Payments By Touch Reaching Out For You

from the touchy-feely dept

The promises of contactless payments consistently seem to fall a bit short. The hardware costs for merchants sound hard to justify, and the benefits to the consumer are usually minimal -- since credit cards aren't exactly a painful process to begin with. However, wireless technologies are cool, so NTT DoCoMo has demonstrated a prototype phone that uses human conductivity to transmit data for services such as payment-by-touch -- so that you can keep the phone in your pocket and simply touch other devices to transmit your personal information. But if the irrational fears of cell phone radiation weren't enough for you, then imagine the possibilities of using skin conductivity. How will users fill up at the gas station? And consider how many more stories about high-tech pickpockets there will be... when thieves just have to touch you briefly in order to get your payment information. NTT DoCoMo admits that it'll be several years before this payment-by-touch system will be "ready, reliable and safe" for Japan -- but phone makers may also want to anticipate the FUD and weigh it against the existing payment methods before releasing a new plot device for Michael Crichton.

Filed Under: contactless, payments, touch
Companies: docomo, ntt

WiMax Spectrum Fight With School Districts Highlights Market Distorting Effects Of Gov't Monopolies

from the worthless-spectrum...-oh-you-want-it? dept

We've tried to point out how government granted monopolies can distort a market, whether it's in the intellectual property space or within wireless spectrum. For example, take a look at what's happening in the 2.5 gigahertz spectrum space. A bunch of 2.5 gigahertz spectrum was handed over to schools and non-profits, supposedly for use in education. The rules on those licenses were that it couldn't be owned by for-profit businesses... but could be licensed to them. Of course, for many schools, the idea that they owned any spectrum rights at all was a complete mystery. Many valued the spectrum at absolutely nothing (which was its real value to them) and let the licenses expire. However, with Sprint's latest focus on WiMax, it could make use of more 2.5 GHz spectrum. It already owns a bunch, but not enough. So, of course, now that this spectrum is suddenly valuable to Sprint, schools are scrambling to renew expired licenses to the spectrum they valued at absolutely nothing, in order to turn around and license it to Sprint for quite a bit of money. In other words, you have a natural resource given to schools absolutely free. They didn't value it and didn't have any use for it at all. Then, a company comes along that actually can do something useful with that spectrum, and the schools are suddenly setting roadblocks in their way. That doesn't seem like a particularly useful thing -- but thanks to another set of gov't granted monopolies, combined with a complete lack of a comprehensive spectrum allocation policy from the FCC, it's what we're left with.

Filed Under: spectrum, wimax
Companies: clearwire, sprint

Family Conversations More Likely To Include 'LOL' Than 'Pass The Butter, Please'

from the changing-times dept

While you need to take this study with a large grain of salt, since it was paid for by T-Mobile (who has a vested interest in the results saying what they say), it does have a ring of truth to it that parents and kids often find it easier to communicate these days using various electronic means of communications. Rather than spending quality time around the dinner table, the study suggests that more tech savvy parents (and grandparents) are able to not just stay in touch with, but relate to, their kids much better by using the same electronic communication tools those kids are used to using with their friends. There will be some, of course, who find this troublesome, but if it actually does allow for better lines of communication within a family, that certainly seems like a good thing.

Filed Under: family conversations

More 700MHz Auction Fun: Frontline Asks FCC To Ban Verizon Wireless From Bidding

from the ah,-the-one-up-manship dept

For something as boring as a spectrum auction, the upcoming 700MHz auction sure has its fair share of excitement. There are the rumors of Google and even Apple potentially bidding on the spectrum. Google requested that the FCC attach some specific conditions to the auction, which the FCC gave some lip service to, but hardly a full endorsement. Meanwhile, Verizon Wireless initially liked the conditions set by the FCC (meaning it thought it had a good chance of getting the spectrum) until it began to think through the scenarios (or heard more credible stories about competitive bids) and then suddenly decided to sue the FCC, claiming that the rules being set are illegal. Of course, others can play the lawsuit game too. Frontline Wireless, a new company basically built to bid on this spectrum, is now accusing Verizon Wireless of breaking the law in not disclosing the details of a recent meeting between Verizon Wireless officials and the FCC about the auction -- as required by the law. Thus, Frontline is asking the FCC to sanction Verizon Wireless, including the extremely unlikely possibility of barring it from the 700MHz auction. Of course, just imagine the resulting lawsuits should the FCC actually agree and bar Verizon Wireless. Somehow, given Kevin Martin's chummy relationship with the telcos, it seems unlikely that Verizon Wireless will be stopped from bidding.

Filed Under: wireless auctions
Companies: fcc, frontline, verizon wireless

Xero Really About To Be Bought? But, Why?

from the what-value-does-it-have? dept

You may recall the bizarre tale of Xero Mobile, a company that was formed out of the ashes of Gizmondo, the UK gaming handheld provider whose spectacular failure revealed all sorts of sketchy details involving executives taking ridiculous salaries and buying themselves luxury cars (which one former Gizmondo exec famously crashed last year). There were all sorts of questions about whether or not Xero was simply an attempt to repeat Gizmondo, which lost investors an awful lot of money with stories of potential riches from a handheld gaming device that would make money through ads. Xero's plan was almost identical, though it would support mobile phone service via ads, rather than a gaming device. Xero followed Gizmondo's strategy, raising a lot of money, and even doing a reverse merger to get its shares publicly traded. Of course, the company never seemed to get very far, other than the occasional highly promotional press release. The latest news, however, is that the company may get bought by UK mobile content provider Rok. This comes after another rumored acquisition a year ago. Of course, it's still not clear why anyone would want to buy the company. It doesn't appear that it ever launched a service -- so there's no clear benefit at all to buying it. As with Gizmondo, you have to wonder if there's really more to this story than what's coming out in the press.

Filed Under: ad supported, mobile operators
Companies: rok, xero

Nokia Finds The Shortest Route To Navigation Info: Buys Navteq For $8 Billion

from the turn-right-$8-billion-ahead dept

Nokia made a bit of a splash this morning by announcing plans to buy digital mapping/navigation firm Navteq for $8.1 billion. Navteq is definitely the leading player in the space, followed by TeleAtlas -- and the two companies basically dominate the market. Earlier this year, you may recall, navigation device maker TomTom announced plans to buy TeleAtlas, though that deal is not yet completed.

Many people are speculating on what this could mean for Garmin, TomTom's main rival in the navigation device space. Garmin uses Navteq for its maps, but it seems hard to believe that Nokia would simply cut off Garmin. That would take a huge chunk of revenue out of the deal, making it a lot less worthwhile. What's much more interesting is how this shows the strength of Nokia's commitment to really leveraging mobile devices for location-based services and navigation information. People have talked about such things for years, and Nokia's purchase certainly suggests that they're about to make a big push into moving navigation info and location-based services out of a separate device and into mobile phones.

Filed Under: location based services, mobile phones, navigation
Companies: garmin, navteq, nokia, teleatlas, tomtom

Apple Sued For Cutting iPhone Price

from the iFrivolous dept

Apple certainly surprised a lot of people last month with its sudden and steep price cuts on the iPhone. It certainly isn't a surprise that technology prices drop over time -- but to have them drop by a third after just two months seemed a bit extreme. While some early adopters just shrugged and figured it was the price of getting the device first, others weren't too thrilled about it. Apple quickly decided to fork over $100 credit to upset early adopters, but apparently that wasn't enough to satisfy one litigious individual who has decided to sue Apple, AT&T and Steve Jobs personally over the price cuts. It's difficult to see how you can sue a company for cutting its prices (especially on such a high-priced item in a competitive market), and the details suggest this case won't get very far. The key to the lawsuit seems to be the highly questionable claim that Apple cut the prices in order to make life difficult for anyone who was trying to resell an iPhone at profit. There's also some ridiculousness about how the 2-year contract with AT&T is unfair because those who bought phones at a later date could unlock them using 3rd party software. Of course, that has nothing to do with Apple or AT&T -- and the recent iBricking certainly suggests that such a claim won't hold much weight in court. All in all, this sounds like a typical "I don't like it, so I'll sue" response, when there's simply no actual legal basis for the lawsuit.

Filed Under: iphone, steve jobs
Companies: apple, at&t

Revisiting The Muni-WiFi Debate

from the let's-go-back-a-step dept

Over the past few years there's been an ongoing debate over the question of muni-wireless offerings, with most people falling into one of two camps: either totally against muni-broadband (to the extreme point of proposing laws against allowing it) or completely for it (to the extreme point of suggesting it's a natural right to have free WiFi). I don't fall into either camp, but tend to fall into the middle. I have no problem with municipal broadband offerings when there's a clear market failure. That is, when (for whatever reasons) incumbent providers are not doing enough to provide the service -- which may exist in quite a few places. Then, if the people want it, it seems perfectly reasonable, depending on how it's implemented. However, I do have a problem with the idea that every city needs to have municipally supported broadband.

Tim Wu's latest article for Slate discusses why he believes muni-WiFi offerings have been such a flop lately and it includes a few problematic assumptions. He completely brushes over the question of why muni-WiFi needs to exist, saying "The basic idea of offering Internet access as a public service is sound." But is it? I recognize the fact that there are natural monopolies to deal with, but that still doesn't necessarily mean that the government needs to provide broadband as a utility. It absolutely can just be about providing the right of way and then allowing private competition.

Wu's argument also brushes over the fact that WiFi really isn't the right technology for this sort of thing. Yes, he's right that it works on college campuses, but it's not perfect there, and college campuses are a lot smaller than most cities. Given the right technologies (and more are on the way) it is possible to set up better wireless coverage without the same problems. Wu's conclusions that cities need to take over muni-WiFi projects and make them truly city supported makes a lot less sense when you add back in those two things. Not every city needs a municipal broadband connection and it's way too early to call all of the efforts failures, because better technology is coming along that will make it possible to offer wide area broadband at a more reasonable cost -- without the government needing to get involved.

Filed Under: municipal wireless, wifi

Sprint Realizes That People Hate Forced Contracts, Early Termination Fees

from the making-it-a-choice dept

It's become quite clear that people absolutely hate the forced two year contracts and early termination fees from mobile operators. It appears that some of the operators are finally getting the message. In discussing how it's going to offer its eventual WiMax offering, Sprint is now saying that there will be no mandatory contracts with early termination fees -- instead, it will be voluntary, based on a sliding price scale. In other words, if you're willing to take a longer contract, it'll be much cheaper. If you don't want a contract, that's fine, but you'll pay more per month. That seems perfectly reasonable and fits with typical pricing systems that lets the customer figure out how much the flexibility is worth to them. It's about time someone started offering this. Hopefully the other operators take the hint and start offering something similar for their regular phone service.

Filed Under: contracts, early termination fees, wireless
Companies: sprint

Unlocked iPhones (Temporarily?) iBricked

from the and-so-it-goes dept

As Apple warned earlier this week, the latest firmware update did, in fact, "break" unlocked iPhones and kill unofficial 3rd party iPhone apps. It's still not clear how intentional this was, but it still seems like something that Apple should have made at least a little more of an effort to avoid. The folks who unlocked their iPhones and who were installing 3rd party apps were the early adopters who were most likely to go out and evangelize the device -- especially if it was more useful thanks to alternative networks and better applications. Over at Gizmodo, they have a good post discussing what's actually happening, with two important points: the update is not doing any permanent damage to the phone (meaning that it'll probably be a short while until software hacks are developed to bring bricked iPhones back to life) and that Apple could have pretty easily avoided messing up the phones (suggesting that perhaps it was at least somewhat intentional).

Filed Under: iphones, unlock
Companies: apple