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New plan would reduce providers to "dumb pipes" telecoms say

Google over the last decade has established dominance of the personal computer-driven internet.  With the internet ecosystem expanding into the wireless and cell-phone markets in leaps and bounds, it was only natural that Google focus on the mobile side in order to gain control of new territories in its internet empire.

The first step was the official debut of its Android OS which officially launched with the release of T-Mobile's G1 smart phone last week.  While some phone companies loathed giving up proprietary control of their platform and potential ad-revenue, the allure of Google's free software and potential lucrative deals was too great, and many mobile carriers are giving in.

Now Google has outlined the next stage of its plan for the wireless future in a patent filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, which outlines a plan for an "open" wireless world.  Under Google's vision, phones, laptops, and other wireless devices would not be stuck with one service or network.  Rather, they would be able to access any available network, selecting the one at the best price.  This, Google says, would foster creativity and would give the consumer more for their money.

Under its vision, users could also use low-cost or free networks.  Web surfing on the phone would be easy with access to Wi-Fi or WiMax networks, perhaps using the currently unavailable "white space" spectrum.

Google's plan comes much to the chagrin of mobile carriers in the U.S.  Under the current market, most telecoms operate tightly closed networks.  Customers leaving the network are dealt high fines, and returning customers are typically offered little incentive to stay.  When roaming outside a particular network's coverage, mobile carriers typically provide service through agreements with other networks, but using these competitors' networks when roaming costs an arm and a leg, so to speak.

This runs contrary to the world of personal computers, which can access any available network that they have permissions to, choosing from a broad selection of Wi-Fi, cable, or DSL connections in various locations.

Some carriers have begun to adopt parts of Google's plan.  Apple's iPhone, despite being locked to AT&T's network, allows consumers freedom when it comes to internet browsing, by allowing access to local Wi-Fi networks.  And Verizon recently announced that it would not penalize customers for breaking contract if they paid the full price of their cell phone.  Additionally, all four major mobile carriers in the U.S. have agreed to pro-rate any existing fines, making the cost of leaving the plan late less than breaking contract earlier.

However, the carriers are also far less open than they like to advertise.  Verizon Wireless' much bragged about Open Network Initiative is not open at all, but merely speeds certification into the wireless brand network. T-Mobile CEO Robert Dotson recently stated, "Even though on the outside (an open device network) looks enticing, there still needs to be a minimum level of control to safeguard security and privacy."

For now, Google is chained by the telecoms demands.  Its new first-gen Android smart phone will be locked to T-Mobile's network inside the U.S.  However, Google isn't giving up its dreams of wireless freedom.  It's investing in municipal Wi-Fi and is pushing for free access to "white space" spectrum, the part of the spectrum between TV channels.

Google may have a long hard road ahead, but the company seems determined to continue its mission of wireless freedom, no matter who opposes it.



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Hope it goes forward.
By Radnor on 9/29/2008 9:35:50 AM , Rating: 3
I really hope they can pull it. They are partially right, the infra-structure is already there.

They just need to capitalize. Of course this agenda will trash traditional telcos. Not that would be a bad thing i guess. Communication should be cheaper by now.




RE: Hope it goes forward.
By FITCamaro on 9/29/2008 9:53:52 AM , Rating: 5
Honestly most of Google's great ideas revolve around other people and companies doing things. They claim to have the answer to our power problems. But they fail to address the fundamental flaws of it (insanely high price of solar and wind + power grid that can't handle it). Instead they expect others to handle it and the insane costs that go along with it.

The same with this open networks idea. Why are companies going to invest in things they have to give away for free? I mean I have no problem signing a contract for a phone. I get it cheap and only commit 2 years to the service. If it doesn't work well, almost every provider has a clause in the contract that says you can get out within 30 days without penalty. So if you find a better deal when your contract is up, you can move to it, taking your number along (which was the main deterrent before).

I think the only real industry that has a true monopoly is the cable/internet industry. As there is almost no ability for better services to move into your area.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By therealnickdanger on 9/29/2008 10:32:43 AM , Rating: 2
Google excels at getting other companies to give stuff away for free so that they can reap the ad dollars. Do no evil.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By quiksilvr on 9/29/2008 3:43:15 PM , Rating: 2
I'm pretty sure Google shares the ad revenue with the companies.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By Radnor on 9/29/2008 11:40:50 AM , Rating: 2
Honestly most of Google's great ideas revolve around other people and companies doing things. They claim to have the answer to our power problems. But they fail to address the fundamental flaws of it (insanely high price of solar and wind + power grid that can't handle it). Instead they expect others to handle it and the insane costs that go along with it.

It is for a very simple reason. If the telcos refuse to do it, Google will. As i said, partially the infrastructure is there. Ever heard of internet through the power lines ? that is just a simple example of under used infrastructure.

The same with this open networks idea. Why are companies going to invest in things they have to give away for free? I mean I have no problem signing a contract for a phone. I get it cheap and only commit 2 years to the service. If it doesn't work well, almost every provider has a clause in the contract that says you can get out within 30 days without penalty. So if you find a better deal when your contract is up, you can move to it, taking your number along (which was the main deterrent before).


Well, telcos make a killing. Maybe it is time to reduce margins. And to end the market of absolutes behind it.

About the "green" power sources. They will be more than enough once they start working on the power grid. 9% efficiency from source to destination sucks. It is worse than the combustion engine. And that is a very inefficient example.

About Internet providers i agree. But this wifi option will touch them as well. So i really hope it goes forward.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By FITCamaro on 9/29/2008 11:46:51 AM , Rating: 4
quote:
9% efficiency from source to destination sucks.


WTF are you talking about? Transmission loss in the power grid is about 7%. That means around 93% of the power generated gets to its destination.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By Radnor on 9/29/08, Rating: 0
RE: Hope it goes forward.
By HinderedHindsight on 9/29/2008 12:53:01 PM , Rating: 2
http://www.nei.org/newsandevents/newsreleases/oper...

Nuclear reactors can hit up to 98% according to NEI.

Now, whether you believe this info or not, that's up to you.

Personally I'm for a mixture of solutions to energy problems, including solar and wind.

I think something that gets lost in this debate is geographic and social viability. For example, you don't want to put a nuclear power plant where soil is fertile and farmland would be a better use of the land. In this case, wind turbines would be a solid solution as these areas usually don't require as much power, and wind turbines do not require as much continuous land as nuclear power plant does.

Power plants are better suited for areas with large bodies of water, preferably salt, since it is so abundant. Freshwater is better used for reservoirs, etc.

You both need to stop being so one sided about the nuclear debate.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By HinderedHindsight on 9/29/2008 12:59:31 PM , Rating: 2
As a side note, this is something that farmers (both corporate and individual farmers, the few that are left) could do to help create profits. Sublet portions of their farmland to energy companies to generate energy, or better yet, buy the turbines themselves, link to the power grid, and start trading energy.

Granted there is extra cost in laying cable to remote areas, etc, but I think something we've all learned in technology is that a decentralized, distributed approach may be more costly initially, but in the longer term, it is overall safer and provides backup methods which saves you the cost of lost productivity.

Talk about diversification.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By FITCamaro on 9/29/2008 1:40:22 PM , Rating: 2
You're talking about power plant up time or efficiency. We're talking about the efficiency of the power that's transmitted over the power line.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By Reclaimer77 on 9/29/2008 6:08:00 PM , Rating: 5
quote:
You both need to stop being so one sided about the nuclear debate.


There is no nuclear debate. There is a right side, and a side comprised of fear mongering knuckle dragging idiots living in caves.

Any questions ?


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By monitorjbl on 9/29/2008 1:39:29 PM , Rating: 2
I would imagine that it varies based on your distance from the power plant, but this ought to give you some idea. FIT was about right, it's around a 7% loss on average:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electricity_transmiss...

Now, as far as your power plant's efficiency is concerned, I couldn't tell you; you'll need to do some research on your particular power company.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By Jimbo1234 on 9/29/2008 2:08:07 PM , Rating: 2
It doesn't matter what the fuel is, most power plants use steam turbines to generate the electricity. The fuel is used to make steam. That means at best mid-40% efficieny. Look up the Rankine cycle in any thermodynamics text and see for yourself. Then there are the losses due to resistance in the transmission lines, and varying power factors of AC devices being used.

So I call B.S. on anyone claiming 90%+ efficiency on anything.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By Solandri on 9/29/2008 2:18:33 PM , Rating: 2
Transmission efficiencies are generally 90%+. I thought that was the original context of the original claim?

If you're factoring in generation efficiencies, then yes fossil fuel and nuclear-based steam turbines are around 40%-60%. But solar is around 15%. Wind is probably down there as well depending on what you use as your baseline (as the windmill becomes more efficient at extracting energy from moving air, it creates a "bubble" of higher pressure air which nearby wind simply goes around). Hydro does the best because the water is forced through the turbine (and nowhere else), yielding about 80%-90% efficiency.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By Reclaimer77 on 9/29/2008 6:13:48 PM , Rating: 2
Numbers meet common sense.

Shouldn't the fact that a fuel rod provides power for years factor somewhat into your efficiency argument ??


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By FITCamaro on 9/29/2008 1:40:59 PM , Rating: 2
I'm going off wikipedia's numbers. What numbers are you going off?


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By InvertMe on 9/29/2008 1:59:06 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
by FITCamaro on September 29, 2008 at 1:40 PM

I'm going off wikipedia's numbers.


Well there's your problem.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By Solandri on 9/29/2008 2:20:16 PM , Rating: 2
In this case, the wiki is correct.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By Spuke on 9/29/2008 3:28:23 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
Well there's your problem.
At least he cited his source. You have yet to cite anything so, therefore, you must be the one full of sh!t.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By FITCamaro on 9/29/2008 1:44:55 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
Well, telcos make a killing. Maybe it is time to reduce margins. And to end the market of absolutes behind it.


Who are you to decide that it's time to reduce margins? Or who is the government to decide that? It is up to the market to decide it. If Google wants to create its own cell phone company, fine. Then they become part of the market. But to tell everyone else to make their system open? No. Then they're only doing it to take advantage of the situation it would create.

Do no evil. Make others do it for you.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By snyper256 on 9/30/2008 11:55:18 AM , Rating: 2
I would like you to explain exactly what, if any, "evils" Google has done that negatively affect the average consumer.

Really, I'm curious!


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By boogle on 9/29/2008 11:49:51 AM , Rating: 2
Always with the bringing threads towards your personal distain for alternative power. This article has nothing to do with power generation - so lets leave that out this time shall we?

As for OT: Google has a dream where you can have any device connect to any network, and you pay for what you use - with the device automatically selecting the cheapest tariff. I think this is a fantastic idea. The carriers still get their money - but this time they can't stick you with their service exclusively.

No longer will you have to worry about network coverage (no coverage? Use another network, no problem). Same goes for congestion, international use, etc. etc. Basically its great for the consumer, and only removes the network carriers from a cushy position. They'll actually have to provide a quality service for the right price, since the competition will be back and very, very fierce.

'Open' network doesn't mean 'Free' - it just means its open to anyone who will pay - with no contracts. Your device will even do the automatic price checking for you - selecting the cheapest one.

Having said that, there's nothing that says the companies can't provide contracts. Something like pay X per month, and get bandwidth for cheap/free. But they can't lock you down to their network, and only their network.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By Solandri on 9/29/2008 2:10:20 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
No longer will you have to worry about network coverage (no coverage? Use another network, no problem). Same goes for congestion, international use, etc. etc. Basically its great for the consumer, and only removes the network carriers from a cushy position. They'll actually have to provide a quality service for the right price, since the competition will be back and very, very fierce.

'Open' network doesn't mean 'Free' - it just means its open to anyone who will pay - with no contracts. Your device will even do the automatic price checking for you - selecting the cheapest one.

The problem with an "open" network is that it has to be fixed for everyone to be able to use. Europe decided on GSM as their "open" standard, and as a result all their wireless phone technology is compatible.

The U.S. elected not to do that, and let the phone companies built what they felt was best. As a result, CDMA (used by Verizon, Sprint, Alltel) filtered to the top, beating out GSM (T-mobile, AT&T). CDMA proved particularly capable when it came to bandwidth sharing, allowing them to easily roll out 3G speeds. GSM (which uses TDMA) can't share bandwidth, so they had to graft on a CDMA standard just to reach 3G data speeds. GSM's successor (UMTS) is based on CDMA.

If the U.S. had gone along with the rest of the world and used GSM as a standard, high speed wireless data either wouldn't have happened, or it would've taken many more years to roll out (because there would've been no competition). Open is fine if you already know what's best, or there is no room for improvement, or closed innovation is allowed to compete against it.

Internet networking is a bit unusual in this regard. It's based on multi-level layers of encapsulated data packets. Each layer is more or less insulated from the layers above it. So if you're sending TCP/IP data (what the Internet uses), it doesn't care if you're doing it over dialup, ethernet, cable modem, DSL, etc. An open system based on something like this can work, because it leaves the functional data of the network independent of the means of transmission.

I could see something similar working for cell phones (much like VOIP works for landline phones), and it'd actually be my preference. But good luck getting the wireless service providers to go along with it.


RE: Hope it goes forward.
By sxr7171 on 9/29/2008 1:52:18 PM , Rating: 2
This is kind of how electric power is now supplied. Purely on market rates. The power may come from anywhere but the accounting on the back end keeps track of how much each plant generates and how much each delivery grid is using. In this case it will actually save on infrastructure since if at noon on a busy day your phone tells you that your call will be billed at $0.25 a minute consumers will wait until 7PM to make that call. Business users won't care since the call is going to be worth at least that much to them. This way we'll see an easing of demand at peak times.


What I would like to see:
By pauldovi on 9/29/2008 12:03:07 PM , Rating: 3
I am tired of paying $40 for data and another $10 for text and another $40 for minutes. This is all "data". I think you should pay for a particular speed and bandwidth amount. That bandwidth applies to all your communication, voice, texting, and browsing.

By the way... I didn't know you could patent a "vision"!




RE: What I would like to see:
By Jimbo1234 on 9/29/2008 2:10:03 PM , Rating: 2
Text cost to you: $10.
Text cost to the telco: $0.

I don't recall where I read that but I believe it was an article at DSLreports.com


RE: What I would like to see:
By Solandri on 9/29/2008 2:36:22 PM , Rating: 2
If your regular phone calls were billed at text data rates, a 15 minute call would cost you over a thousand dollars. IIRC, cell phones use CELP or derivative voice codec which averages about 8kbps. 15 minutes at 8 kbps is just under one megabyte of data.

http://www.crunchgear.com/2008/07/01/atts-text-mes...

I pay $35/mo for 500 minutes, unlimited text, and free data. You have to shop, negotiate, and threaten to change service for these things. If you meekly accept what the companies offer, you're just encouraging them to continue charging these outlandish rates.


RE: What I would like to see:
By jtesoro on 10/2/2008 10:27:38 AM , Rating: 2
It's not correct that the text (short message service) cost to telcos is $0. There are specific switches that route and deliver that to and from subscribers (SMS centers) which require robust hw/sw and are licensed from suppliers on a transaction per second basis. There's also the matter of radio spectrum that you'd have to allocate together with voice traffic. Neither of these are cheap.


Photo(shop?)
By Fnoob on 9/29/2008 9:54:31 AM , Rating: 5
Doesn't the guy to Mel's left look a bit out of place? Should be on the set of a Bill and Ted movie instead? The expression on his face doesn't say "We're about to be overrun and killed" it says "Pass me the bong, dude!"




RE: Photo(shop?)
By InvertMe on 9/29/2008 2:20:13 PM , Rating: 2
In the bigger version of that photo the two biggest "problems" I noticed are they are clean looking and they all have white teeth.

Clean bodies and white teeth were quite the rarity in that time period.

But yeah... that guy does look out of place.


And You Have To Stop and THINK...
By Quiescent on 9/30/2008 12:30:21 AM , Rating: 2
Who cares about Microsoft or Apple being the big bad giant companies that are going to try to take over. Nobody seems to stop and think how Google might be the bigger threat.

They started with the search engine, came out with a toolbar for firefox or IE, then they came out with custom search engines, all kinds of software like adsense, analytics, gmail, blogger, google talk, google maps, videos, and all the software they could practically take over. They are much bigger than Microsoft and Apple put together. Just take a look at how many things they have compared to Microsoft and Apple put together. A lot of software, a lot of different things they plan on doing too.

I think it was great that Google has all this software. I use google search engine, google maps (Live maps for bird's eye view), gmail, google chrome, orkut, and google talk. But they are definitely wanting to get into all the industries they can if they made mobile software, want to make free wireless internet, and want to have cleaner energy. To be honest, where are they getting all their money, it's like they invented trees that grow money too, to be having so many free services available to the public.

In all, really, who is the real big threat here? I mean, I love Google products, but I'm certainly not going to be a fangirl and deny the fact that Google could be a threat.




By FITCamaro on 9/30/2008 7:58:23 AM , Rating: 2
Google is really Skynet...

*wonders what the shiny red dot on his chest is*


Dumb pipes?
By MrWho on 9/29/2008 5:43:37 PM , Rating: 2
I personally prefer to see telecom companies as dumb pipes than having them feed me stuff that I don't want and/or don't need.

Of course they don't like it because it puts them out of a substantial cut of their profits, but I really don't care for that.

I want to be able to choose what I get when I get and how I get it.




By artemicion on 9/29/2008 8:21:45 PM , Rating: 2
This article gave me an idea - can you buy an iPhone and write a program that allows you to use the Wifi adapter to make phone calls, via Skype or some other type of VOIP service? Hence giving you a phone without the obscene contract rate that ATT charges for the iPhone? Granted, you can only make calls when you're near a wireless hotspot, but maybe having a pay-per-use phone on hand for emergencies can make the economics work . . .




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