Entries from July 2008 ↓

Download caps is something we’ve had to live with for a long time in this country. My cable Internet provider imposes a 20GB download limit, and every cellphone provider in Canada imposes ridiculous limits on standard contracts in the order of 5MB, 20MB or at the most 100MB. The problem, obviously, is that as web sites become more complex, they take more space, and as more services start appearing online, such as video streams and Peer to Peer (P2P) transfers, people need to use more bandwidth.

The big issue is how network providers want to make as much money as they can, and spend as little as they can. They refuse to upgrade their pipes to allow more bandwidth through, and as such view anyone who wants to use more than the average as a threat to their profits. The rational they give is always that a few people abuse the network and it impedes on others, but the fact is those few are not so few anymore, as plenty of people now watch media streams like YouTube, or download using P2P.

The troubling part is that lately, everything we see in the news has been going the opposite way of what should be happening to satisfy those growing bandwidth needs. Caps are not going up, they are coming down. While they are common here, in the US many ISPs had none, and are now adding them, with some going as far as saying people should only use 5GB per month!

When they are not capping people, they are putting in equipment that monitors the use of their network and then throttling, or degrading, the connections of people who use certain applications, such as VOIP software (like Skype) or P2P transfers. Comcast was famous for degrading BitTorrent and recently got reprimended by the FCC for doing so. When they aren’t throttling, some providers go so far as treatening to disconnect users who decide to use certain applications on their network.

Net neutrality says the Internet should be free from interference by the providers. It means whether you use a cable link, DSL or dial-up, wherever you are in the world, you should be free to use any lawful network application you want. Every month, new restrictions are put in place by companies, and the network is less and less neutral. The real goal of the providers is to make the Internet like TV is: A series of approved web sites, those who pay the various providers for exposure, for a flat fee, and any other web site would be blocked and unavailable, unless each user pays extra for access to more sites. All I can say at this point is it’s a sad trend, and hopefully people will speak out enough so that net neutrality can be restored.

Friday, July 11. For most people, it’s a friday as any other. For Apple fans, however, it’s the big day. iPhone 3G release day. People are lining up to the store fronts, and talking about it on blogs and forums. There’s also the controversies, such as contract lengths, data plans, text messages, and other such details.

Meanwhile however, the world keeps turning. The fact remains that Apple only has 11% of the smartphone market, with RIM leading at 42%. So what are the other guys doing? There’s actually a lot of innovation and new interesting releases coming soon.

The first obvious thing is that companies have noticed what Apple has done. It’s obvious with all the new phones with the word “touch” in them. One of the most popular ones is the HTC Touch Diamond which just got updated. Samsung also has a popular device with a nice large touch screen called the Instinct.

Nokia in its usual way releases new smartphones every few months, with the N96 being the hot toy right now. On the business side, Blackberry has it’s Bold phone. CNet has a nice video review of some of these. And interestingly enough, it seems pretty much all of the manufacturers also got the idea that full screen, heavy multimedia web presentations is the way to go to advertise their devices.

As far as features go, again things have improved. 2-3MPx cameras used to be the norm a year ago, now most new smartphones are expected to have a 5MPx camera, usually with flash and auto-focus. Advanced image and video handling is also standard, and a full featured web browser is of course part of the standard features.

Wi-fi and 3G are also no longer things found only on a few models, and even FM radio chips are becoming a typical feature that many devices now throw in, just because. Most smartphones have either a touch screen, or a full QWERTY keyboard, with some models having both.

The smartphone market is very active and the road ahead is really exciting, with most device makers doing extra efforts to innovate and provide more to the customers. Unfortunately the network providers are still in the dark age, and that’s something Apple hasn’t managed to change (why, oh why didn’t they release an unlocked phone in the first place) with companies charging per text message, having capped data plans, and charging ridiculous fees. Thankfully with wi-fi becoming more ubiquitous it’s less of an issue, but that’s one area that could use some of that Apple influence right now.