UPDATE: As of 11:30 am PST, the AT&T upgrade is available.  IMPORTANT!: If your iPhone doesn’t automatically shut down and restart, you will have to turn off your phone and restart it  (press the top button for 3 seconds and slide the red arrow to turn it off..wait a second and then press the top button again).  Also, the photos or videos will show up small in the text screen…to see the photo bigger or top play a video,  just tap on it.

DON’T SEE THE UPDATE?:  When you connect your iPhone to the computer and open itunes, a dialog box should pop up saying that there is an update from AT&T.  If it doesn’t appear automatically, click on you iphone icon and then the “check for update” button. Sync your phone, turn it off and on and you should be ready to go!

You may have finally gotten used to texting. And for many who have smart phones, they’ve also enjoyed MMS- (Manufacturing Messaging Specification) which means they can send a video or photo with a text message.  It’s really handy.  Like when you’ve stopped at a store and you want to send a picture of the pair of pants you want to buy for your husband, or make sure that it’s the right brand of olive oil at the store or share the party moment with a friend who couldn’t make it…snap a quick picture and send it home with a quick text like “is this what you want.”

Instantly, you can share what you are looking at without having to send it to an email and wait for someone to get it.  Quick picture, quick text.  Boom.  It’s like you are there with each other.

But although there’s been an “app” for just about everything on the iPhone, we haven’t been able to send MMS text messages.  Until today, September 25.

Later in the day, you can sync your iPhone and the update will come through.  When you text, a button will appear to attach a video or a photo.

Why did it take so long?  It is said that AT&T is nervous about the strain on their network.  All those photos will take up a lot of air space (big photo and video files to send over their network) and could slow things down.

And…if you look at my posts from June, when I first got my iPhone 3Gs, I’ve  had a lot of problems with the AT&T network (the 3.1 iPhone update mostly cured it and I seem to be getting most of my calls now).

Well, I’m sure looking forward to it…I’ll post some tips once I’ve had a chance to play with it.

If you have an iPhone…make sure you update by syncing with  iTunes. Try later in the day…

Having problems sending MMS pictures or videos.  Here’s a great idea from a comment on CNET

Another solution from a comment on CNET.