Apple Joins AT&T Attacks on Verizon Ads
Apple Monday joined AT&T in its attempt to counter Verizon’s attack on both the iPhone and the handset’s exclusive carrier. In a series of prime-time ads, the Cupertino, Calif. company asked viewers: “can your phone and network do that?”
The two ads show the iPhone checking e-mail and movie listings while on a phone call. AT&T’s 3G GSM network is capable of multiple voice and data connections, an ability apparently lacking from Verizon’s CDMA network.
Verizon had directly challenged the iPhone by launching an ad campaign dubbed “iDon’t.” The ads claimed Verizon’s new Android 2.0-based Droid smartphones could accomplish tasks better than Apple’s handset. Later, Verizon stopped directly attacking the iPhone, later depicting the phone as a member of the mythical “Island of Misfit Toys”, it’s performance hampered by AT&T. The carrier claimed AT&T’s 3G network lacked sufficient coverage.
Although AT&T had sued Verizon, asking that the ads – including an earlier series of “Map” spots – be taken off the air, a judge recently summarily ruled against the Atlanta, GA-based carrier. In response, AT&T launched its own ads with actor Luke Wilson, claiming AT&T covered 97 percent of Americans.
This latest wrinkle in the AT&T versus Verizon ad war comes as analyst Brian Marshall claims AT&T will lose its exclusive deal with the iPhone in July 2010.
- Via AppleInsider, Engadget
Ed Sutherland is a veteran technology journalist who first heard of Apple when they grew on trees, Yahoo was run out of a Stanford dorm and Google was an unknown upstart. Since then, Sutherland has covered the whole technology landscape, concentrating on tracking the trends and figuring out the finances of large (and small) technology companies.
