AT&T spokesman wins doublespeak award for pretending to offer tethering to excited iPhone users

Omaha, Nebraska--AT&T spokesman Aaron Darling today reportedly received a Spokesman of the Year award from AT&T for his comments to Wired magazine yesterday, in which he managed to convey the impression that AT&T is planning to support tethering with new iPhones announced yesterday. Tethering, which lets a computer user connect to the Internet through the iPhone's Internet connection, and a host of other features were announced today by Apple.

In a stunning use of doublespeak, Darling spoke thusly:

“We plan to offer a tethering plan, but don’t have an announcement to make at this time. [...] We absolutely will offer MMS on iPhone 3G S and iPhone 3G with 3.0 upgrades in late summer once we complete some system upgrades that will ensure our customers have the best experience with MMS. These upgrades are unrelated to our 3G network.”

The commendatory certificate reads, in part:

Whereas his statement conveys the impression that tethering and the full suite of iPhone 3G S and iPhone OS 3.0 features (announced today by Apple) will be supported by AT&T, it in fact, accurately delivers the following information:

• iPhone users will never be allowed to use tethering
  
• MMS messaging will be offered at a substantial cost to iPhone users before the end of the first fiscal quarter of AT&T's fiscal year 2010, or once system upgrades and customer satisfaction surveys are complete, which could take many years
• Features of the iPhone OS 3.0 will not be supported for the old (previous) model of the iPhone 3G until the first fiscal quarter of AT&T's fiscal year 2010, or once system upgrades and customer satisfaction surveys are complete, which could take many years
  
• All statements about MMS and iPhone support are subject to change or cancellation
  

In his acceptance speech, Darling promised that "Acceptance of this object in no way denotes endorsement of the concept that I express opinion for or have express knowledge of the plans of any corporate entity."

He continued, "The purpose of AT&T may be, as it were, to hold a mirror up to user expectation; to exact payment for the return of once-removed features as if for new, to deliver the opposite of what's desired, indeed, to generally define the very age and body of our time through 2-year contracts and constant peer pressure."