AT&T executive comments yesterday that the carrier might be ditching the current "all you can eat" $30 iPhone data plan for usage-based pricing didn't go over very well with either the company's users or the press. Many felt AT&T was blaming its customers for the company's inability to adequate meet iPhone bandwidth demand. Others felt AT&T was continuing the industry trend of pretending that the flat-rate pricing model doesn't provide enough revenue for network upgrades. The coverage has had echoes of Time Warner Cable's botched attempt to hoist usage-based billing upon their customers earlier this year.

As has repeatedly been the case when it comes to AT&T's 3G network this year, AT&T again found itself in the unenviable position of having to do damage control. As such, AT&T's been going around to various news outlets insisting that AT&T Wireless boss Ralph de La Vega's comments were "taken out of context." As such, they're providing a link to the one hour presentation where the comments were made. Here's the transcript of the relevant bits:The idea that "user education" will somehow magically compensate for the capacity and network reliability AT&T failed to provide iPhone users is the kind of disingenuous language Time Warner Cable used when they tried to impose a new pricing model that lacked consumer value. Like Time Warner Cable, AT&T investors and executives are chomping at the bit to impose an unpopular usage-based billing model on both their wireless and wireline networks -- simply because it generates more revenue than flat rate pricing. "User education" plays no part in the equation. User disinformation does, and there's been a lot of it.

The argument that an already hugely profitable company wants to charge even more money for bandwidth isn't one that sits well with consumers. As such, AT&T's tried to sell the idea by arguing that usage-based billing is about being fair to grandmothers, while their lobyists have spent a lot of money arguing that unless you embrace their new pricing vision, the Internet will explode. As with Time Warner Cable, AT&T's customers see this "consumer education effort" for what it is: an effort to impose higher prices on consumers. As de la Vega himself notes, the issue will be whether regulators and consumers sign off on the idea.