Akamai to Make iPhone Video Streaming Smooth
Akamai today said it would provide adaptive bit-rate streaming to deliver video content from web sites to the Apple iPhone 3G and devices running the iPhone OS 3.0 operating system. Basically, using adaptive bit-rate streaming means folks can watch streaming video on their iPhones or iPod Touches with fewer stops and starts. Adaptive streaming adjusts […]
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Google’s App Engine Is Sputtering
Today we’ve received an email and seen multiple tweets alerting us to the fact that Google’s App Engine software development platform is down. We’ve emailed the company for details, but in the meantime, a check of the App Engine status page won’t even load at 11:30 a.m. PDT, and updates on the site indicate that […]
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Advertisers: Pay No Attention to the Data We Are Stealing
Several marketing associations supported by Google have banded together and released seven principles that they believe should govern online privacy. Are you ready for a journey to the Emerald City? Because the principles are the online advertisers’ attempts to stave off government regulation around protecting consumers’ online privacy by diverting attention to the Great and […]
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Do Lower Phone Bills Justify Ads on Your Mobile Phone?
Orange, a UK ISP and mobile phone company, is reportedly close to signing a deal with an ad-supported mobile virtual network called Blyk that would offer certain Orange customers credits on their service in exchange for receiving text-based ads on their mobile phones. According to an article in New Media Age, Orange has been in […]
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Government Enforces the Status Quo With Broadband Stimulus Bucks
The two national agencies responsible for allocating $7.2 billion in broadband grants as part of the stimulus bill today released the rules governing the process and said the government would provide about $4 billion in loans for the first of three funding rounds. That money will start flowing to projects in November. It’s a […]
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Today the Stars Aligned for Satellite Cos
Globalstar today closed on $738 million in financing, while rival satellite operator TerreStar launched its new bird, TerreStar-1. Globalstar plans to use its money to fund operations and launch a new generation of satellites in 2010 that will deliver all IP-based voice and data to its customers through 2025. Before celebrating, know that Globalstar’s new […]
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Embarq and CenturyTel Merge, Become CenturyLink
CenturyTel and Embarq today announced the completion of their $11.6 billion merger, which results in a phone company that will serve 7.5 million customers in 33 states. The combined company will now be known as CenturyLink — and the aging copper-based DSL lines it offers to most of its subscribers will certainly act as a […]
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Can the Free Market Provide Broadband for Everyone?
Only 2 percent of the world lives in a country where broadband penetration has exceeded 80 percent, according to a report out today from TeleGeography. The report noted that worries over broadband saturation are really only appropriate in 10 countries out of the 127 the firm tracks, and the U.S. isn’t even one of those […]
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Want to Be in the App Store Top 100? It’s Gonna Cost You
They say it takes money to make money, but it you want to be in the top 100 apps in the Apple App Store, it’s gonna take you $1,875 per day to buy enough ads, according to a report out today from AdWhirl. The company, which operates an advertising platform for the iPhone (and would […]
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Cisco Shows Off Its Hit List
Cisco today outlined its plans for delivering IT services over the web (aka cloud services), and as part of a conference call, showed off a great slide that illustrates exactly how many companies this former networking gear maker wants to take on. If I were to boil it all down, I’d say the company’s cloud […]
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Unisys Offers Enterprises a Security Blanket in the Cloud
Unisys, the IT services company, today became the latest with a set of products aimed at helping customers create their own internal clouds. And in a month it will offer a true Infrastructure-as-a-Service product that will deliver computing and storage on demand and on a per-instance basis. Like many of the traditional IT vendors, Unisys […]
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Three Startups That Want to Deliver a Fat Mobile Pipe
Mushroom's PortaBella device
Good things come in threes, and any triptych of services is the basis for a journalist to declare a trend, so when I met three different companies last week that offered a way to bundle a variety of mobile broadband connections into one fat pipe, I was compelled to pull together an article […]
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When It Comes to Real Estate, It’s Location, Location, Broadband!
Eight-two percent of home buyers who have had broadband service over fiber all the way to the house rank it as the leading real estate amenity, the Fiber-to-the-Home Council said today. A national study of U.S. broadband consumers by RVA LLC Market Research and Consulting shows that fiber-to-the-home ranks higher than green spaces, […]
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RIM Paid $8.3 M for Dash. Proof That Hardware a Risky Business
Research In Motion bought Dash Navigation in May for an undisclosed price, but yesterday an investment adviser did the math and stated on his blog that the BlackBerry maker paid $8.3 million for the navigation company. Davis Freeberg combed through Research In Motion’s SEC filings and its first-quarter fiscal 2010 conference call in June, and […]
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Europe Gets Handset Makers to Agree to Universal Charger
Nokia, Motorola, Research in Motion, Apple (yes, even Apple) and six other cell phone makers have agreed to a European Commission request to develop a universal charger. The agreement was announced today by the the EC. The new handsets will use Micro-USB connectors, and will be available in Europe beginning next year. The GSM Association […]
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Germans Get Cheaper Cell Phone Service In Exchange for Ads
Alcatel-Lucent said today that it’s begun providing German carrier E-Plus with equipment that inserts advertisements onto mobile devices based on demographic information provided by a subsidiary of the carrier. Customers opt in to the service and in exchange get extra minutes or texts on their cell phone plans. Gettings, the E-Plus subsidiary collecting the information […]
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Analyst: Nokia to Offer an Android Netbook in 2010
Nokia plans to launch an ARM-based netbook that relies on the Google-pioneered Android mobile operating system in 2010, writes Lazard Capital Markets analyst Daniel Amir in a research note issued this morning. In the same note, he predicts that the total number of netbooks sold worldwide will reach 25 million in 2009 vs. 10 […]
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It’s Official: Julius Genachowski Is FCC Chair
The congratulations are rolling in after the Senate today confirmed Julius Genachowski as the new chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. The Senate also confirmed Robert McDowell for his second term, leaving only two spots remaining to be filled on the five-member commission. The confirmation by the full Senate came one week after the Commerce […]
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Biggest Barriers to Seamless Mobile Connectivity
Most technology vendors agree that multiple mobile networks create a lot of complexity for users trying to figure out how they should connect when Wi-Fi or 3G networks are available. Add WiMAX and LTE to the picture and things get even more complicated, according to Barbara Nelson, CTO of iPass.
Creating an easy user experience through […]
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We Need a Broadband Cloud, But It’s a Hard Sell
The demand for ubiquitous web access and a scarcity of bandwidth on wireless networks are driving the technology world to try to figure out how to build the equivalent of a bandwidth cloud composed of a variety of available networks, from cellular to Wi-Fi and WiMAX. Various speakers at a Portable Computer and Communications Association […]
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Oracle’s Ellison Rethinks Clouds as Economy Tumbles
Oracle CEO Larry Ellison is rethinking his earlier disdain for software as a service and all things cloud, according to a report today in The Wall Street Journal. Maybe a dismal economy and a drop in Oracle sales are forcing him to change his position. The Journal quotes comments made on Oracle’s earnings call yesterday, […]
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The Battle for the Home Network Pits PCs Against Set-top Boxes
The other night I watched “Corpse Bride.” The Tim Burton flick was streamed from Netflix via my Time Warner broadband subscription, though my Linksys router to my Roku box, and from there through an HDMI cable to my television. But I could have watched a different movie on my TV using Time Warner’s video-on-demand […]
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Verizon CEO Seidenberg’s Words of Entrepreneurial Wisdom
Ivan Seidenberg, the CEO of Verizon, appeared on “The Charlie Rose Show” yesterday talking about the communication company’s plans for global growth, network neutrality and the role of government. For the record, Verizon plans to build out its wireless business internationally within the next 5-10 years, and about one-third of that growth will be through […]
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TI Sees Multicore Phones Coming in 2011
Texas Instruments is betting that a more powerful cell phone, one that uses identical computing cores working in parallel inside the application processor, a setup it calls symmetric multicore processing, will be here as soon as 2011. Such phones, which will be built with multicore ARM-based chips, will allow for faster processing on mobile phones […]
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Intel-Nokia Deal Could Mean Nokia Netbook Is Near
Intel is expected to announce today that will sell its chips to Nokia for use in the Swedish handset maker’s mobile devices, according to a report from Bloomberg. The deal may be a coup for Intel’s low-power Atom chips, which it hopes to provide in small computers, embedded devices and eventually, smartphones. Intel’s Anand Chandrasekher, […]
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FTC to Take a Deep Look at DPI?
In the battle over consumer privacy, it looks like information gleaned from deep packet inspection may be under fire, according to a post on Perkins Coie’s law blog. Deep packet inspection tools can review the content of each packet of information traversing the web. The post, written by Barry Reingold, a partner with the law […]
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Are Upload Speeds the New Broadband Selling Point?
Verizon today boosted its upload speeds across its FiOS fiber-to-the-home broadband packages, which leads me to wonder if upload speeds are the new download speeds in a saturated market for broadband. Om and I both have complained about anemic upload speeds, which are becoming more of a handicap in today’s world of video uploads and […]
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The Coming Trans-Atlantic Bandwidth Crunch
During the dot-com boom, so many undersea cable delivering the Internet traversed the bottom of the ocean between the U.S. and Europe that bandwidth prices plummeted and providers of submarine cables filed for bankruptcy. But those cables may soon no longer be enough to satisfy the global demand for bandwidth between the two continents, according […]
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Gigle and Belkin Team Up for Gigabit Home Networking
Gigle Semiconductor said today that consumer device maker Belkin is using its chip in an adapter that allows for home networking of up to 1Gbps using a home’s power line infrastructure. Such speeds are a huge boost for power line networking. A consumer buys the adapter, plugs it into an electrical outlet, and then can […]
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Affordable Austin: No Longer a Tech Mecca
Austin is among the places that people are flocking to in the recession, according to BusinessWeek. Other magazines have given Austin (and all of Texas) similar praise, mostly because it’s so darn cheap to live here. But I don’t want to lie to y’all — Austin may not be the best place to build […]
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Sony CEO Stringer: It’s the Network, Stupid
Sony Walkman
Sony CEO Howard Stringer reaffirmed the consumer electronics giant’s decision to focus on networked gadgets while discussing its restructuring at a shareholders’ meeting held today, according to Reuters. Stringer said the company would lay off 16,000 workers and close eight of its 57 manufacturing sites as part of an attempt to reduce spending by […]
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Ending Handset Exclusivity Won’t Mean a Phone That Can Roam
FCC acting chairman Michael Copps said yesterday afternoon that the agency would investigate exclusivity deals between carriers and handset makers, and “take action” if they were found to cause harm to consumers. While the largest cellular carriers are protesting the probe, consumer advocates are thrilled. However with two of the four largest U.S. […]
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Broadband Revenue Will Beat Out TV Revenue on Planes By 2011
Wi-Fi on planes isn’t just a threat. It’s here, as evidenced by this recent video chat between our earthbound colleague Kevin Tofel and Paul Walborsky, our fearless leader, who was crossing the country on a Virgin America flight. What’s better (or worse, depending on your point of view) is that by 2011, in-flight broadband service […]
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Europe’s Privacy Concerns May Hinder Facebook
The European Commission, which has been a staunch protector of privacy, may consider tighter regulations about sharing a user’s data with third-party sites, The Financial Times is reporting. It also wants to subject marketers that use social media sites like Twitter to tougher regulations. Under such regulations, a company like Facebook, which opens up […]
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The Young Entrepreneur Stereotype Bites the Dust
While there are plenty of 20-something, ramen-eating entrepreneurs coding into the wee hours of the morning, the demographic with the highest rate of entrepreneurial activity consists of those between the ages of 55 and 64, according to a study released today by the The Kauffman Foundation. The study found that folks in the 20-34 age […]
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Iran’s Election As Seen Through the ISPs
The protests in Iran that have come in the wake of the country’s June 13 election results, which returned President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to power, have showcased the rise of social media like Twitter, Facebook and even cell phone video taken in the streets and uploaded onto YouTube. Arbor Networks, a company that provides security and […]
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ISPs Should Decide If They Provide a Utility or a Service
Wireless carriers have had a busy two days in Congress, today getting grilled over exclusivity agreements and yesterday over the high cost of texting. In reading Ars Technica’s coverage of the texting hearings, I was struck by the attention paid to the cost of sending a text on a per-megabyte basis. We’ve looked at […]
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Congressman Files Bill to Stop Tiered Broadband Pricing
Rep. Eric Massa (D-Corning) today introduced legislation that would force Internet Service Providers that want to implement usage-based pricing plans to go through several regulatory hurdles, including public hearings, to determine if such pricing is anti-competitive. Such usage-based plans may involve tiered pricing or caps based on the amount of data downloaded.
Massa is one of […]
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Congressman Files Bill to Stop Tiered Broadband Pricing
Rep. Eric Massa (D-Corning) today introduced legislation that would force Internet Service Providers that want to implement usage-based pricing plans to go through several regulatory hurdles, including public hearings, to determine if such pricing is anti-competitive. Such usage-based plans may involve tiered pricing or caps based on the amount of data downloaded.
Massa is one of […]
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Congressman Files Bill to Stop Tiered Broadband Pricing
Rep. Eric Massa (D-Corning) today introduced legislation that would force Internet Service Providers that want to implement usage-based pricing plans to go through several regulatory hurdles, including public hearings, to determine if such pricing is anti-competitive. Such usage-based plans may involve tiered pricing or caps based on the amount of data downloaded.
Massa is one of […]
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Congressman Files Bill to Stop Tiered Broadband Pricing
Rep. Eric Massa (D-Corning) today introduced legislation that would force Internet Service Providers that want to implement usage-based pricing plans to go through several regulatory hurdles, including public hearings, to determine if such pricing is anti-competitive. Such usage-based plans may involve tiered pricing or caps based on the amount of data downloaded.
Massa is one of […]
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IBM Throws $100 Million at Mobile
Realizing that the phone is now a computer, or possibly that ubiquitous wireless networks mean that computers can go anywhere, IBM said today it would spend $100 million on research over the next five years to improve mobile communications for businesses and consumers worldwide. This is a piddling amount for IBM (it spent $1 billion […]
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Sen. Kerry Wants Wants His iPhone Unlocked
The iPhone has sure brought a lot of whiners out of the woodwork. Today Sen. John Kerry joined them by publishing a blog post on the Save The Internet blog arguing against exclusivity of certain phones on some wireless networks. Yesterday, Kerry sent a letter to the FCC in preparation for hearings scheduled tomorrow that […]
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FCC Nominee Favors Creative Spectrum Use
At his confirmation hearing this afternoon, Julius Genachowski, the nominee for the chair of the Federal Communications Commission, spoke out in favor of using spectrum creatively for providing mobile broadband. In response to questions by Sen. Maria Cantwell on how he planned to handle decision-making around white spaces broadband, Genachowski said he “applauds the creative […]
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Opera Unite Hopes Old Idea Entices New Developers
Opera Software today is trumpeting its new technology offering called Opera Unite that uses the Opera browser to turn your PC into a server that can host photos, files, music, and even act as a Facebook-style wall for exchanging notes and chats. The idea is similar to services such as FolderShare that allow you to […]
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Stat Shot: DSL Still Rockin’ the Whole World
Western Europe had the most broadband subscribers and Asia-Pacific the slowest broadband growth during the first quarter of 2009, according to a report today from The Broadband Forum. Global broadband grew by 16.6 million lines in the first quarter of 2009, and total IPTV subscribers approached 24 million, said the report, which was prepared for […]
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Clearwire Launches in Atlanta: WiMAX for 3M People
Clearwire launched its Clear WiMAX service in Atlanta today, providing 3 million people across 1,200 square miles in the home of Coke and the Braves with 4G wireless download speeds of 4-6 Mbps. WiMAX service is available in several packages, including home Internet service plans for $20 per month, mobile Internet plans starting at […]
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IBM Tries to Sell Enterprises on Workload-Specific Clouds
IBM’s first true cloud computing products, announced today, consists of workload-specific clouds that can be run by an enterprise on special-purpose IBM gear, Big Blue building that same cloud on its special-purpose gear running inside a firewall, or running the workload on IBM’s hosted cloud. The offering seems like a crippled compromise between the scalability […]
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Google: The Data Center Is the Computer
As folks increasingly store and access information online, the data centers powering cloud services need to be managed more like a single computing entity rather than a bunch of servers, according to a Google white paper (Google calls it a mini-book) released today.
The paper lays out the concept of warehouse-scale computers (which we have previously […]
Like Google, Salesforce Is Pushing Its Platform for the Enterprise
Salesforce.com is trying to entice developers working inside the enterprise to its platform-as-a-service product by offering them a free first taste of Force.com. The platform is built on Salesforce.com’s own infrastructure that it cobbled together to deliver its CRM software as a service. It looks like Salesforce.com’s goal with Force.com is to create an enterprise […]
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