Verizon responds to AT&T in court: 'The truth hurts'

Verizon filed an aggressive legal response Monday as part of its ongoing defense against AT&T, accusing its competitor of overreacting to "the truth" of its wireless data service.

The latest filing on behalf of Verizon Wireless was in response to the latest request by AT&T to pull a series of ads from the air which highlight the disparity between the two companies' 3G data networks. The legal response holds no punches and is aggressive from the introduction: "AT&T did not file this lawsuit because Verizon's "There's A Map For That" advertisements are untrue; AT&T sued because Verizon's ads are true and the truth hurts."

Verizon's filing was issued in response to AT&T, which asserted that Verizon's ads are "false and misleading" because they confuse customers into believing that AT&T has no coverage in the areas highlighted as being devoid of 3G coverage.

Verizon's conclusion filed Monday in an Atlanta court maintains the tone set out from the start: "In the final analysis, AT&T seeks emergency relief because Verizon's side-by-side, apples-to-apples comparison of its own 3G coverage with AT&T's confirms what the marketplace has been saying for months: AT&T failed to invest adequately in the necessary infrastructure to expand its 3G coverage to support its growth in smartphone business and the usefulness of its service to smartphone users has suffered accordingly. AT&T may not like the message that the ads send, but this Court should reject its efforts to silence the messenger."

In light of Verizon's advertising assault, AT&T recently issued a response directly to its customers, calling the ads "so blatantly false and misleading, that we want to set the record straight about AT&T's wireless data coverage." AT&T then went on to highlight the speed of its network and the total coverage of its EDGE and 3G networks.

This response followed its federal complaint against Verizon's series of five ads which compared both network's 3G national coverage areas. The first two, dubbed "College" and "Bench," used the phrase "There's a map for that" in parody of the famous "There's an app for that" iPhone commercials. Verizon then followed up with three holiday-themed ads, with one describing the iPhone as a "misfit" due to AT&T's poor 3G coverage.

Verizon has recently turned up the heat on AT&T in the hardware arena as well, releasing several ads directly criticizing the iPhone and highlighting the differences between it and the Droid. The Droid is currently Verizon's flagship phone and is the first phone to have the Android 2.0 platform along with Google Maps Navigation, a GPS-like application which gives turn-by-turn directions directly over the data connection.

AppleInsider recently reported that scores associated with the Verizon Wireless brand have soared, while AT&T's have dropped since the Droid and 3G-coverage ads started to run Oct. 18th.