The class action lawsuit against AT&T’s US iPhone exclusivity has been certified, which means a judge thinks it meets the legal requirements to go forward. If you remember back, The crux of suit states that customer contracts are 2 years, but the AT&T exclusivity is 5 years — so customers were falsely lured to AT&T for 5 years, not 2 — if they want to keep iPhones, that is. The lawsuit seeks to include all current AT&T iPhone customers.

Now, whether or not that original 5 year exclusivity has changed over the past few years is anyone’s guess — the only people who know that for sure are the AT&T and Apple higher ups that sign the contracts. In this day and age, contracts change constantly.

My opinion? I don’t know if a court will buy this as falsely leading on customers. Most carriers don’t ever specify how long their exclusivity deals are, it’s all hearsay until they announce it. Yes, the iPhone deal is unique in length (I don’t believe any carrier has ever had an exclusive anywhere even close to the length AT&T scored with Apple), but I don’t necessarily know if I believe it misleads customers. When the first iPhone was released, the 5 year deal was already publicized, even if it was hearsay, and people still bought iPhones. And honestly, if you get an iPhone, no one’s forcing you to get another one. If you upgrade and lock yourself in, that’s pretty much your decision, your hand isn’t forced.

We’ll watch this one but I personally don’t think it will go very far.

[Engadget]

Class action lawsuit over iPhone/AT&T exclusivity gets certified — should it go to court? is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

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With Apple all but certain to announce a the 4th generation iPhone (iPhone HD/iPhone 4G) with iPhone OS 4 at WWDC the week of June 7, and AT&T to release it later the same month, why would AT&T want to release the new BlackBerry 9800 slider running OS 6.0 at around the same time?

Since 2007 the iPhone has been AT&T’s summer blockbuster. It’s been the phone that got the users and made the numbers, quarter after quarter. Some would go so far as to say iPhone exclusivity is the only thing that’s kept AT&T competitive with their arch-rival, Verizon.

Rewind. Back in March our sibling site CrackBerry.com did a Q&A roundup about the BlackBerry Slider, which could end up being part of the Bold lineup. A full, capacitive touchscreen device with a Palm Pre-style vertical slider it would give the BlackBerry faithful the Storm-like experience needed to compete in today’s mainstream smartphone market, but keep the industry-leading physical keyboard those same faithful are so loathe to do without. And CrackBerry thought it was going to be released on AT&T, and in the summer.

Today Boy Genius added fuel to that fire, saying the BlackBerry Bold 9800 slider would launch on AT&T in June, be exclusive for 3-6 months, and that AT&T had placed an incredibly large order for the device — easily exceeding 1,000,000 units.

Repeat. Why would AT&T want a huge order of an exclusive, powerfully branded, touchscreen smartphone with keyboard differentiation at the same time they’ve traditionally, and successfully launched their heretofore exclusive new iPhones?

Since I’ve sworn off Verizon iPhone rumors this week, including rumors of Verizon iPhone ads, manufacturers and equally large manufacturing runs, and increasing chatter, I’ll let you answer that in comments.

Why would AT&T want an exclusive BlackBerry Bold 9800 slider hero phone this summer? is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

TiPb - The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog

The original iPhone exclusivity agreement between Apple and AT&T was for a 5-year period running from 2007 to 2012. Confirmation of this comes by way of court documents from 2008, however, and 2 years is an eternity in corporate contract-dom.

In other words, anything from AT&T’s service levels (or lack thereof in New York and San Francisco) to their deal for iPad 3G data plans could have led to renegotiations, extensions, or new contracts entirely since then.

So file this away under iPhone trivia unless and until a Verizon iPhone shows up… sometime.

[Engadget]

Original AT&T iPhone exclusivity was a 5 year deal is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

TiPb - The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog

According to an inside source close to the going-ons involved in all of this, a new tablet of some sort may not be the only thing on deck for next Wednesday though. We have been led to believe by an inside source that AT&T will lose their iPhone exclusivity on the same day

Yeahbuwhy?

Inside of AT&T, we are hearing that the iPhone is causing more trouble than ever before. On some level, having the iPhone is hurting AT&T’s image. Because they are the only company to carry it, and it’s such a data hog, it’s largely to blame for AT&T’s network troubles. [...] The iPhone itself doesn’t really handle the switch from 3G to EDGE very well, so calls that are in-progress tend to fail whenever the 3G bands aren’t optimal and the phone attempts to step down to EDGE.

They claim AT&T is tired of the bad press and will let other networks share the burden while AT&T introduces new phones from other platforms (hello Android and webOS?) in order to compete.

The follow on rumor, of course and as always, is that Verizon will then start to carry a CDMA-friendly version of the iPhone 3GS and the new iTablet.

No comment from AT&T yet, but anyone buying this?