AT&T intends to integrate Apple’s iPhone, which only AT&T sells in the US, into its U-verse pay-TV and broadband service, according to a report from Reuters.
Owners could use the iPhone like a TV remote control (perhaps consumers are less likely to lose a $300 TV remote), play their phone messages on the TV set (probably not on anyone’s top 10 most-wanted function) or copy shows that had been recorded on the DVR to their iPhone, something that many iPhone-ites would undoubtedly love to have in their quest to use their iPhone every waking minute.
‘We’re looking at the whole landscape of what people use, and what’s out there in the home,” AT&T CTO John Donovan told Reuters. He said some of the services might be available by year-end.
AT&T is in a ferocious fight with cable TV operators to sell U-verse pay-TV, keep the cablecos from decimating its residential phone business and protect its broadband market share. Using the iPhone, far and away the most popular smart phone, will help its cause.
Donovan said iPhones might even have Nintendo Wii-like capabilities such as “throwing” tomatoes at the TV.