What is the status of the HTC Status at AT&T?

Wasn't it just 5 weeks ago when we reported the launch of the HTC Status for AT&T? We know that the life-cycle of a smartphone is a lot shorter these days, but certainly you would expect more than this. You see, according to an inside source for Tech Crunch, AT&T is planning on discontinuing the HTC Status. After 36 days, it appears that the the phone is not being sold like hot cakes, or any kind of cake for that matter. Other sources have confirmed to Tech Crunch that the device is collecting dust on the shelf, but all AT&T will say at the moment is that "The HTC Status is a great product and our plans for it to be part of our portfolio haven’t changed."

The HTC Status features a 2.6 inch touchscreen on top of a physical QWERTY keyboard and a Facebook button on the bottom right of the unit. The button lit up when you were taking pictures, listening to tunes, or sending messages. That meant that the picture, song or text that you were in the middle of producing, could be sent on to your Facebook page. While Android 2.3.3 was aboard, the HTC Status had an 800MHz Qualcomm MSM7227 under the hood. Rear-facing and front-facing cameras came in at 5MP and .3MP respectively.

So what is the status of the HTC Status? Until we hear officially from AT&T-and the carrier at this time seems to refute the story that the Facebook-centric phone is all washed up-we would have to answer that no, at this moment AT&T is not ready to give up on the device. At $49.99 after a 2-year contract, the cost is hardly what is holding back sales of the phone. It could be that Android users are paying more for a higher-end model and then just using the Facebook app that comes with the unit. Whatever the problem, where there is smoke there is fire and perhaps AT&T simply floated a trial balloon about the future of the HTC Status with AT&T.

source: TechCrunch