• by Thom Forbes , January 12, 2016

AT&T is offering a new unlimited data, talk and text plan to new and existing wireless customers who have or add its DirecTV or U-Verse services, ratcheting up the battle for the unplugged consumer of all things video.

“AT&T is going to be a major player in being able to mobilize entertainment,” Brad Bentley, chief marketing officer of AT&T Entertainment Group, tellsVariety’s Todd Spangler.  “The new strategy is straightforward: AT&T is bundling unlimited data-usage pricing with TV and other video services so users won’t have to worry about how much they’re streaming,” writes Spangler. In other words, “the moves by AT&T and others could accelerate video viewing over wireless networks, which historically have been pricey ways to watch live TV, Netflix, YouTube and other bandwidth-intensive video content.”

The service costs $100 per month; additional smartphones can be added for $40 per month each, and a fourth smartphone can be added at no additional cost.

“Wireless companies have generally moved away from unlimited data plans in recent years. AT&T's new offer will only be promoted for a limited time, but households who opt into it will keep the unlimited data deal,” points out Brian Stelter for CNN Money. 

“Carriers continue to face a surge in wireless data consumption, especially from customers watching videos from services such as Netflix or YouTube on mobile devices,” reports Thomas Gryta for the Wall Street Journal. “The average smartphone owner in North America in 2015 used about 3.2 gigabytes of data a month, up from less than 1 gigabyte a month during 2010, according to Cisco Systems.”

In a post cited by Spangler, VideoNuze analyst Will Richmond says “wireless carriers look like they’re eager to change the equation and enable a dramatic increase in mobile video use.” He also tells us “it’s hard to believe [AT&T’s] timing wasn’t influenced by the introduction of T-Mobile’s ‘Binge On’ feature last November.”

Indeed, why is AT&T offering unlimited data now after years of heading in the other direction? asks Gizmodo’s Mario Aguilar. 

“Well, in part, it’s got to be increasing capacity. Wireless networks are getting more robust over time, and so unlimited customers might not be as much of a burden on the network as it was in the past,” he responds. “You also get the sense that the increasingly aggressive ‘Uncarrier’ marketing from T-Mobile is starting to make carriers that don’t offer unlimited data seem like they’re stuck in the Stone Age.”

Binge On “allows subscribers to stream video from services like Netflix or Hulu without the data counting against their monthly allotment, as long as they don’t mind that the video is downgraded to 480p, or ‘DVD quality,’ which is lower than standard HD resolution,” explainsFortune’s Kif Leswing, in a piece looking at the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s charges last week that Uncarrier was, in fact, “throttling video streams, plain and simple.”

T-Mobile CEO John Legere responded with a Twitter video saying, “There are people out there saying we’re ‘throttling.’ That’s a game of semantics, and it’s bullshit,” Leswing reports.

Legere refined that message yesterday in an “open letter,” elucidating what Binge On is and how you get it. (If you’re a T-Mobile customer, you’ve got it. Period.) He also apologized “for offending EFF and its supporters.” And while he admitted to being a “vocal, animated and sometimes foul mouthed CEO” who no one at T-Mobile even attempts to filter, he refused to apologize for “sometimes incite[ing] a bit of a ‘social media riot.’”

That’s always a good tactic on a slow news day, of course.

Meanwhile, Glenn Lurie, president and CEO of AT&T Mobility, “dismissed comparisons” with Binge On, writes Edward C. Baig for USA Today, saying its plan “applies to all content and doesn’t compromise on video quality.”

“This is nothing like Binge On, it’s actually quite opposite,” Lurie tells Baig, who points out that “15 million homes have DirecTV but do not have AT&T wireless as their mobility service” — meaning that there are a lot of ducks already in the pond. 

“If you think about 2½ to 3 lines per home, you are talking about 40-plus million opportunities there,” Recon Analytics analyst Roger Entner tells Baig. “On the reverse side, you have 21 million homes that have mobility or wireless services from AT&T, that don’t have DirecTV.”

AT&T, meanwhile, is breaking a new campaign “touting its history and experience building networks to match consumers’ (and businesses’) needs,” writes Marketing Daily’s Aaron Baar, who has all the details here.