All the big media companies are in New York. All of these guys use iPhones. So they all know, and have known for a long time, how bad AT&T’s service is in New York. Yet they’ve said nothing.

Even now, with the blogs all over the story, and Michael Wolff griping, and with AT&T admitting that its coverage in New York and San Francisco isn’t up to par — even now, with all this going on, no one in the mainstream media will hold AT&T’s feet to the fire.

Know why? Katie points me to this article. The big T was the second-biggest ad spender last year, just slightly behind Verizon. For the first nine months of this year they’ve dropped a bit but they’re still the fourth-biggest advertiser.

But wait a minute, you say. Would TV networks and leading newspapers really look the other way on a big story just because they feared losing advertising revenue? Would AT&T really use its advertising budget as a weapon to shape the way it gets covered? Surely that kind of thing doesn’t happen.

Yeah. Surely not. Must be something else. All that breaking news about the underpants bomber or something.