No, In-Flight Internet Is Not A Terrorist Threat

from the panic-stations! dept

The New York Times noticed over the weekend that some US airlines have begun offering in-flight WiFi, and that not everybody's happy about it (via Wolfe's Den ). There are the usual comments about passengers being annoying by making loud VoIP calls or not turning down the volume on YouTube videos, but inserted in is the unchallenged statement from a flight attendants' union spokesman saying it fears "terrorists plotting a scheme on a plane could use Wi-Fi to communicate with one another on board and with conspirators on the ground." As Glenn Fleishman points out, this is only slightly ridiculous. If you're a terrorist, you're hardly likely to se a ban on in-flight phone use as an impediment to communications, while the airplane's WiFi system doesn't enable any on-board communication that wouldn't be possible with other technologies like Bluetooth, or even ad-hoc WiFi networks. There are plenty of more legitimate reasons to dislike in-flight WiFi, but the suggestion that it's making planes unsafe is a fairly hollow one.

Filed Under: in-flight, internet access, terrorism

Scammers' ISP Off The Internet... Temporarily

from the well-that's-one-way-to-deal-with-it dept

Apparently an ISP that's got quite the reputation of being "scammer-friendly" is finding it increasingly difficult to find anyone who will provide it internet access. Its latest upstream provider finally kicked it off the internet this past weekend after receiving mounting complaints from researchers who found that 78% of the domains on Intercage's system were scammers and spammers. That's quite a lot, and says something about Intercage's unwillingness to deal with complaints directly. Though, it does raise questions about the "innocent bystanders" who make up the other 22% of Intercage's customers. Should those customers be expected to investigate who else hosts on the ISP they sign up for? Is it fair to cut them off from the internet too? In the meantime, there's always someone else willing to provide service -- and, indeed, it took all of about two days for Intercage to find itself a new provider.

Filed Under: internet access, scammers, spammers
Companies: intercage

What If You Owned Your Own Fiber Connection?

from the not-a-ridiculous-suggestion dept

Almost five years ago, we wrote about a project in Burlington, Vermont to bring fiber optics to residents there. The idea was that, rather than a traditional "municipally-owned" network, this would actually be owned by the residents themselves. The article focused on the work of economist Alan McAdams, who (it needs to be admitted) was the guy who not only sent me down the path of better understanding the economics of information over a dozen years ago, but also convinced me to start Techdirt in the first place. McAdams has been pushing for the idea that if the end users actually owned the network itself, you would end up with much greater broadband, in part because you might still end up with a single fiber network, but there would be significant competition of service providers on that network. And, indeed, it appears that's where the Burlington fiber project has gone. A more recent case study on the project suggests that, with a slow and deliberate pace, thousands of residents in Burlington now have access to the fiber network, and can choose their own ISP, if they want.

Tim Lee has now written about another example as well, where there's an effort underway in Ottawa (which is only about 170 miles from Burlington), to string up 400 homes with fiber, but where the individual home owners will pay for and own the "last mile" connection to their homes. This is definitely a test on a small scale, but it's a similar situation to what McAdams has been pushing for all along. Let the customer own the connection itself, and then get to choose the service provider. In the Ottawa case, once again, service providers would no longer have to worry about wiring up your home (the most expensive part), but just need to offer service at various peering points, and each individual could choose who to get service from.

In this manner, you still get real competition, which is sorely lacking in the telco arena, and you get the benefits of higher speed networks. It's not as crazy as it might sound, either. As Lee points out, the telephone company used to own not just the wiring in your house, but the actual telephone as well. Over the years, that's been pushed back. Now you own your own phone -- and the wiring inside your house. So is it so crazy to think that you should own the wires outside of your house out to the main network as well? There are still plenty of practical issues that need to be resolved -- and the initial economics may be a bit daunting for many (the idea of paying, say, $3,000, to own your own fiber drop may freak some people out). But, it's experiments like these that are a real step in the right direction towards adding real competition, rather than the faux duopoly we all deal with today.

Filed Under: alan mcadams, economics, fiber, internet access, ottawa, ownership, telcos

Will Self-Control Work For In-Flight Internet Access?

from the are-people-trustworthy? dept

With in-flight internet access getting closer and closer to reality for many airlines, there are still plenty of questions about etiquette and acceptable behaviors. Some airlines are purposely setting up content filters and blocking the use of VoIP (as much as possible, since it's possible to get around most blocks), but as Broadband Reports points out, some believe that people will self-regulate, in most cases. People surfing porn at open WiFi hotspots hasn't been a huge issue, because people know that others are around and so they have enough self-control. The same should be true on airplanes. And while we all know people who are oblivious to how rude it is to hold a loud mobile phone conversation in public, a few reminders and social cues may be enough to keep that from being a serious problem in the air. There will be exceptions -- but is trying to eliminate those few exceptions worth having a near total ban on certain activities?

Filed Under: etiquette, filters, flying, in-flight internet, internet access, self-control, voip

So Much For Those Synergies Between Time Warner Cable And AOL, Huh?

from the nice-work,-guys dept

While the AOL/Time Warner merger has gone down in the record books as one of the worst mergers ever, I still contend that it could have gone much better if stronger management had been in place. Most specifically, there were obvious synergies between aspects of Time Warner and AOL -- but petty squabbles and turf wars kept most of those synergies from being realized. The most glaring and obvious of these was Time Warner Cable (or RoadRunner) and AOL. Both offered internet access, and it seemed perfectly reasonable to merge the two properties, and use RoadRunner to upgrade all those dialup users onto broadband, and then keep them engaged with all the Time Warner content. Of course, the Time Warner content people freaked out about content on the internet of course, so that would never have worked -- but the failure to link up RoadRunner and AOL never made any sense.

In fact, the two services began aggressively competing with each other. Then, after three years, someone finally realized that maybe the two should work together and made an announcement saying so. Of course... an announcement without action is worthless. So, another year goes by and another exec trots out with an announcement that the two divisions will work closely again. And again... nothing. Give it almost another year... and yet another announcement. Sense a pattern? In the end, the two groups never actually did combine, and with today's announcement that Time Warner is selling off the cable business entirely, it just puts an exclamation point on all these years of keeping the two businesses separate. Of course, in selling off Time Warner Cable, it will also likely lead to speculation that the company will sell off AOL (or merge it with Yahoo -- remember that plan?) as well -- though, as an entirely separate entity.

While I tend to be skeptical of mergers based on vague "synergies," it's still rather amazing that in all this time, no one at Time Warner ever got these two divisions together -- and now the company may end up selling each off separately. In the end, this was a deal that only worked out for the investment bankers. Remember, they love to convince companies to consolidate one year and diversify the next -- because they make money on both transactions.

Filed Under: internet access, mergers, synergies
Companies: aol, time warner, time warner cable

Turning Off Internet In The Classroom Won't Make Lectures Any More Interesting

from the competing-for-attention dept

Just about two years ago, we wrote about some law professors who were threatening to ban computers in their classrooms because students just weren't paying attention. While some apparently did so, perhaps it wasn't enough, because as Slashdot points out, the University of Chicago's law school has now decided to pull the plug on classroom internet connections entirely, as a dean was upset at how many students were surfing the web during class. However, as we noted two years ago, this seems to say a lot more about the lecture quality than the internet access in the classroom. Especially when it comes to a graduate school-level class, where students are supposedly actually interested in the subject, if the professor can't keep the attention of the class, that should be a problem for the professor to deal with, rather than by cutting off internet access. Either way, with 3G wireless access (and eventually 4G) schools simply won't have control over internet access anyway. So, if these schools are really concerned about it, rather than cutting off the connection they do have control over, perhaps they should focus on making the lecture experience more worthwhile.

Filed Under: classrooms, internet access, law school, professors, teaching, university of chicago

JetBlue Providing WiFi/TV For Other Airlines?

from the helping-the-industry-out dept

Prior to 9/11, there was a lot of effort being put into plans for internet access from airplanes. However, the resulting turmoil in the airline industry put all of those plans on hold. In the end, that may have been a good thing, as the early technology was both expensive and clunky, and only a few generations later are we starting to see technology that is both affordable to install and use showing up. In the last few months, we've seen more and more stories about WiFi in the sky, with the latest one being that Continental is about to start offering live TV and WiFi, similar to a few other airlines. Having just flown on Continental on an excruciatingly long trip to Europe and back, I'd say that having internet access and live TV would have made the flights much more enjoyable.

What's really interesting here, though, is that Continental is turning to competitor JetBlue to provide the service. We were among those surprised when JetBlue bought some available spectrum for air-to-ground internet access. Like many, we had suspected that it would go to a service provider that would provide a generic service to any airline that wanted it. But, with JetBlue winning the bid, it opened up questions about whether the company would hoard the opportunity as a differentiator for its own flights. Apparently not. If JetBlue can succeed in outfitting other airlines, it could represent a useful side-business for the company -- even if it diminishes some of JetBlue's own competitive advantage. Of course, given that a new study has suggested that WiFi-in-the-sky really isn't a huge selling point, perhaps this makes sense. Basically, people are saying that it's a nice-to-have rather than a need-to-have. In other words, it's unlikely to bring that much new business directly to JetBlue, but if JetBlue can make it available on lots of other airlines, people would be happy using it.

Filed Under: airplanes, internet access, wifi
Companies: continental, jetblue