Fake Steve Declares ‘Operation Chokehold’ on AT&T

AT&T’s comments that it was considering incentives to keep heavy data users from crowding others out have sparked an online backlash led by Daniel Lyons.

The carrier said last week that 3% of its smart-phone customers (many of them iPhone users) consumed about 40% of the traffic, and that incentives could encourage them to reduce or modify their usage.

Mr. Lyons took to his blog, Secret Diary of Steve Jobs, a spoof of the Apple CEO, to complain about the remarks and AT&T’s service. On Monday, he took it a step further, suggesting an act of disobedience he called “Operation Chokehold.”

Fake Steve published a fictitious memo asking iPhone users to turn on data-intensive apps at noon Friday in an attempt to overwhelm AT&T’s network. “The idea is we’ll create a digital flash mob,” he wrote.

AT&T condemned the post. “We understand that fakesteve.net is primarily a satirical forum, but there is nothing amusing about advocating that customers attempt to deliberately degrade service on a network that provides critical communications services for more than 80 million customers,” a spokesman said in a statement. “We know that the vast majority of customers will see this action for what it is: an irresponsible and pointless scheme to draw attention to a blog.”

Operation Chokehold has gotten some traction, however, as blogs and tweets have spread the word.

Mr. Lyons told Cult of Mac that he got the idea from a reader who suggested a one-day AT&T boycott. “I liked the sentiment but who’s going to stop using their iPhone?” he said. “And for a whole day? I figured no one would go for it. But a one-hour flash mob of overuse? Now that i could see people doing.”

While disgruntled consumers signaled their support, several tech bloggers were more ambivalent. “We should not forget that bringing down a network the size of AT&T could have disastrous implications,” Mashable said. “I’m all for a bit of fun, obviously, but isn’t it ironic that this is what passes for political action these days? Our forefathers went to union meetings, we use Pandora all day,” Crunchgear added.