T-Mobile boss John Legere apologises after calling Binge On critics' throttling claims "bullshit"
T-Mobile’s chief executive, John Legere, has apologised for his vehement retort to critics who have accused the mobile operator or “throttling” after he branded their claims as “bullshit”, called Google “jerks” and asked what “what would Dumb and Dumber do”?
Legere addressed criticisms that T-Mobile’s Binge On streaming feature was “throttling” download speeds - artificially slowing-down data and removing customer control.
In a three-minute video posted to Twitter he said: “There are people out there who are saying we are ‘throttling’. That’s a game of semantics and it's bullshit”
There’s been a lot of confusing, agenda-steered, talk about #BingeOn lately... It’s time to set the record straight… https://t.co/PYm5odrSXC
— John Legere (@JohnLegere) January 7, 2016
Legere adds: “We give customers more choices and these jerks are complaining? Who the hell do they think they are? What gives them the right to dictate what my company what my customers or any wireless consumer can choose for themselves?"
He then goes on to suggest that these special interest groups and even Google are using net neutrality as a platform to get into the news.
The acquisitions directed at T-Mobile came from digital civil liberties group The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) who said the company was “throttling" data across its entire network in order to “help customers stretch their high-speed data while streaming video”.
In an open letter posted on Monday, Legere apologised for causing offence - but reiterated his rejection of the EFF's characterisation of Binge On.
"[I] apologize for offending EFF and its supporters," he wrote.
"Just because we don't completely agree on all aspects of Binge On doesn't mean I don't see how they fight for consumers.”
However, he added: "By now you know that I am a vocal, animated and sometimes foul mouthed CEO.
"I don't filter myself, and you know that no one at T-Mobile filters me either (no, they don't even try). That means I will sometimes incite a bit of a 'social media riot', but I'm not going to apologize for that."
The EFF described Binge On as a cover for slowing down video download speeds across the entire T-Mobile network, lightening the load on its network, but reducing the quality of video content for customers. T-Mobile has stated that this drop in quality is in no way noticeable on a mobile screen.