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AT&T on Monday said it plans to more broadly enable the use of Apple’s FaceTime for users over its cellular network in the next few weeks, and by year’s end plans to allow video chat apps use over its network by all customers. This latest position on FaceTime and similar apps represents total shift from its position almost a year ago.

AT&T’s statement to the Verge on Monday notes that “by mid-June, we’ll have enabled those apps over cellular for our unlimited plan customers who have LTE devices from [Apple, Samsung and BlackBerry].” Besides FaceTime, Samsung and BlackBerry’s pre-installed video chat apps will also be included.

And more will be coming for all of its customers before the end of the year: “Throughout the second half of this year, we plan to enable pre-loaded video chat apps over cellular for all our customers, regardless of data plan or device; that work is expected to be complete by year end.”

When Apple updated its mobile video chat app to work over cellular last summer, AT&T came under fire when it announced subsequently that only customers who subscribed to one of its Mobile Share plans could use it. Several open internet groups threatened to file complaints with the FCC, calling the carrier’s policy a violation of net neutrality. Several months later, AT&T opened the service to anyone with an LTE device.

Based on broadness of the statement, it sounds like video chat apps like Google’s new Hangouts app, available for both iOS and Android, will also be free to operate over AT&T’s network later on this year.

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Thinking of upgrading to the latest smartphone? Sprint is already offering a $100 smartphone credit if you port your number to the network, but AT&T appears to be fighting back. The carrier announced a new AT&T Trade-In Program on Tuesday. Starting on May 1, you can turn in an old smartphone and get at least a $100 credit towards your next smartphone, effectively cutting in half the up-front contract price of a Samsung Galaxy S 4, entry level Apple iPhone 5 or HTC One.

AT&T says you’ll get a minimum credit of $100 and if the phone is worth more, it will increase the credit accordingly. Once the smartphone is turned in and evaluated, customers can use the credit immediately in three ways: “towards an accessory purchase, apply it to an existing bill, or even donate it to AT&T’s charitable cause Cell Phones for Soldiers.” As long as the phone is no more than three years old and in good working condition, AT&T will accept it. (Maybe I’ll dig out my old Palm Pre!) According to an AT&T representative, it will even take phones from other carriers.

These deals reinforce that the cellular market is all about the services and ongoing revenue per user. Carriers generally don’t make money on hardware sales unless contract customers continue using their hardware after the contract period. T-Mobile is the exception to that rule, having branded itself the “uncarrier” and by separating the cost of hardware and services: Once you pay your hardware off with T-Mobile, your monthly bill is reduced to just the service plan.

I won’t say that AT&T just completely trumped Sprint’s $100 deal, but it’s likely going to take the wind of Sprint’s promotion. AT&T currently has LTE service in far more areas than Sprint. And even better — if you use AT&T’s network, that is — fallback service drops to HSPA+ which can be nearly as fast as LTE. Sprint’s fallback outside of LTE is EV-DO service, topping out around 1.5 Mbps.

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There have been a lot of conflicting and confusing – and several plain wrong – reports on whether the current version of the iPhone 5 will work on T-Mobile’s new LTE network. I’m sorry to say I even helped spread some of that misinformation by talking about those reports on GigaOM’s mobile call-in podcast on Wednesday. But I’ve since had a chance to talk Apple, and got the details about what exactly the iPhone 5 can do and what it can’t.

Bottom line: if you have a North American GSM version of the iPhone 5 — whether you bought it from AT&T, directly from Apple or got it in from Canada – it can connect to T-Mobile’s new LTE network. It just has to be unlocked. So for AT&T customers looking to switch sides, that means you have to finish your contract, and ask your carrier to unlock the device.

The device will also work on T-Mobile’s 3G HSPA+ network (which T-Mobile calls 4G), just not in every city today. T-Mobile is in the process of a big network overhaul that will align all of its networks with the radios in the iPhone and most other AT&T devices. It’s completed the upgrade in about 50 cities covering 142 million people, but other cities are getting converted quickly.

The source of the confusion is over frequencies, which is why we’ve been seeing all of these references to the Advanced Wireless Services (AWS) band. T-Mobile runs two technologies in the AWS band, it’s LTE network and a portion of its HSPA+ network. The iPhone 5 will support LTE in the AWS band, but it won’t support HSPA+ over AWS. The iPhone 5, and all previous versions of the iPhone, will work on its new upgraded HSPA+ systems in the PCS band.

Apple will release a new version of the iPhone 5 next month that will make all of the band differences completely moot. The updated version will support HSPA+ on both AWS and PCS band. It will even be able to access T-Mobile’s dual-carrier 42 Mbps HSPA+ network, which current and older versions of the iPhone cannot.

All of this is probably still extremely confusing so I’ve broken it down into a Q&A, which hopefully will answer any lingering questions.

How do I know if my iPhone will work on T-Mobile’s networks?

For the iPhone 5, check your model number. It must be the A1428, sold by AT&T, the Canadian operators or Apple. Older iPhone models will also work on T-Mobile’s 2G and 3G networks. All of these devices must be unlocked, though, or they’ll be blocked.

How can I be sure I’ll have access to T-Mobile’s LTE and HSPA+ networks?

For LTE, it’s simple. T-Mobile launched LTE in seven markets this week: Baltimore, Houston, Kansas City, Las Vegas, Phoenix, San Jose, and Washington, D.C. New York City is scheduled to come online this summer along with a bunch of other yet unnamed cities.

For HSPA+, it’s a bit more difficult to tell since T-Mobile doesn’t have any kind of map that tracks which markets have HSPA+ running on the PCS band. They make regular updates on their blog and to the media. PCMag has the most the recent list of T-Mo’s 49 iPhone-optimized cities.

As a general rule of thumb, though, if T-Mobile has LTE in your city, then HSPA+ will be in all the right places, too. And if you get a new version of the iPhone 5 next month, it will work on all of T-Mobile’s network.

When will I be able to bring my old iPhone over to T-Mobile? 

You can do it right now if you like. T-Mobile already has millions of iPhones on its network, running over its 2G and 3G services. In order to access LTE though, you’ll have to wait until Apple updates iOS, authorizing the iPhone 5 to use T-Mobile’s network. Apple hasn’t given a date for when this will happen, saying it will come as an over-the-air update.

Will I be able to access dual-carrier HSPA+?

On a current iPhone, the fastest 3G network you’ll have access to is its 21 Mbps single-carrier system, since all of T-Mo’s dual-carriers are in the AWS band. T-Mobile will eventually launch dual-carrier in the PCS band, but that will take some time. It has to close its acquisition of MetroPCS and convert a lot of old GSM networks to 3G first. If you’re set on accessing the dual-carrier network in the near future, then you’ll need to get one of new versions of the iPhone 5.

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It doesn’t matter how long AT&T has had the iPhone; it just keeps selling more. Ma Bell had another record-setting quarter thanks to Apple, activating 8.6 million iPhones and selling a total of 10.2 million smartphones overall in the last three months of 2012.

Of those 8.6 million iPhones, only 16 percent of their owners are new to AT&T, meaning the device is really more a tool for it to keep current customers by upgrading them from other phones or earlier iPhone models. But keeping customers happy with iPhones has benefits as well. AT&T’s contract churn rate (the percentage of its customers that depart every quarter) fell to 1.19 percent from 1.21 percent in last year’s fourth quarter. That puts it just a little bit behind Verizon Wireless, which has the most enviable churn rate in the industry at 0.95 percent.

AT&T added a net total of 780,000 new contract subscribers while increasing its overall number of connections by 1.1 million. Verizon added 2.2 million new subscribers, meaning Verizon grew at a much faster rate. But AT&T and Verizon were much more evenly matched in smartphone performance with Verizon activating 9.8 million devices. The difference was primarily in the mix of devices. With only 6.2 million iPhone sales, Verizon leaned much more heavily toward Android devices.

AT&T’s iPhone prowess over the years largely explains its huge smartphone penetration. Seven in 10 contract customers now has a smartphone on the AT&T network.

On the wireline side, AT&T added 192,000 U-Verse TV customers and 609,000 U-Verse broadband customers, giving it 8 million U-Verse customers in total. In Q4, the number of U-Verse broadband customers surpassed the number of DSL customers, a measure of DSL’s decline as well as U-Verse’s popularity.

Like Verizon, AT&T’s bottom line suffered due to higher pension costs and the expense of recovering from Hurricane Sandy. It posted a Q4 loss of $3.9 billion off of $32.6 billion in revenues. AT&T’s LTE network now covers 170 million people, but in 2013 its capital outlays will increase as it fills out its 4G footprint to cover 250 million people and engages in the massive undertaking of transforming its old-school telephone systems into an all-IP network.

This post was updated at 2:18 p.m. to add more details on AT&T’s financial and operational performance.

It doesn’t matter how long AT&T has had the iPhone; it just keeps selling more. Ma Bell had another record-setting quarter thanks to Apple, activating 8.6 million iPhones and selling a total of 10.2 million smartphones overall in the last three months of 2012.

Of those 8.6 million iPhones, only 16 percent of their owners are new to AT&T, meaning the device is really more a tool for it to keep current customers by upgrading them from other phones or earlier iPhone models. But keeping customers happy with iPhones has benefits as well. AT&T’s contract churn rate (the percentage of its customers that depart every quarter) fell to 1.19 percent from 1.21 percent in last year’s fourth quarter. That puts it just a little bit behind Verizon Wireless, which has the most enviable churn rate in the industry at 0.95 percent.

AT&T added a net total of 780,000 new contract subscribers while increasing its overall number of connections by 1.1 million. Verizon added 2.2 million new subscribers, meaning Verizon grew at a much faster rate. But AT&T and Verizon were much more evenly matched in smartphone performance with Verizon activating 9.8 million devices. The difference was primarily in the mix of devices. With only 6.2 million iPhone sales, Verizon leaned much more heavily toward Android devices.

AT&T’s iPhone prowess over the years largely explains its huge smartphone penetration. Seven in 10 contract customers now has a smartphone on the AT&T network.

On the wireline side, AT&T added 192,000 U-Verse TV customers and 609,000 U-Verse broadband customers, giving it 8 million U-Verse customers in total. In Q4, the number of U-Verse broadband customers surpassed the number of DSL customers, a measure of DSL’s decline as well as U-Verse’s popularity.

Like Verizon, AT&T’s bottom line suffered due to higher pension costs and the expense of recovering from Hurricane Sandy. It posted a Q4 loss of $3.9 billion off of $32.6 billion in revenues. AT&T’s LTE network now covers 170 million people, but in 2013 its capital outlays will increase as it fills out its 4G footprint to cover 250 million people and engages in the massive undertaking of transforming its old-school telephone systems into an all-IP network.

This post was updated at 2:18 p.m. to add more details on AT&T’s financial and operational performance.

It doesn’t matter how long AT&T has had the iPhone; it just keeps selling more. Ma Bell had another record-setting quarter thanks to Apple, activating 8.6 million iPhones and selling a total of 10.2 million smartphones overall in the last three months of 2012.

Of those 8.6 million iPhones, only 16 percent of their owners are new to AT&T, meaning the device is really more a tool for it to keep current customers by upgrading them from other phones or earlier iPhone models. But keeping customers happy with iPhones has benefits as well. AT&T’s contract churn rate (the percentage of its customers that depart every quarter) fell to 1.19 percent from 1.21 percent in last year’s fourth quarter. That puts it just a little bit behind Verizon Wireless, which has the most enviable churn rate in the industry at 0.95 percent.

AT&T added a net total of 780,000 new contract subscribers while increasing its overall number of connections by 1.1 million. Verizon added 2.2 million new subscribers, meaning Verizon grew at a much faster rate. But AT&T and Verizon were much more evenly matched in smartphone performance with Verizon activating 9.8 million devices. The difference was primarily in the mix of devices. With only 6.2 million iPhone sales, Verizon leaned much more heavily toward Android devices.

AT&T’s iPhone prowess over the years largely explains its huge smartphone penetration. Seven in 10 contract customers now has a smartphone on the AT&T network.

On the wireline side, AT&T added 192,000 U-Verse TV customers and 609,000 U-Verse broadband customers, giving it 8 million U-Verse customers in total. In Q4, the number of U-Verse broadband customers surpassed the number of DSL customers, a measure of DSL’s decline as well as U-Verse’s popularity.

Like Verizon, AT&T’s bottom line suffered due to higher pension costs and the expense of recovering from Hurricane Sandy. It posted a Q4 loss of $3.9 billion off of $32.6 billion in revenues. AT&T’s LTE network now covers 170 million people, but in 2013 its capital outlays will increase as it fills out its 4G footprint to cover 250 million people and engages in the massive undertaking of transforming its old-school telephone systems into an all-IP network.

This post was updated at 2:18 p.m. to add more details on AT&T’s financial and operational performance.

It doesn’t matter how long AT&T has had the iPhone; it just keeps selling more. Ma Bell had another record-setting quarter thanks to Apple, activating 8.6 million iPhones and selling a total of 10.2 million smartphones overall in the last three months of 2012.

Of those 8.6 million iPhones, only 16 percent of their owners are new to AT&T, meaning the device is really more a tool for it to keep current customers by upgrading them from other phones or earlier iPhone models. But keeping customers happy with iPhones has benefits as well. AT&T’s contract churn rate (the percentage of its customers that depart every quarter) fell to 1.19 percent from 1.21 percent in last year’s fourth quarter. That puts it just a little bit behind Verizon Wireless, which has the most enviable churn rate in the industry at 0.95 percent.

AT&T added a net total of 780,000 new contract subscribers while increasing its overall number of connections by 1.1 million. Verizon added 2.2 million new subscribers, meaning Verizon grew at a much faster rate. But AT&T and Verizon were much more evenly matched in smartphone performance with Verizon activating 9.8 million devices. The difference was primarily in the mix of devices. With only 6.2 million iPhone sales, Verizon leaned much more heavily toward Android devices.

AT&T’s iPhone prowess over the years largely explains its huge smartphone penetration. Seven in 10 contract customers now has a smartphone on the AT&T network.

On the wireline side, AT&T added 192,000 U-Verse TV customers and 609,000 U-Verse broadband customers, giving it 8 million U-Verse customers in total. In Q4, the number of U-Verse broadband customers surpassed the number of DSL customers, a measure of DSL’s decline as well as U-Verse’s popularity.

Like Verizon, AT&T’s bottom line suffered due to higher pension costs and the expense of recovering from Hurricane Sandy. It posted a Q4 loss of $3.9 billion off of $32.6 billion in revenues. AT&T’s LTE network now covers 170 million people, but in 2013 its capital outlays will increase as it fills out its 4G footprint to cover 250 million people and engages in the massive undertaking of transforming its old-school telephone systems into an all-IP network.

This post was updated at 2:18 p.m. to add more details on AT&T’s financial and operational performance.

It doesn’t matter how long AT&T has had the iPhone; it just keeps selling more. Ma Bell had another record-setting quarter thanks to Apple, activating 8.6 million iPhones and selling a total of 10.2 million smartphones overall in the last three months of 2012.

Of those 8.6 million iPhones, only 16 percent of their owners are new to AT&T, meaning the device is really more a tool for it to keep current customers by upgrading them from other phones or earlier iPhone models. But keeping customers happy with iPhones has benefits as well. AT&T’s contract churn rate (the percentage of its customers that depart every quarter) fell to 1.19 percent from 1.21 percent in last year’s fourth quarter. That puts it just a little bit behind Verizon Wireless, which has the most enviable churn rate in the industry at 0.95 percent.

AT&T added a net total of 780,000 new contract subscribers while increasing its overall number of connections by 1.1 million. Verizon added 2.2 million new subscribers, meaning Verizon grew at a much faster rate. But AT&T and Verizon were much more evenly matched in smartphone performance with Verizon activating 9.8 million devices. The difference was primarily in the mix of devices. With only 6.2 million iPhone sales, Verizon leaned much more heavily toward Android devices.

AT&T’s iPhone prowess over the years largely explains its huge smartphone penetration. Seven in 10 contract customers now has a smartphone on the AT&T network.

On the wireline side, AT&T added 192,000 U-Verse TV customers and 609,000 U-Verse broadband customers, giving it 8 million U-Verse customers in total. In Q4, the number of U-Verse broadband customers surpassed the number of DSL customers, a measure of DSL’s decline as well as U-Verse’s popularity.

Like Verizon, AT&T’s bottom line suffered due to higher pension costs and the expense of recovering from Hurricane Sandy. It posted a Q4 loss of $3.9 billion off of $32.6 billion in revenues. AT&T’s LTE network now covers 170 million people, but in 2013 its capital outlays will increase as it fills out its 4G footprint to cover 250 million people and engages in the massive undertaking of transforming its old-school telephone systems into an all-IP network.

This post was updated at 2:18 p.m. to add more details on AT&T’s financial and operational performance.

It doesn’t matter how long AT&T has had the iPhone; it just keeps selling more. Ma Bell had another record-setting quarter thanks to Apple, activating 8.6 million iPhones and selling a total of 10.2 million smartphones overall in the last three months of 2012.

Of those 8.6 million iPhones, only 16 percent of their owners are new to AT&T, meaning the device is really more a tool for it to keep current customers by upgrading them from other phones or earlier iPhone models. But keeping customers happy with iPhones has benefits as well. AT&T’s contract churn rate (the percentage of its customers that depart every quarter) fell to 1.19 percent from 1.21 percent in last year’s fourth quarter. That puts it just a little bit behind Verizon Wireless, which has the most enviable churn rate in the industry at 0.95 percent.

AT&T added a net total of 780,000 new contract subscribers while increasing its overall number of connections by 1.1 million. Verizon added 2.2 million new subscribers, meaning Verizon grew at a much faster rate. But AT&T and Verizon were much more evenly matched in smartphone performance with Verizon activating 9.8 million devices. The difference was primarily in the mix of devices. With only 6.2 million iPhone sales, Verizon leaned much more heavily toward Android devices.

AT&T’s iPhone prowess over the years largely explains its huge smartphone penetration. Seven in 10 contract customers now has a smartphone on the AT&T network.

On the wireline side, AT&T added 192,000 U-Verse TV customers and 609,000 U-Verse broadband customers, giving it 8 million U-Verse customers in total. In Q4, the number of U-Verse broadband customers surpassed the number of DSL customers, a measure of DSL’s decline as well as U-Verse’s popularity.

Like Verizon, AT&T’s bottom line suffered due to higher pension costs and the expense of recovering from Hurricane Sandy. It posted a Q4 loss of $3.9 billion off of $32.6 billion in revenues. AT&T’s LTE network now covers 170 million people, but in 2013 its capital outlays will increase as it fills out its 4G footprint to cover 250 million people and engages in the massive undertaking of transforming its old-school telephone systems into an all-IP network.

This post was updated at 2:18 p.m. to add more details on AT&T’s financial and operational performance.