This Is Way, Way Off-Topic: ATT to the Bakken

This is way off topic but it is too good a story to resist.

Today, the Bismarck Tribune is reporting that ATT will soon provide wireless service in North Dakota. That is great news for those of us who travel with iPads.

However, that's not the point of this story.

If one is familiar with the current marketing war between ATT and Verizon, this story has a bit of irony.

Verizon started the controversial ad war by stating it covered much, much more of the continental United States, and true enough, when looking at the map of coverage, there are huge ATT gaps across fly-over country in the US.

ATT went to court suing Verizon over misleading ads. ATT lost.

ATT countered with a pretty good ad showing that (despite the gaps across fly-over country), ATT coverage reaches 97% of Americans.

I guess ATT is trying to fill in that fly-over gap by bringing wireless to North Dakota, one of the larger fly-over states.

But here's the irony: how ATT is entering this new territory. ATT has bought the Alltel network from Verizon wireless which covered North Dakota, and much of the other fly-over country.

It appears ATT's geographic coverage will increase at the expense of Verizon's. I doubt the change will move the needle with regard to actual subscribers. But it makes the iPad a more viable tablet in North Dakota.

I can't make this stuff up.

[Note: ATT and Verizon announced the sale of Alltel assets back in May, 2009, but the deal is finally completed. Lots of federal red tape to get through to close the deal.]


Telstar, The Tornados, 1962

Named for the ATT communications satellite, Telstar. The writer of this song received no royalties for this song. He was accused of plagiarism. The court finally ruled in his favor ... one year after his death. It is unlikely the composer ever heard the song he was accused of stealing --- that song was only released in France. This is the first single by a British band to reach number one on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, and was also a number one hit in the UK.