Wednesday, April 23, 2003

IDC: Handheld shipments still falling. Tight IT budgets contribute to decline in shipments during first quarter [InfoWorld: Top News]
7:43:25 PM    comment   

Good Technology, Dell to announce tie-up. The companies aren't disclosing details, but among the possibilities are Dell selling Good's gear and service or using Good's technology in its own wireless handhelds. [CNET News.com]
7:43:02 PM    comment   

Mapping the Wireless Revolution. This map robs us of the attention we're trying to desperately to conserve: Schuyler Erle and Rich Gibson are talking about how maps tell stories in their session at the Emerging Technology conference. The bold line above is Schuyler's reaction to a map that had an enormous amount of detail, but didn't tell their story. What they have as a goal is using mapping software and GIS (Geographic Information Systems or data:map software) to be able to overlay their wireless systems and connections onto geographical systems to tell the stories they have.... [Wi-Fi Networking News]
7:42:45 PM    comment   

Tech Forum Tackles Big Ideas. The O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference, held this week in Silicon Valley, is a primary gathering of the alpha geeks who want the buzz on the future of technology. By Leander Kahney. [Wired News]
7:41:11 PM    comment   

Palm's Latest Moves Get High Five. The world's largest handheld computer maker has seen its lead erode as consumers opt for less-expensive, higher-capacity models from other vendors. But recent moves by Palm may put it back on course. By Elisa Batista. [Wired News]
7:31:04 PM    comment   

Apple and AMD working together, claims senior AMD official. Mac OS X on Opteron rumours revived? [The Register]
2:25:49 PM    comment   

Nebraska Rescue Workers to Use Aether Wireless Software. Nebraska's Lincoln Fire and Rescue plans to equip its vehicles with Aether's PacketCluster Rescue wireless information software. [allNetDevices Wireless News]
2:25:34 PM    comment   

Notify Adds Support For Wi-Fi. The company's NotifyLink Enterprise Edition now supports Wi-Fi-capable PDAs. [allNetDevices Wireless News]
2:23:22 PM    comment   

Emerging Technology. Emerging Technology Conference in Santa Clara this week: I'm off to the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference in a few hours. Running Tuesday (tutorial day) to Friday, this event promises to open my eyes to lots of tech that I've heard vaguely about or not at all. The event is based on a Call For Proposal (CFP) approach in which random people submit proposals, and I (chair of the "untethered" track) and others chairs and O'Reilly folk ask folks to write up proposals on topics we think they should present on. The result is an eclectic, sometimes focused set of subjects, many of which relate to several O'Reilly interests, like privacy, wireless, swarm, biological modeling, emergent behavior, nanotech, grass roots, etc. I'll be reporting from the field; I'm part of a tutorial on Tuesday morning and then free to write up what I hear.... [Wi-Fi Networking News]
2:21:47 PM    comment   

Centrino: Trojan Horse for Future Cell Data. Intel's trying to become the life of the Wi-Fi party: My analysis of Intel's Centrino plans appears in today's Seattle Times. My thesis, in a nutshell, is that although putting 802.11b in a modern laptop isn't a stroke of genius, Intel's actual, stated goal (if you listen to them closely) is much clearer: to provide an end-to-end experience for purchasers of Centrino laptops (configuration, troubleshooting, connection) and to have a path for them to offer ever more advanced wireless technology in the same form factor to manufacturers who are already happy with the process. You could see within a year or 18 months a Centrino offering, for instance, Wi-Fi (g or a/g) plus GPRS or a 3G flavor with Intel's branding on the service. You might be buying Intel Centrino Service by Cingular or T-Mobile Centrino for Intel or whatever the combination of brands is. But it would be a single brand promise and an end-to-end promise, too. Right now, there's a lot of finger pointing when you buy and try to configure a Wi-Fi adapter. Most of the time, it works. When it doesn't, who do you complain to or even get tech support from? When Linksys and Orinoco cards I purchased didn't work in a Sony laptop, I sent email to five different companies and received 15 to 20 suggestions. Fortunately, the last of these, which trickled in, had the solution (Wireless Zero Configuration was turned off). In the same circumstance, if I had a Centrino laptop, I could call the laptop maker, and if I wasn't happy with their help, Intel has a staffed Centrino support line I could call. Both tech support operations are supporting the entire chain. I'm not going to get (I hope) a cock and bull story about it being Microsoft's fault, the driver's fault, the hardware's fault. Let's take one alternative, too: Dell is offering Broadcom's g and a/g solutions under its own TrueMobile name. The g card is a zero-cost sidegrade from a Centrino system to an identical Pentium-M/855 system. If something goes wrong with this combination, I'm entirely reliant on Dell. (Dell is selling a/g and g into the enterprise mostly. If you're planning to upgrade your WLAN to g later in the year, buying a Centrino now might be foolhardy -- and I'm guessing a lot of companies who have thoughts of g or a/g are holding off on... [Wi-Fi Networking News]
2:21:26 PM    comment   

Motorola's Cable Modem Plus Wi-Fi. Motorola releases $350 box: cable modem, Ethernet switch, printer sharing: This device is being sold directly via big-box computer retailers. It's unclear to me which consumers buy their own cable modems; it's more likely that cable operators will offer this as an option or upgrade.... [Wi-Fi Networking News]
2:18:44 PM    comment   

Wi-Fi Goes Hi-Fi. Om Malik talks about Wi-Fi's future as a consumer electronics standards: I've thought for some time that the most interesting Wi-Fi gear that will emerge this year will be ancillary products that rely on the presence of a Wi-Fi network but have nothing to do with computers or printing. Several audio players, like the cd3o c300 and the HomePod, support Wi-Fi networks, and I expect many more audio and video devices to appear unless the DMCA (in the US) restricts manufacturers' desire to promote fair use. More later on that subject. (I promise it's a coincidence that this week's sponsor is mentioned in the opening paragraph of this article.)... [Wi-Fi Networking News]
2:17:36 PM    comment   

Dave Hughes: High on Wi-Fi. Dave Hughes, 75 years young and full of fidelity: I had the pleasure of meeting Dave Hughes at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology conference yesterday. Dave is one of the leading lights in pushing community-based wireless initiatives (as opposed to community wirelss networks). He ranted in Wales, home of his ancestors, and the Welsh committed what he said was $100 million to an ongoing project to bring broadband to places that British Telecom said were impossible to provide affordably. Dave got in the loop with the Sherpa community through Gordon Cook and harrangued a friend at Cisco to provide the Nepalese Mt. Everest base camp with some wireless bridges and routeres to allow a satellite link to be relayed to offer connectivity. But base camp is just how he gets his real agenda going: to help Sherpas in the US (and elsewhere) provide distance learning to their relatives and countrypeople in Nepal. And to offer access to a village that's essentially cut off by Maoist insurgents. Although Dave noted repeatedly that he was 75, I would have pegged him at 52, and only because of his white hair. Decorated veteran of two wars who graduated at the bottom of his West Point Class, Dave is a shining example of how generosity, intense obsession, and the Internet's worldwide reach can transform pockets of humanity. Dave's greatest moment -- at least recently -- was when he picked up his voice-over-IP (VOIP) Vonage phone and dialed Mt. Everest. Tsering Gyaltsen answered on the second ring.... [Wi-Fi Networking News]
2:16:58 PM    comment   

Palm Debuts Wi-Fi-equipped Handheld. Palm shows Tungsten C with built-in Wi-Fi: If you can't beat 'em, wait a really really long time and finally join 'em. Months and months after Toshiba shipped an integral Wi-Fi-enabled PocketPC, Palm has finally joined the revolution with the Tungsten C with extraordinary battery life (they say): one full day of use. I hope this isn't like the laser printer toner claim of 10,000 sheets (at 2 percent coverage per page). The Tungsten C includes a color screen, 64 Mb of RAM, Microsoft-compatible productivity software, and Web and Internet tools. List price is $499.... [Wi-Fi Networking News]
2:16:44 PM    comment   

Boeing Says Connexion a Success. Boeing says that their test Frankfurt-to-Dulles in-flight Connexion broadband service tested out well: The three-month trial is over, and Boeing says that 50 to 80 passengers per flight availed themselves of the service and post-flight surveys showed that 95 percent were successful. My understanding is that they weren't charging during this test, but let's imagine they were. (Also, you couldn't use your own Wi-Fi card: only a single obscure card was approved; you had to borrow cards or use the business/first-class wired connections.) Let's say 75 people per flight at $35 per flight and one plane can do a turnaround on that flight once per day, or two flights (once there, once back). That's $5,250 per cycle. Let's say that they get about 10 flights per week, or $52,500 dollars. 52 weeks a year is $2,730,000. Now reality: planes are taken out of service for regular maintenance. Minor problems may make service unavailable at times. Some flights will be less full. After the initial interest, regular travelers may stop using the service on every flight. Let's say that they can eke a gross of $750,000 to $1,000,000 per year for that one plane. Retrofitting a plane is expensive, potentially exceeding that $1,000,000. The cost is per plane not per route: you have to equip every possible plane because travelers will come to expect it. The real money, however, may be in yield demand management. That is, if the airlines continue their insane pricing models in which, to quote Dave Barry, no two people on a plane have paid the same fare (and someday, no two people will ever pay the same fare for any flight). If you can assure customers that they can have continuous connectivity in a flight, you may be able to charge a slightly higher price, possibly even a few percentage points, on every seat in a plane. As executives demand this service, perhaps they pay $2,500 instead of $2,000 or $1,500 for that round-trip ticket. At that price, and with that kind of variable pricing, the $35 (estimated) per flight for service is a tiny part of what the airline can yield. They could almost certainly squeeze another $1,000,000 per year in higher fares -- at least until Boeing and its competitors unwire other airlines on competing routes.... [Wi-Fi Networking News]
2:15:52 PM    comment   

Poland Gets Hot Spots. Competition is underway to build hot spots after first hotel offers service: Wi-Fi blooms the world over, and the Novotel Hotel in Warsaw adding Wi-Fi apparently has spurred two mobile operators in the country to figure out their own plans. Estonia has far outpaced Poland so far -- you can tell there might be a little national pride at stake here, too.... [Wi-Fi Networking News]
2:14:43 PM    comment   

News.Com: A mosaic of new opportunities. Ray Ozzie. Even though our current use of PCs, productivity tools, e-mail and the Web seems quite sophisticated, we've only just begun to understand how to apply them and effectively realize their benefits. The next 10 years will find us moving decidedly from an era of personal productivity to one of joint productivity and social software. [Tomalak's Realm]
1:57:54 PM    comment   

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