Verizon Asks Court To Affirm 'Most Reliable' Claim

suraj.sun writes "Verizon has asked a court to affirm its claim to be 'America's Most Reliable 3G Network.' From the article, 'Verizon Wireless, a joint venture of Verizon and Vodafone Group PLC, asked a US court for a judgment that its advertising claims to be "America's Most Reliable 3G Network" were truthful, which rival AT&T called "misleading" on Monday. In papers filed in US District Court in Manhattan, Verizon said assertions on July 1 by AT&T Mobility LLC, a unit of AT&T, that its advertising was false could not be supported. AT&T, which has its principal business in Atlanta, had filed the challenge with the National Advertising Division of the Council for Better Business Bureaus. Verizon Wireless said its claims of having "America's Most Reliable 3G Network" and "America's Best 3G Network" and "America's Most Reliable Wireless Network" are "truthful, accurate and substantiated" and do not violate the trademark law known as the Lanham Act. It said that AT&T's challenge "relies on the incorrect premise that speed is an essential element of the standard for measuring network reliability.'" I can only hope that at some future date a court will decide which light beer truly is the best tasting.

It's called puffery

[BadAnalogyGuy]

Definition: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puffery [wikipedia.org]
Example: http://www.theonion.com/content/node/31864 [theonion.com]

I'm not even a huge fan of 3G anymore

[bbhorrigan]

It does not even seem noticeably faster from EDGE, and for tethering it is just barely faster then EDGE or 1XEV. All I've found 3G good for is killing my battery.

Light beer

[Stele]

I can only hope that at some future date a court will decide which light beer truly is the best tasting.

It's quite possible that none of them are the best tasting. You need flavor to actually have taste, don't you?

</off-topic>

AT&T should focus

[wardk]

on fixing their

1. inadequate network
2. price gouging
3. treating iPhone users differently than other customers (see 2)
4. crappy support (see 1)

I have an iPhone, an original, I love it. but I am SERIOUSLY considering an alternative as I am just flat out disgusted with AT&T and APPLE for their behavior.
FWIW, our home has 4 Macs, and no PCs.

the iPhone needs to be opened up to other carriers, plain and simple.

in my humble opinion, AT&T/Apple isn't a whole lot different than a mob operation and should be broken up with extreme predjudice.

the bigger question I have is why does the Fed allow phone carriers to consistently scam their citizens?

Re:Atleast for me....

[Tycho]

Yeah, but where my parents live, which is in an inner ring suburb of Minneapolis, with Verizon, I can expect one bar intermittently, at best, on the top floor and no reception at all at either the ground level or outside in the yard. As one might expect, there is no reception as well in the partially underground basement. Granted, the signal is better than Sprint or T-mobile, which have no signal, but that's not saying much. I suppose there is the Verizon picocell basestation, but why should anyone have to pay any more than a trivial fee to deal with a poor signal, especially in a suburban area that, Verizon does not want seem to want to fix on its own.

Canada? Rogers?

[Anonymous Coward]

America's most reliable 3G network? Is it more reliable than Roger's 3G network in Canada?

Last time I checked, Canada was part of America which is a continent, not a country.

Re:I'm not even a huge fan of 3G anymore

[Evan Charlton]

One of the huge benefits of 3G is that you can have a data connection while on a voice call. This isn't possible with EDGE. This also means that it's possible for a data connection to prevent a voice call from being received, if it does not yield the radio for an extended period of time.

Let's throw in a ruling of 'Biggest Assholes'....

[daoine_sidhe]

Seriously, I don't care if the only other 'network' I have is a pair of goddamned tincans and some dental floss, I will never, under any circumstances, do business with any division of Verizon again after my experience with their Wireless division. I used to be a Unicel customer prior to Verizon purchasing them. I was a Verizon customer for about 1.5 days before their craptastic completely locked down phones and (at least in my area) truly sub-par voice quality just drove me crazy. Despite having the paperwork from both Unicel and Verizon saying that I had thirty days to cancel service, they jacked my bill from the ~$180 (three lines) to ~$650 due to 'early termination fees' and the like. When I complained they agreed to drop it to $380, never sent a new bill detailing the charges, and sent it directly to collections within a week. I'm still fighting with them over this, and I will never, ever allow myself to be suckered into anything with them again, I don't care if the service is free and comes with a solid gold ruby encrusted phone that grants wishes. Fuck Verizon and fuck their service. If Verizon was a person I wouldn't piss down their throat if their heart was on fire.