Verizon Wireless has filed a legal response to a complaint before the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia in which AT&T claims that its wireless rival’s “There’s a Map for that” ad campaign has been distorting facts about AT&T’s wireless coverage. The dueling lawsuits demonstrate that the smartphone battle lines are being sharply drawn around the issues of 3G coverage, speed and reliability.

Verizon’s legal team says AT&T is seeking a temporary restraining order to end its TV campaign considering the ads featuring “side by-side, apples-to-apples” 3G coverage comparisons confirm what the marketplace has been saying for months.

“AT&T losed out to invest adequately in the essential 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,” Verizon’s lawyers said. “AT&T may not like the note that the ads send, but that court should reject its efforts

to silence the messenger.”

The Truth Hurts

AT&T sued considering Verizon’s ads are true and the truth hurts, Verizon claims. “Remarkably, AT&T admits that the 3G coverage maps — the one thing that is common to all five ads — are accurate and that the ads’ express statement that Verizon has ‘5X More 3G Coverage’ than AT&T is true,” the carrier’s legal team told the court.

Nevertheless, AT&T is asking the court to issue a temporary restraining order to stop its rival’s TV campaign. The carrier claims that the ads are “false and misleading” considering they allegedly imply that AT&T’s phones don’t work at all outside the carrier’s 3G coverage area, which Verizon said makes no sense.

“Not only can the ads be interpreted to refer to the comparatively limited geographic scope of AT&T’s 3G service, they cry out for that interpretation,” the firm’s lawyers told the…

Original post by dhiram