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Unlimited Plans = Unlimited Trouble?

Are unlimited voice and data plans causing unlimited headaches for carriers? More than one person told me at CTIA they think Sprint is going to be in real trouble as a result of the unlimited plan they are selling to customers.

Where does the trouble lie? In three places really. First of all, many of the enhanced services which used to generate revenue have now gone away. In addition, data and voice usage is increasing so capacity must do the same. Finally, the customers who used to pay more than $99/month now pay less.

One would imagine if my sources are correct, that Sprint may have to retract this offer at some point just to stay in business.

In the mean time, this new plan seems to have renewed some much-needed life into this carrier. It is unclear what magic the company will have to create to offset the elimination of this plan (of course this is hypothetical at this point).

I for one can't wait to see how this all plays out but I am enthused that an entire class of new mobile applications is being born for people to take advantage of.

Perhaps if Sprint does change its pricing, we will be so hooked on the data services that we won't mind paying a buck or two for data capability.

Om Malik has some thoughts on the matter as well.

Update: See also: ABI:Flat-Rate Price Plans Pose Serious Network Challenges for Operators

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Google Android Running

Here is the good news. You can get Google's Android running on current hardware. In fact the AT&T Tilt is the Guinea Pig of choice for this particular endeavor in the following example.

It is a bit early to jump for joy of course and perhaps the bad news is I am not sure what Android does for you yet. At least this demo is not so impressive.

As a pure technical accomplishment however, perhaps this is a bigger news than the credit I assign to it. I will be impressed when I see Google Apps integrated with Android on the AT&T Tilt. Basically what I mean is that for this platform to be of use to me and other users, it needs to do something that I can't do today.

So this is one small step for mobile users and I am waiting for the giant step in productivity.




[Gizmodo]

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Second Life Meets the Call Center

You have heard me discuss how contact centers could connect with virtual worlds and moreover how virtual worlds could connect with e-commerce. One of my most recent posts is titled Virtual Customer Interactions and in this post I give an example of how you could shop in a virtual "Sachs 5th Avenue" for a tie.

In case you aren't aware, there are web sites which sell glasses and the way they do so is quite novel. You upload a photo of yourself and then virtually try on various frames. You do this until you find a pair you think looks good on you.

This same concept extends into virtual worlds where you are able to try on clothing, glasses, accessories and anything else you may think appropriate. The goal being to see how things look on you without trying them on.

Even if e-commerce is not your primary business, the ability to connect your contact center with virtual worlds is good to have as many expect these worlds to become more important over time.

This is why I read with great interest that Nortel will be adding Second Life integration into their Call Center 6.0 solution. Tony Rybczynski goes into more detail on his blog.

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Sending out an SMS

It is great to see the US Government embracing technology. Recently the FCC said that by 2010 we should have a nationwide alert system capable of delivering timely warnings vis SMS in the event of disaster.

Participation in this broadcast communications network is optional for carriers and for subscribers.

My thoughts? This is great news and shows that even the government benefits from the innovations which take place in the communications space.

I just hope all regulators and government officials realize that providing a fertile environment for competition in the communications space has benefits which are far greater than just providing more competitive pricing for consumers.

[TMCnet]

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Dimdim is to WebEx like Asterisk is to Avaya

Open source web conferencing company Dimdim is looking to attack the conferencing market in the same way Asterisk "attacked" the PBX space. Although the concept of open source is not new this sort of product just shows how virtually every corner of the software market has to deal with the issue of competing with free or very cheap software supported by a community of developers who work for the "fun of it".

One way to compete with such challenges is to focus more on consulting and systems integration. Another is to focus on building your development community up as a way to add value to your core offerings.

These are things Avaya has done masterfully and it remains to be seen how companies in the conferencing space will deal with the increased pressure from open source conferencing providers such as Dimdim.

[TMCnet]

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Digium's New Deal

It looks like Digium's Java based client will be getting commercialized as a result of a five year deal with PhoneFromHere.com. Apparently this agreement will improve the voice quality of PhoneFromHere's products and for Digium this signals another potential revenue stream -- externally commercializing some of their engineer's creations.

[TMCnet]

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