Blog | News & Information on Wireless Services & Telecommunications
Posted: 03/30/10 by Mobile Future Team
A new survey by the Nielsen Company shows the speed at which smartphones in America are moving from niche to the norm. Nielsen’s survey concludes that within the next 18 months, smartphones will overtake basic phones in the U.S. market. That compares with an estimated 24 percent of the phone market today.
Especially encouraging, according to the report, Hispanic Americans and Asians are slightly more likely to have a smartphone than would be expected based on their overall population in the U.S. (The ability of wireless to help close the Digital Divide is a favorite topic for us – see here and here.)
Posted: 03/16/10 by Jonathan Spalter
Cross-posted from Huffington Post
Heading into the mid-term elections, these are divisive times in the nation's capital. But today Washington witnessed a rare moment of comity, as the Federal Communications Commission released its much-anticipated National Broadband Plan. All five commissioners signed a joint statement embracing the broad objectives of the plan.
It will take days, if not weeks, for the various stakeholders to fully digest a blueprint of this ambition and scope. But before the detail-oriented debates ensue -- and the inevitable divisions emerge -- it's worth taking a moment to step back and offer an appreciation of the process that got us to this potentially historic day.
President Obama was elected on the promise of inclusive and connected government. In crafting this plan, the FCC offered a compelling model of how that gets done. The efforts of Chairman Genachowski and his broadband team have been exceptionally open. The three dozen policy workshops on topics ranging from civic engagement to connected health were webcast live and archived online, allowing ample opportunity for citizen engagement. Several dealt exclusively with the potential of mobile broadband, ranging from thoughtful debates on spectrum to discussions of bleeding-edge applications and wireless deployment. Commissioners also reached outside the beltway, holding nine field hearings throughout the country to bring diverse perspectives into the conversation.
As for the product itself, I am heartened that the Commission recognizes the critical role wireless technology can play to spur global competitiveness, innovation and sustainable job creation. Profoundly significant to mobile consumers and innovators alike is the vow to free up 500 megahertz of wireless spectrum. This is essential progress to support the boom in connected devices -- from the iPhone to the Kindle to mobile medical tablets, digital textbooks and future innovations yet to be imagined.
Other regulatory proceedings that may flow out of the plan could be more polarizing. The depth of division and passion on both sides of the net neutrality regulatory debate is well-known. And, the rumors of an attempt to overturn the Supreme Court's landmark Brand X decision, which essentially upheld the privatized nature of U.S. broadband networks, would likely make the net neutrality debate look like a walk in the park.
Likewise, narrower proposals to create new rules -- whether to impose wholesaling requirements or mandate the provision of "free" broadband services -- would affect many aspects of the already intensively competitive and innovative wireless market and could actually undermine the very laudable objectives of the national broadband plan. The FCC must resist these extreme calls and tread carefully to avoid disrupting an American industry that leads the world and is working extremely well today.
Among the cornerstones of the plan is a 'shoot for the moon' goal of connecting 100 million U.S. households to 100 megabits per second broadband service over the next decade. Goals of this ambition require an unshakeable policy foundation that is unequivocally supportive of investment. This means the many rulemakings that likely flow out of this plan must be cohesive in nature -- pulling in the same constructive and unifying direction and staying true to the Chairman's early and firm commitment to fact-based, data-driven decisions.
As we look to the future, I hope the Chairman remains steadfast in his commitment to encouraging a wireless ecosystem that can fundamentally transform our society and our economy. As we begin the long and hard process of translating bold ideas into concrete, attainable and constructive actions, the hard work is yet ahead. It is my hope that we stay true to this open and participatory process and keep in sight the larger goals of advancing deployment, accelerating investment and promoting genuine competition.
History will judge this plan on its effectiveness. If it does so favorably, a nod is due to the process that got us to this day. It's a famous old adage in Washington that you don't want to see the sausage being made. But thanks to the very innovation we unite today to celebrate and advance, a new era of openness and participatory government has arrived.
Jonathan Spalter, chairman of Mobile Future, has been founding CEO of leading technology, media, and research companies, including Public Insight, Snocap, and Atmedica Worldwide. He served as an advisor to and spokesperson for Vice President Al Gore during the Clinton administration. www.mobilefuture.org.
Posted: 03/16/10 by Mobile Future Team
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, the Federal Communications Commission released a National Broadband Plan, as directed by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, designed to stimulate economic growth, spur job creation, foster innovation and investment, and improve education, health care, energy efficiency, homeland security and more.
The following statement should be attributed to Jonathan Spalter, chairman of Mobile Future:
"We commend Chairman Genachowski and the broadband team at the FCC for demonstrating the vision and leadership required to tackle the challenging task of creating a National Broadband Plan. We are particularly heartened that the Commission recognizes the critical role wireless technology must play in charting a clear path forward and the need to identify additional spectrum to spur global competitiveness, innovation and sustainable high quality job creation.
We encourage the Chairman to remain steadfast in his commitment to encouraging a wireless ecosystem that holds the promise of fundamentally transforming our society and our economy. As the FCC moves toward the Plan's implementation, we urge the Chairman to continue along this bold roadmap to America's future by avoiding barriers that slow deployment, undermine investment, and stifle competition and innovation."
Posted: 02/09/10 by Mobile Future Team
Last week, the White House unveiled a great step forward in the fight to reduce birth defects. It's a public-private effort called the Text4baby campaign and according to the Associated Press, it is the U.S.'s first free, pre-natal education program to use mobile phone text messages.
Expecting parents should text "BABY" (or "BEBE", for Spanish texts) to 511411. They'll receive weekly texts geared to the baby's birth date that cover nutrition, immunization and birth defect prevention. The texts, which have been vetted by government and nonprofit health experts, continue through the baby's first birthday.
An added benefit: Several major wireless carriers have waived text fees for the service.
For more information, click here
Posted: 01/07/10 by Mobile Future Team
This week's Pew report on Internet, broadband and wireless demographics has some interesting news regarding Internet and wireless users. Of those aged 20-29, 80 percent have accessed the web wirelessly. Morover, Pew's survey continues to show that wireless is key to bridging the Digital Divide, as African-Americans and Hispanics are using wireless at rates between 7 and 10 percentage points higher that the rate for whites. For more about this, click here.
Posted: 01/04/10 by Mobile Future Team
The Duluth News Tribune in Minnesota recently published an op-ed piece by Mobile Future Advisor Diane Smith. The piece details Diane’s success as an entrepreneur in rural America, and the many ways that technology helps small business and promotes economic opportunity.
The wireless sector employs nearly 2.7 million Americans - from applications developers to retail store workers to network engineers - and contributes $100 billion annually to our nation's economy. In the last year alone, wireless companies have invested more than $20 billion in networks that are expanding opportunities for the next generation of connected businesses.
You can read the rest of Diane’s op-ed here.
Posted: 07/27/09 by Jonathan Spalter
Anyone concerned about bridging the digital divide should be as fascinated with last week's Pew Internet report as Charles Darwin was with the Galapagos.
The report, based on an April survey of almost 2,300 adults, looks at the growing popularity of the mobile Internet. Its overall conclusion: Mobile Internet usage is surging, with 19 percent of adults reporting that they used the mobile web on the day prior to answering the survey.
Given that smartphones have accounted for 20 percent or more of U.S. mobile phone sales since the final quarter of 2008, this result is not particularly surprising. But look closer and some truly interesting demographic data emerges:
African Americans are the most active users of the mobile Internet -- and their use of it is also growing the fastest...
- 48% of Africans Americans have at one time used their mobile device to access the Internet for information, emailing, or instant-messaging, half again the national average of 32%.
- 29% of African Americans use the Internet on their handheld on an average day, also about half again the national average of 19%.
- Compared with 2007, when 12% of African Americans used the Internet on their mobile on the average day, use of the mobile Internet is up by 141%.
As the report's author John Horrigan told the New York Times, "The typical early adopter of a dozen years ago was a white guy in his mid- to late thirties. Now you see the cutting edge in mobile Internet being populated by younger people of color."
Two implications of Pew's findings are especially significant. First, these results are the most clear-cut indication to date that the most viable way to expand affordable access comes through wireless technologies, not through a wire. As the report states, "To an extent notably greater than that for whites, wireless access for African Americans serves as a substitute for a missing onramp to the Internet -- the home broadband connection."
Second, from a technological point of view, Pew's findings show the enormous social benefits from the impending roll-out of wireless broadband, including 4G and BRS networks. With their higher speed and greater ability to pierce walls, these systems could make wireless broadband even more accessible, thereby permanently closing the digital divide.
President Obama's campaign understood the value of wireless communication better than any other campaign or grassroots movement over the past decade. This Pew report shows why his administration should continue to encourage more investment in and deployment of high-speed wireless networks.
This item was originally posted on Huffington Post on July 24, 2009.
Posted: 07/06/09 by Mobile Future Team
PDA's have long since shed their stereotype as toys for the rich and famous. One in five wireless customers during the past several months signed up for a PDA and even in these tight economic times, sales of smartphones are expected to increase 25 percent this year. Now, as CNN points out, PDA users increasingly are found midway between Wall Street and Rodeo Drive - on farms in Nebraska:
[Farmer Steve Tucker] is proof that smartphones are starting to put down roots in rural America. He lives in a 150-person town near Brandon, Nebraska -- a place even he calls "the middle of nowhere." The nearest neighbor to his 4,000-acre farm is about 2 miles away. Yet, farmers like Tucker are using Internet-enabled phones to gain a foothold on online social networks -- both for business and personal reasons.
CNN details how the PDA is benefiting farmers - giving them access to real-time weather reports, tracking pesticide use, and monitoring how much water is in the soil. Not surprisingly, social network use is accelerating (check out agchat on Twitter Tuesdays from 8 to 10 PM).
PDAs also help farmers like Tucker swap photos of diseased plants to figure out treatment.
This is great news for rural Americans, who are enjoying fast, new links to the rest of the country. Thanks to a growing number of wireless apps, America's "amber waves of grain" are only a tweet away.
Posted: 06/16/09 by Mobile Future Team
Tens of thousands of demonstrators swarmed through central Teheran this week, protesting alleged voting problems with the recent Presidential elections. And how did so many come together at once? "Iranelection" was the top Twitter trend of the day and according to AFP:
"Protestors in Iran on Monday used Twitter for battle cries and to spread word about clashes with police and ‘hard line supporters' of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Twitter messages, some with links to pictures, streamed from Iran despite reported efforts by authorities there to block news of protests...."
The events in Iran this week help to illustrate the empowering influence of wireless technology. And whether the user is a lone hurricane survivor in Palquemines Parish, Louisiana or 50,000 Iranians protesting perceived injustice, wireless continues to be the vital link to make their voices heard.
Posted: 03/25/09 by Molly Kocour
The Washington Post reports on how DC's homeless refuse to fall behind the curve on mobile technology. Strikingly high numbers of the homeless have taken to the use of cell phones, joining the rest of world in the creation of a dependency on wireless communication.
According to the District's homeless advocates, up to 45 percent of those living on the streets own or have access to cellular phones, and view them as an absolute necessity to live amongst the homeless community of the twenty first century. The technology also allows family members to stay in touch with their loved ones.
Bridging the technology gap for DC's homeless allows those on the streets to stay on top of housing applications, jobs, and their ability to keep track of their food stamps. The speedy development of wirless technology has made basic cell phone communication cheap and accessible to those without credit or home addresses.
Why stop at the cell phone? Recent trends also reveal that more of the homeless are capitalizing on free access to public computers to create email accounts and even blog about their lives on the web. As the opportunities associated with technology and internet networking are obvious, these patterns are exciting and progressive for DC's homeless population.
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Tags: Minority Access, Smartphone, Digital Divide