An interesting observation from over at Consumerist. It appears that AT&T is advertising the new iPhone 3G over in Wichita, Kansas. Problem is Wichita does not have a 3G network presence yet. So that fancy 3G will drop down to the legacy wireless at half the speed.
Nice going there Blue Star! More here.
The Inquirer has a dilly of a piece on the move by Nokia to take the Symbian handheld OS Open Source. Link here. As the lede intones, I think there are a few hurdles. –
Commercial distributors of software may accept certain responsibilities with respect to end users, business partners and the like. While this license is intended to facilitate the commercial use of the Program, the Contributor who includes the Program in a commercial product offering should do so in a manner which does not create potential liability for other Contributors.
I can appreciate the attempt, but it pretty much would be impossible to guarantee that inclusion of commerical components will not conflict with the open provisions of the EPL. That’s why the GPL just says ‘Nyet’ and avoids the whole issue.
Is this a good move? Well if the Foundation is open to all AND they move eventually to a GPL based licensing I would say yes. Is it a Android killer? Time will tell. Android has not hit the market yet in a physical manifestation. Till we see a head to head comparison in the marketplace all bets are off. But I would offer the following — if Android is even close to Symbian in capability, the advantage is to Google. They have a nest of free development providers and Google Widgets to support warp speed deployment cycles.
But there is one thing I agree with in the Inquirer article — MicroSoft’s Mobile Phone platform is in trouble. No developer is going to pay when they can use a competing tool for free.
Filed under 3g, 4g, Google, Open Source, Wireless, new technology by Dr. Dog
Competitive pressure may be ready to break the wireless cartel’s hold on mobile broadband service by next year. Price / performance pressure should mount when T Mobile 3G and Xohm WiMax services come to market. While 3G is not broadband by a modern rich media measure, it does offer a real improvement over what is available to far too many Americans that are not served by fixed line broadband today. If Xohm performs as advertised, 3G may only be able to compete on price. The bodes well for the consumer who has been at the mercy of the cartel for far too long.
Thus by early 2009, the U.S. will have four national mobile networks:
- AT&T Mobility (formerly Cingular) using W-CDMA
with HSDPA and eventually HSUPA
- T-Mobile USA deploying W-CDMA with HSDPA and then HSUPA
- Verizon using CDMA 2000 EVDO Rev A and later Rev B
- Sprint using CDMA 2000 EVDO Rev A and later Rev B (and partnered with four major cable companies)
In addition, WiMAX
Four competitors is a magic number. One operator is a monopoly. Two or three operators typically form a stable oligopoly. There’s competition and evolution, but it’s controlled — no one goes bankrupt, no one takes over. However, markets with four or more viable competitors go wild, to the benefit of consumers. We’ve seen this effect in the evolution of mobile voice services in many countries around the world. Markets with four or more viable competitors experience hyper competition. (TMCnet)
Filed under 3g, Wimax, Wireless, competition by admin
broadband news Wimax News
