use it as a phone. iPhone, not iApps. And I’m not here to crack you iPhone users, don’t freak out on that, I’ve got one. That’s why I don’t use it as much as my Verizon BlackBerry. Big drag. We’ll try to re-establish that with another phone or if not, what are you going to do? Guy made time for it. Tried to do it. We’ll see if maybe we can still turn that around.”

Immediately after this, the tweets started rolling out, and it began to look rather bleak for AT&T at the same time as it started to look like one heck of a free commercial for Verizon:



Jim Rome continued the show with a reading of an email, and suddenly the show was very much about AT&T’s coverage with their version of the iPhone. The email Rome read: “Hey, Jim, I agree completely about iPhones. I was on a call with one about a month ago. I could not hear a word the guy was saying, signed Joe Pa.”

Today, the story took another interesting turn. Aaron Rodgers tweeted his wish to call in to the Jim Rome Show again, saying that he was afraid as his iPhone warned him of the inevitable:



This alerted Verizon to the continuing situation, and they immediately took action with their fabulous free phone machine, appearing to offer Rodgers a brand new iPhone 4 from their recently released collection:



What can we learn from all this? Perhaps just make sure to have excellent service, especially when your device is in the hands of celebrities and sports icons.

One bad call can go a long way.

http://www.slashgear.com/verizon-gifts-green-bays-aaron-rodgers-with-a-replacement-iphone-4-10132652/

danger boy

i hate cell carrier bashing... because all of them at some spot or another depending on where you are at any given time in the universe will have dropped calls.

none of the carriers are better or worse then the other one. yes everyone that uses a cell phone says their carrier is either the best of the worst. to each his own.

ryanjoachim

Well, when you have a carrier saying "we cover 97% of the country", while at the same time having millions of (different) users complaining of dropped calls constantly for the last 3 years...it lends some credence to their complaints.

Obviously every carrier has dead spots, and some issues with dropped calls though, so I'm not going to start flinging mud.

thsmith

The 5 people I know in DFW area all complain about dropped calls with AT&T and their iPHONE, even sitting still with strong signal.

Jstas

Ah nobody calls me anyway so what the hell do I care? As long as my data stream stays up, I'm good!

ryanjoachim

Jstas wrote: »

Ah nobody calls me anyway so what the hell do I care? As long as my data stream stays up, I'm good!

Story of my life.

bobman1235

Jstas wrote: »

Ah nobody calls me anyway so what the hell do I care? As long as my data stream stays up, I'm good!

Yup. Talking on the phone is for old people and women.

heiney9

danger boy wrote: »

none of the carriers are better or worse then the other one.

Ummmm.....yes AL, some are better than others. AT&T is horrible and drops calls. That is a fact, period!

H9

mantis

I have had At&T for years now and I think it's fine in most places and sucks in others. I had Verizon and it was better in some places and sucks **** in others. I had T mobil , same story , I had Nextel and again same ****.

AsSiMiLaTeD

heiney9 wrote: »

Ummmm.....yes AL, some are better than others. AT&T is horrible and drops calls. That is a fact, period!

H9

Of course that's a fact. It's also a fact for every carrier. There's not a single carrier out there that doesn't have dropped calls. Period.

Jstas

I blame Toyota.

heiney9

Jstas wrote: »

I blame Toyota.

The shoddy floor mats are to blame.

bigaudiofanatic

So glad ATT is finally being showed for what they are JUNK verizon FTW as i said before been with them for 6 years still will stay with them. And with 4g coming that will boost there signal strength even more. WOOT

shack

I wish everybody that tried to call the Jim Rome show would lose connections. Maybe then they would take the **** off the air.

wz2p7j

I'm with Bigaudio on this one. Been on Verizon forever and dropped calls are very, very rare. At least where I live in SE Michigan.

Chris

shack

I have no complaints about ATT cell service. Almost never have a dropped call except for those places (usually at the base of a ridge or similar terrain) where most any signal would drop because of the topography. Their customer service and billing office are another story.

jbooker82

Verry few dropped calls with verizon in the middle of nebraska.

blueboxer

Everyone has to select the carrier that matches their needs and coverage area required, I have used all four of the major carriers in my location, Verizon has offered the best and most consistent coverage, followed by Sprint, T-Mobile, and lastly AT&T. I am sure this could be the exact opposite in other areas. For my work it is a necessity that the phone service offers the maximum coverage with the least amount of outages possible, which for me is Verizon. I loved my Iphone, I just hated the phone part of it with AT&T. I am hoping to rekindle my love soon thou.

edbert

I'm with Verizon and love them. What's a dropped call? Seriously, I think I may have had maybe 5 dropped calls in the past 6 years we have been with them. My inlaws are also here in the metroplex, both on AT&T and both with iPhones and I can almost guarantee that if they call us the call will be dropped at least once during our conversation. It is really annoying. The thing I don't understand is my parents live only 10 minutes or so from the inlaws also both with iPhones on AT&T and they never have dropped calls. Both drive around in the same areas, have near identical phones, yet one has crappy service and the other is great! How much sense does that make?

bobman1235

Kind of funny when someone says "what's a dropped call" and then says "every time I talk to my in-laws their call drops."

Demiurge

bobman1235 wrote: »

Kind of funny when someone says "what's a dropped call" and then says "every time I talk to my in-laws their call drops."

I think he meant that as a Verizon customer, he doesn't know what a dropped call is because he doesn't have that problem with Verizon -- not that he doesn't know what it is. Figure of speech.

bobman1235

I know what he meant, I was being a smartass. Shocking, I know.

Slinger182

I have an iPhone 3GS on at&t. I'm up for an upgrade now but am waiting for the iPhone 5. My contract is up in August so I might be jumping ship to verizon. I'm happy with my service now though so it might just come down to who I'll have a cheaper monthly bill with. Plus I'm grandfathered into at&t's unlimited data plan and rumor has it that verizon will be getting rid of theirs as well.