‘iPhone 3.0 and MMS’ Claims Spur Lawsuit Against Apple, AT&T

Macnn is reporting that an angry Apple customer and buyer of an iPhone has filed a lawsuit against Apple and the leading US mobile carrier (AT&T) over misleading statements surrounding claims of MMS support for the respective device.

When Apple introduced iPhone OS 3.0, the company touted the piece of software as being packed with several key enhancements, including cut, copy and paste, as well as MMS (multimedia messaging service). Apple, however, failed to explicitly mention that the feature would be blocked until late summer 2009, when AT&T would supposedly launch the service for iPhone 3G and 3GS users. The service is still unavailable, by the way.

Therefore, the dissatisfied Deborah Carr filed a lawsuit against the two companies on Wednesday, “referencing various Apple and AT&T support documents that discuss MMS messaging,” the Macnn report reveals. And, while the court filing does acknowledge a disclaimer on behalf of the two companies – stating that MMS messaging would be available around the end of summer 2009 – the document also suggests that said disclaimer is nearly impossible to read, due to the extremely small font used for the writing.

“Millions of customers, as a result of the false and deceptive representations and concealments of Apple and AT&T purchased the 3G and 3GS, waiting for the wonderful day in June 2009 when the new application would be available which would allow MMS,” the filing states. “Unfortunately, after downloading the new 3.0 Software Update application, MMS still did not work on both the 3G and 3GS.”

According to the aforementioned source, the plaintiff has demanded $5,000,001,000, citing a breach of contract by both companies.

Softpedia Note
It should also be noted that first-generation iPhones do not support MMS at all, while Apple failed to make this too very clear. Fortunately, first-generation iPhones are harder to come by now, so a mistake on behalf of the customer is not as probable.

Recent reports are now saying that AT&T is preparing to start offering MMS support for iPhone owners. The move is said to be marked by the release of iPhone OS 3.1, but it will not happen until sometime next month.