Carl Ford : 4G Wireless Evolution
Carl Ford
| 4G is the next evolution in wireless technology. Discover how 4G will transform the wireless industry

EU vs. US

The State Ruling on State: Do EU Understand

November 22, 2010

Today's WSJ has an interesting article"":http://http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704444304575628610624607130.html?mod=WSJ_Tech_LEADTop about the use of cookies.

As someone who used to build VoIP services, I want to speak in praise of cookies and particularly their use for stateful things like Presence and Call Control.

When I worked on the first class 5 softswitch, we made a bad decision that was based on keeping state of a call on the network. My SOB friend from Harvard filled me in on his advice for the rest of the community that came to late to save me.

Did you buy your car to access the road?

November 2, 2009

Roger Von Oech, the creator of the Whack Pack, often looks to spur creativity by asking questions that are not direct but would have a parallel.  So I asked the question to understand the nature of the access point to the Internet, which is your phone, home network or some other connection.  You buy a car with the assumption that your ride on roads. 

Are we at the point where you buy a device assuming it has connectivity to the Internet?

What if the device starts at Google?

What if the device only gives you Apple approved sites?

What if Microsoft made it a closed system?

Note these are not the names associated with the access fees you pay, but having everything to do with the regulations being discussed. 

We are at interesting stage of discussion in Washington about the future of the Internet.  We could make a case that it is an irrelevant discussion since the Internet has never been designed to be regulated by a single country.  However for the 200 M plus of us that live in the US, these issues are real.

In the Wall Street Journal today, L. Gordon Crovitz did a nice job talking about the goings on in Washington.  Markey and McCain giving opposite views as well as the Freedoms / Principles expanded by Chairman Genachowski.

One thing that Washington may be missing is the insight by Craig Labowitz shared at the joing meetings of NANOG/ARIN.  It was very insightful about the technological innovations that are reshaping the Internet. 

In the presentation there is cause for concern, in the fact that 50% of the Internet's traffic is aggregating into 150 sites.  It used to be thousands.  So Media control may be happening to Internet as well.  However these 150 sites are not just carriers or media companies, so the rules and roles of regulators are not a match to this next generation.  We could of course redefine Media to include them.

The reality is the Internet is progressing in its own policing with technology.  So where is the bottleneck?  And is it a smoking gun, a slow adopter, or some market power that represents the problem?

My own take is that its slow adoption, so I applaud the administration for its BTOP program, because the last mile is the place where you attach your device.  And back to the car metaphor, you want to hit the open road as soon as possible.  Trying to regulate the open road by your driveway specification seems like a bad strategy.

























ATT vs. Telefonica The Long Tail Effect of Apple's App Store

August 10, 2009

where the wireless Internet has been available the longest, there is where iPhone sales are least.
Featured Events
Pages