AT&T Announces MMS Available for iPhone Customers on Sept. 25: But, Says Their Network Can’t Handle Tethering Yet

Yesterday, AT&T finally announced…

An Update on iPhone MMS for our Mobility Customers

MMS (Multimedia Messaging Service) lets you send audio, photos, and short video clips as easily as you send text messasges. The iPhone is pretty much the only smartphone in the U.S. that doesn’t have this feature. Others phones (even ones on AT&T’s network) have had this feature for years. iPhone 3G and 3GS owners will gain the feature (presumably for an additional cost) on September 25.

But, you know what? I have absolutely zero interest in this MMS service. But, I would like to have a 3G wireless tethering option to let me use my iPhone 3G as a wireless modem for my netbook when out and about. So, I tweeted the following message to AT&T:

FYI @ATTNews I don’t care about MMS. But, I do care about iPhone tethering. Any news on that service?

Here’s the tweet response (direct message) that I received from AT&T:

ATTNews: Tethering could exponentially increase traffic on the network, we need to ensure current upgrades are in place.

My interpretation is that AT&T is a long ways away from making this feature available to their U.S. based iPhone customers. FYI: Phone companies in other countries already provide tethering to their iPhone customers.

Join Baratunde Thurston (left), The Onion’s Director of Digital and author of How to Be Black, for an entertaining look at creative social media campaigns in our Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting February 16. Other speakers include Morin Oluwole (Facebook), Tim Devane (bitly), and SocialTimes' writer Devon Glenn.   Register now.