Misleading Comparative Advertising? There’s a map for that.

If you’ve been watching TV during the past few weeks you’ve probably seen that biting parody ad that Verizon put out attacking AT&T’s network.

It is a pretty direct attack on what Verizon must feel is their biggest threat. The tag line is “There’s a map for that.” A clear parody of Apple/AT&T’s “There’s an app for that” campaign for the iPhone. The “other” guy in the ad is also clearly using an iPhone if you look carefully.

The ad points out that Verizon’s 3G data map is 5 times larger than AT&T’s. The map they use to show that is especially illustrative of this.

AT&T has filed a lawsuit claiming that the map is misleading. While Verizon clearly states “3G” and says the same, the way the ad plays out is that that blue AT&T map shows coverage. What they don’t point out is that even if you don’t get 3G coverage in that blue map, you still fallback to the 2nd Generation EDGE data network. You have data coverage, its just slower.

Do you think it is a confusing ad? Did you understand that? If not, you are the reason AT&T is suing.