Ok, so you’ve read about AT&T’s new data plans for the iPhone and iPad and you immediately got so pissed that you fired off half a dozen comments on your favorite blog, texted your friends to gripe at them about it and had dark thoughts about the Sprint EVO. Now let’s talk about them for a bit in a rational manner. I think you’ll see that although AT&T is probably one of the worst customer service companies on the planet and yes they are trying to wring every drop of money out of their customers, especially iPhone and iPad customers, that the plans actually aren’t that bad.

First of all, here’s the basic overview of plans:

Data Plus – 200 MB of data for $15/month. Additional 200MB for another $15.
DataPro – 2GB of data for $25/month. Additional 1 GB of data for $10.
Tethering – Additional $20/month for DataPro customers.

So we’ve got the basic one which will be fine for anyone who wants basic internet access but isn’t really a heavy user, but that’s not the plan that’s causing all of the commotion on Twitter and the web. The heavy users are the ones that are really up in arms and they’d really be looking at the $25/mo DataPro plan.

I have to admit that when I initially read the news, I saw red. I was so ticked that this company with a reputation for being total richards was at it again. “I’m a heavy user!” I said, “This is going to ruin me!”

Then I logged on to AT&T Wireless and checked my data history.

Yeah, if you look at the chart above you can see that I’ve never made it over 1.5 GB in a month. When I say I’m a heavy user, I mean it as well. I tether my iPhone to my iPad, I tether it to my laptop, I download and stram video from my home computer with Air Video, I remotely administer machines. You name it, I do it on my iPhone and iPad and yet I still can’t seem to hit the 2GB mark. So under AT&T’s new data plans, if I decide to change over to the 2GB plan, I stand to save $5 a month on my bill, even as a “power user”.

I think that a lot of the noise on the net about this issue is coming from people that don’t like the new plans on principle, which is fine, but it’s mostly not grounded in reality. The hue and cry would most likely be more muted if people actually checked their data usage. Almost every major carrier including Verizon and Sprint are moving to charging per megabyte used a month and AT&T’s plan actually stands to be one of the more generous options available.

In fact the overage charges aren’t even that bad. An additional 1GB for $10 only puts you $5 over the unlimited plan if you happen to go over your limit in a month. AT&T has also stated that you will be getting warnings at 65%, 75% and 100% of your limit by text as well as 75% and 100% after you purchase additional data.

Is it kinda sucky to know you have a limit and have to keep track of it? Yes. Was it inevitable? Yes. Is this the worst that could happen to most iPhone users? Nope.

Pretty much the only users who will be affected by this is people using the iPhone as a hotspot to provide the internet for their whole household, something which up to this point has been against AT&T’s TOS anyway.

Which brings us to Tethering, the sharing of your iPhone’s data plan with another device like an iPad will cost you an additional $20 on top of the $25 DataPro plan; the only plan to support it. This is the point at which my teeth begin to grit.

You’re not using any more bandwidth or getting any more data allowance than you would be otherwise, yet you’re still getting charged more. All for a feature that already exists on the iPhone and can be enabled with a simple carrier settings change. This is a total crock.

Or is it?

Verizon Hotspot: $50 per month. AT&T DataPro + Tethering: $45 per month. It’s a jerk move to charge more for it, but guess what? They’re not alone. It’s pretty much the industry standard price. They’re not charging more because they have to they’re doing it because they can. Welcome to business in the wireless marketplace. Of course if you still hate paying more for tethering, there is still a solution for you… Jailbreak your iPhone.

Paying extra for tethering is something that I never see myself doing, but moving down to the DataPro from my grandfathered unlimited plan is something that I could easily see if my data over the next few months stays below the 2GB level. All-in-all I want to hate AT&T as much as the next guy, but the pricing makes a lot of sense and stands to save the majority of users money.

Whether they like it or not.