Nice analysis, and just what I was thinking, except I don't see canceling it as n available option to AT&T. It would be a breach of contract, and that is why they are using subtle coercion.
I am surprised that no one has suggested false advertising. If you throttle back, then the theoretic amount of possible data usage is greatly reduced compared to a non-throttled account. That seems to be the opposite of unlimited, or more correctly... limited.
Brent
On Feb 25, 2012, at 11:33 AM, AnneL wrote:
> > however, to deliberately sabotage a customer's ability to use the service
> > is another matter entirely.
>
> I haven't read the court's full decision, but I would imagine that it's not
> the throttling itself that caused the ruling, but throttling an "unlimited"
> customer at a lower level than people on tiered plans are allowed to use
> unrestricted. I imagine that if AT&T established their "top 5%" number and
> then throttled *all* data users at the same data point, the court's decision
> might have been different. I imagine it's the fact that the unlimited users
> are singled out for throttling at a threshold that caused the ruling. If
> "unlimited" users are throttled more tightly than tiered plan users, then
> that constitutes a limitation since it's not being applied across the board.
>
> At this point, as I see it, AT&T has four options:
>
> 1. Appeal the ruling and fight it out in court, which means either AT&T
> wins and nothing changes, or the customer wins and AT&T is stuck with the
> other choices below
>
> 2. Stop throttling unlimited plan users at lower thresholds than the
> highest level tiered plan
>
> 3. Pick an arbitrary "top 5%" level and throttle everybody, regardless of
> plan, when they reach that level
>
> 4. Cancel the unlimited plans altogether and force customers to go to a
> tiered plan.
>
> Since there's only one outcome in four that ends well for me, as an
> unlimited user, chances are that when all the dust clears I'll end up
> jumping ship to another carrier, likely Verizon, who also throttles, but
> much more reasonably -- they only throttle those using a particular tower
> when THAT tower becomes congested, and they stop throttling as soon as the
> congestion eases, usually a matter of hours or even minutes, rather than for
> the rest of the billing cycle as AT&T does.
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