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Customer focus is a data imperative

Age of information is really the age of confirmation and it is upon us. Gone are the days of naive customer focus termed as providing the b...

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Why is my desk phone still at my desk?

Well the new self imposed infliction is to build QuickFIX java using the netbeans. What better way of getting on rally with Java and C# then to build a small exchange and a webservice in .net. Shelving that topic and delving into how the day was spent on going over VoWLAN market shares and who shipped the most units and whose market share bumped up and which theater is showing more progress. Frankly speaking, when is the promise shown by IP phones is really going to be realized. I see smartphones projections going through the roof, and apps galore to dazzle the consumers till they will think they need a head scratching app, but where are my IP everywhere phones, and I mean wireless. Interestingly enough, most enterprises have converted to IP PBXs and the desktop phones are mostly IP based, then why O! Why that IP phone is not my Droid, iPhone, Blackberry or your pick of robots or fruits. Even with the promise of unified communication, the conversion to Mobile VoWLAN has not been "exponential". Surprisingly, even the companies that make WiFi enabled, or single mode Wifi phones don't have their products rolled through out their network. The Mobile plans are still not cheap enough to replace each office worker with a smartphone hence the need for a VoIP phone is there. The seamless transfer of call between a cellular and Wifi network is a thing of past, and it did not generated any thrill in the market place, but I think it is not the feature that is lack luster, it is the devices and their eco systems. It took iPod to popularize digital music, iPhone to apps, iPad to tabletts, and I guess when there is a superb VoIP client on a dazzling device with all the right integration to PC, PBX, networks, social media, cable, reality TV...I am getting carried away here...
Back to fun...with some build configurations..

Thursday, June 17, 2010

Uncle Sam wants you, to broadband

....and for good reasons. The way FCC has taken up the task of making broadband every citizens right foretells its importance. The broadband is probably the next "industrial revolution" and FCC wants to make sure that it has the right tools and data to bring this revolution to masses. The mechanism it wants to evoke is competition to lower the prices and incentives to bring private sector investments. The tools it wants to use is the power to allocate spectrum and yes the eternal source of never ending cash flow, tax payers money, will be used as development funds. Hey 10 Billion in 10 years to bring high speed data to my premises, is better than using 100, no ...200 Billion dollars to basically insure an agency, that insures me, well that's a "technical" discussion of other sort.
The task to reduce prices of wireline by bringing about competition from wireless, through increased spectrum allocations and developments seems plausible. But the task is much harder then it seems. First the top speeds of LTE and WiMAX download/upload don't and can't match the peak speeds of wireline as Cable, PON or DSL. But for most practical purposes, I would say they can and will compete. But the real problem is the cost of laying infrastructure and then the two to maximum three players in big metros, to one and none players in rural areas.
The recent price hikes and data plan manipulations by AT&T highlight this problem, and we can also see similar moves by Verizon and Sprint to limit data usage or pay to "stream" as much as you want.
The FCC wants to get a better handle on pricing and competition and it will start collecting pricing data to decide the best remedies. Data collection is first, then it is 500 MHz spectrum, 30o MHz of which will go to mobile but all in due time of 10 years, which is not bad, since it accompanies a plan to spread digital literacy. We should see some of the broadband "stimulus" fund money, aka Connect America Fund going to the Digital literacy Corps.
...This post is to barely scratching the surface of one chapter of the plan...but hey we have 10 years to catch up ...