AT&T to be late on iPhone MMS, tethering

Among today's announcements at Apple's WWDC, iPhone Software Senior Vice President Scott Forstall presented many of the new updates coming with the iPhone 3.0 software upgrade, which will endow the popular iPhone with more than 100 new features. Among these will include the highly demanded support for MMS and bluetooth data tethering, which the popular device has lacked.

Unfortunately, though, the United States' exclusive iPhone carrier AT&T was not listed among the launch partners supporting these updated services, which elicited boos from the audience this morning. The new 3.0-enabled tethering feature was simply listed as being available "later this summer," from 22 carriers worldwide, but with no mention of AT&T.

On Apple's 3.0 Software site it notes that "Tethering is not currently offered in the US and some other countries. See your carrier for availability."

6:00 pm EDT June 8, 2009 • AT&T has acknowledged its absence from Apple's latest list of new partners, and said that it will offer tethering with the iPhone 3G S, but it has not laid down any timeline for availability.