AT&T disgusts me. How much money has the iPhone dropped in their lap? And all they do with that money is drag down the entire user experience with horrible, overpriced service which cripples the device severely.
They have had time, however, to try to squeeze as much money from this venture as possible while they still have exclusivity. I've now received two emails from AT&T about their navigation app. They charge $9.99 per month for it. How many other iPhone app developers can send out an email to every single iPhone owner at will? Zero. The rest of us have to charge 99 cents (one time) if we want to get noticed on the App Store.
And now that they've cashed in on Apple's brilliance and innovation, they're going to do the same with Loopt. They are the perfect example of a company willing to do whatever it takes to increase profits, but not willing to do much of anything to help their customers.
I dunno, I mean, the government already tried to deal with AT&T, and it didn't seem to help.
If you're trying to make a snarky comment about how phones aren't important when compared to health care, I actually would find it quite refreshing if everyone stopped talking about health care, and started talking about how America's technological infrastructure is years behind.
Health care is more important then how we may or may not be behind technologically. That argument is based on other countries who are the size of Texas to Rhode Island. Based on the size of the US we are not doing as bad as some paint it out to be; improvement is always needed!
Overall if you are one who prefers text based communication over voice & loathe AT&T, you still can use an iPod Touch via Wifi or buy a Verizon or Sprint MiFi and use that as your communication device. Of course there are issues with doing this, but last two months has worked great for me.
If countries the size and density of the NYC metropolitan area have better digital infrastructure than the NYC metropolitan area, that is a problem. No one's expecting gigabit internet in Wyoming, but not even in the densest parts of the country can we compete with the rest of the world.
If health care is going to be nationalized, it can't be a productive part of the economy anymore. It's already (probably) a net drain on public resources. If we're gonna have something like public health care, we need a way to pay for it. Fixing our technology infrastructure enables this country to create more wealth.
> Health care is more important then how we may or may not be behind technologically.
It all depends on your priorities. I personally am against nationalized health care, and, more importantly, all this "debate" is doing is pulling everyone even farther and farther apart. Everyone is yelling and screaming and calling each other names, and I'm frankly sick of it.
> That argument is based on other countries who are the size of Texas to Rhode Island.
Normally, I'd agree with you. But I live in Pittsburgh, down the street from CMU, and several of my friends can't even get FIOS. Let alone the kind of crazy awesome internet they have in Japan or South Korea. You can't get that anywhere in the US. Of course, rural areas aren't going to be able to get fiber to their homes, but there's no reason to be so far behind in urban areas.
And while the MiFi seems interesting, it's completely unreasonable that I can't just get wifi built into my phone. I don't want to carry around a whole second box for something that should just be built in.
I have a small plastic casing I put both Mifi and iTouch in. So only disadvantage per your argument is that it's slightly bulkier then just an iPhone. The other disadvantages too, but i prefer text based communications over voice.
Overall I am sure when LTE (Verizon's 4G) & or Wimax (Clearwire) offer ubiquitous coverage will start to see Internet mobile devices with built in 4G. Though carrier's don't want to be dumb pipes, but I'm thinking that's what they'll become, as us consumers only need/want them for the pipe!
I tend to prefer text communications as well, but I'd really like to browse some WWW from time to time.
I agree that carriers will have to become dumb pipes... if they don't want to be a dumb pipe, they should let someone else be one, and just build off of that. Then again, with all of the money and history that's involved in the telecommunications industry, I'll imagine that we'll be held back for quite a while longer.
Cool. In any case, we fundamentally agree, both things are terribly broken. You can also add intellectual property laws, giving power back to the states, and a whole host of other things too...
Wow, cry me a river. Apple gave them exclusivity for exactly the same reason -- more profits. Obviously you like them enough to be a customer. You could switch, why don't you?
Seems like these sorts of things will never work in a paid subscription model. The only way I can see them working is ad supported - show you vouchers for the shops/restaurants as you pass them etc etc.
Maybe it's just me, but would anyone here pay $3.99 per month for this?
> Maybe it's just me, but would anyone here pay $3.99 per month for this?
Probably not, but I think the other 90% of the world might. My cell phone bill is high because I pay $15 extra for tethering. My little sister's cell phone bill is high because she buys ringtones. As much as I think that's a waste, way more people buy the latter than the former.
There's no way in hell I'd want my kids "friends" (who knows who they friend on loopt) seeing where my kid is at.
All that being said, I wonder if Loopt could offer a "for parents" app that just allows parents to see where their kids are (w/o all the other app functionality). I'd bet a ton of parents would pay for that.
I believe that is what he was getting at. So parents can see where their kid's phone is.
We all know that teenagers are plenty creative when it comes to sneaking around. 1) drop cell phone at friends house and enable call forwarding. 2) do whatever you want.
And while they'll probably get a lot of customers to sign on to this service, these people won't be happy when they see Google Latitude running for free on their friend's Android phone.
You can run Latitude on the iPhone but the whole no-background-apps thing renders it nearly useless.
AT&T is living proof that the "free market" has failed. I know we don't have a free market, but we are led to believe that we do by pro-business establishment conservatives.
I was told I shouldn't mention founders of YC-funded companies in this list. But Sam Altman can't be stopped by such flimsy rules. If he wants to be on this list, he's going to be.
Honestly, Sam is, along with Steve Jobs, the founder I refer to most when I'm advising startups. On questions of design, I ask "What would Steve do?" but on questions of strategy or ambition I ask "What would Sama do?"
What I learned from meeting Sama is that the doctrine of the elect applies to startups. It applies way less than most people think: startup investing does not consist of trying to pick winners the way you might in a horse race. But there are a few people with such force of will that they're going to get whatever they want.
I still can't believe he manages to cut the deals that he does. I was really shocked when it showed up on Boost Mobile.
Is Loopt really that great? Does he prove that it makes money for the phone company? I guess that must be the pitch, since it would be easier to track what's driving spending from a pre-pay customer.
Cool for people who use Loopt I guess BUT this is really not fair to other developers (especially the competitors of Loopt).
It feels like one of those "Well, if I let YOU do it I have to let EVERYONE do it" type of things, and AT&T should have said no.
I also find it interesting that Apple isn't mentioned anywhere in the deal, which is strange because the article makes it seem that AT&T has the power to just tell Apple to break one of its developer rules for a special case. Shady, if I do say so myself.
"The app isn't running in the background; it's working server-to-server."
So presumably all they've done is a deal with AT&T to access the cell-location data for a subscriber, and using the app to tie that into their Loopt identity. Nothing special going on inside the iPhone OS.
I wondered about this. It was discussed about how Pre sends a location update with its debug bundle. I wondered why Apple didn't send a location update when they pole for the push update.
It wouldn't have to happen every time, but once every 5-10 minutes would be a good balance of phone battery and timeliness.
Why do I get this feeling that Loopt simply struck a deal for access to location/tracking/logging data that AT&T is already collecting for its own purposes...
In reference to pricing, I think you guys are forgetting the study which found that the majority of iphone users make over $80,000 in salary. There is quite a lot of disposable income in that population. Therefore it only makes sense that they would attempt to milk every dime. Especially when competitors are sure to emerge in the next 2-3 years.
When you consider that location based services like Loopt can be used to feed Apps like Foursquare.com you realize this technology has broad applications for iphones majority audience. Foursquare is a mobile social media platform that allows users to see what bars their friends are situated at.
I was planning to write something which alternates between Sosumi and Clarke (Skyhook FireEagle updater for Mac) so when you are at your computer and updating you don't eat into your iPhone battery.
It's more or less required for cell phone service. They need to know what cell you are in order to connect incoming calls.
Besides if you're using AT&T you're either ignorant or unconcerned about privacy. They have looong history going back to the Clipper chip, PATRIOT act era wiretaps, of "selling out" their customers.
This is really exciting news; traditionally the carriers have been a bit closed in nature, and this represents a healthy step forward for people like myself who use and enjoy Loopt. Look forward to seeing this technology progress!
As a complete side note; how many people do you know that use Loopt? I'm curious as to how well they're doing in comparison to say something like Facebook.
Apps have been running in the background since Backgrounder was published on Cydia. And it doesn't cost anything to do so. Backgrounder lets me set up my TomTom, Flow Chat (IRC), and AMBER Alert to background themselves automatically... and my 3G[s] still runs plenty fast.
Guh, I was trying to point out you're probably the Sama and maybe get some info on the actual deal. Not get you down-voted. Your comment was perfectly acceptable considering your connection to Loopt.
