Exploring the impact of broadband and technology on our lives, our businesses, and our communities.
Internet of things: more shark jumping
The Internet of Things continues to be more hype than substance, and the whole Internet industry is starting to feel like 1998 again, when any Red Bull-addled idea seemed to be able to attract millions in venture capital.
The latest IoT gadget nobody needs is GasWatch, a device that lets you check how much propane is left in your BBQ propane tank.....from your phone.
What?
The device costs $35, and I can buy a tank gauge that requires no batteries, wires, or any other electronics for $15, and it gives me the same information.
If you want to know how much gas is left in your propane tank, I would guess most people do what I do...lift it an inch off the ground and shake it. I don't need an app for that.
Technology News:
Social media and hiring
The always interesting David Strom has a great piece here about the dangers of social media in the business world. He recounts a recent incident where a job applicant who received two job offers decided to ask the whole world which one she should take.
Needless to say, it did not turn out well for the young woman. One of the companies, after seeing her "pros and cons" post about each company, took offense and rescinded their offer. Which might sound sensible, but left the company looking thin-skinned and defensive.
Read the whole thing....there are lessons for both job applicants and companies.
Technology News:
Knowledge Democracy:
There is still an AOL? Who knew?
I was surprised to hear that Verizon has purchased AOL. I occasionally get a message from someone who still has an AOL email account, but I can't remember the last time I actually went to aol.com...sometime in 1999?
Verizon seems to be trying to imitate the Comcast/NBC merger. Verizon says they are after the AOL OTT (Over The Top) content. Really? I have not met or heard anyone say, "Wow, that show on AOL was really great!"
Vertical integration may work in markets where Verizon/AT&T/Google/Comcast already have a de facto monopoly via their copper or fiber infrastructure, but I remain convinced that the future of entertainment is complete separation of content from infrastructure, which is the WideOpen Networks model.
The incumbents are still stuck on the notion that entertainment is the only thing their customers want, but on open networks, entertainment will be one of hundreds of services available. And on an open network, there will be many entertainment options, including lots of entertainment bundles from new content companies that are building packages specifically to meet consumer interests as opposed to building packages to tie consumers to a monopoly network.
Technology News:
The Apple Watch jumps the shark
The Washington Post is running online ads touting that you can read the newspaper on the Apple Watch. Really? Really? If there is ONE THING that I have never ever wished for, it has to be this: "I wish I could read a newspaper on my watch."
Does it work something like this?
Today in
(scroll)
Washington
(scroll)
the
(scroll)
President
(scroll)
announced
(scroll)
that he
(scroll)
was.....
Have we completely lost our minds over these gadgets?
Technology News:
Why fiber? The work from home problem
We get asked all the time, "Why do I need a fiber connection at home? My Netflix works fine."
I was trying to do some work from home over the weekend, and I needed to move some relatively small files back and forth between my computer at home and a remote server. I was getting dial up speeds consistently for several hours. File transfers that would finish in a second or two at the office were taking many minutes--long enough that I had time to go do other things and then become more and more annoyed as I would check back and see the file transfer was still not complete.
Why so slow? I have a theory. It rained all weekend, and I think of lot of people (kids?) were streaming video, which can drag down the overall bandwidth and network responsiveness. Or it could be throttling of file transfers by the cable company in an effort to get me to pay extra for "business class" service.
Want to work from home? Want to run a business from home? We're designing and building networks that can deliver real business class services anywhere, making everyone more productive.
Technology News:
Apple Watch strap is ugly
It's Friday, and I am delinquent in writing about hardware and gadgets. I am mildly interested in the Apple Watch, but I do wonder if anyone besides me thinks that the cheesy plastic strap provided with the entry level models is not only ugly but unpleasant. I have worn watches with a plastic strap, and have found them profoundly uncomfortable, especially in the summer or when exercising. Perspiration builds up under the plastic and the band and watch gets hot and, and how do I put it....sweaty.
I just watched a couple of Apple videos about the Watch, and most of the people depicted in the ads are exercising. I really have trouble with the idea that I have spend hundreds of dollars more just to get a more comfortable leather band. It does appear that it is possible to buy a third party watch strap for the Watch, and maybe this whole cheap strap thing is similar to Apple's similarly inexplicable strategy of providing the world's worst earbuds with iPods. Who knows?
Technology News:
Comcast-TimeWarner merger is over
Comcast has announced that it will give up trying to merge with TimeWarner Cable. The company has said that scrutiny from the Feds was a factor.
I never thought this was going to be important no matter how it turned out, because cable TV is dead. The body is still warm, but the rapid acceleration of Over The Top (OTT) alternatives to cable makes cable TV irrelevant. The cable giants already seem to understand this, and have been switching revenue streams to their Internet service for several years. Just like how my cable TV fees went up year after year by a few dollars, now my cable-delivered Internet goes up by a few dollars every year, even while the cost per Meg for Internet goes down (a primary expense for cable-delivered Internet).
TV is getting ever more interesting, and Netflix is leading the way. While HBO plowed new ground with non-network TV shows many years ago, Netflix is now producing some of the most interesting shows--Lillyhammer is just one example of the success of Netflix in producing high quality programming.
But despite the efforts of the cable network operators to increase Internet download bandwidth to their customers, their Achilles heel is the highly asymmetric service they offer that makes their "entertainment" service profoundly unsuitable for work from home and business from home activities.
The single biggest complaint we hear now is that "I can't work from home with my cable Internet connection." Whether we like the "always connected" business culture or not, the reality is that many of us are trying to get some work done from home at least part of the time, and the trend is accelerating. Meaningful business work from home requires symmetric bandwidth, and it is fiber that can deliver business class services. WideOpen Networks, our sister company, is now rolling out true community-owned Gigabit networks in the U.S. Want more information? Give Dave Sobotta a call at WideOpen: (540-552-2150).
Technology News:
Is home-based work over-rated?
There is a conversation over on LinkedIn about whether or not home-based tele-commuting is a real thing or not. I don't think the concept of working from home is "wrong," but I would agree that it is over-hyped.
We are not all going to work from home in the future. I first started using IP-based videoconferencing in 1994, and use it now on a daily basis. It is a tool, and nothing more than that. It is not some magic device that eliminates the need for face to face interaction.
Having said that, we have done more than two dozen county-wide and city-wide surveys in the past six or seven years involving thousands of respondents, and it is very clear that there is a floor of ten percent for full time home-based workers and businesses. If you add in respondents who are working part time from home, we see as many as 40% trying to work from home part time--while most of this is routine nights/weekends type stuff, on top of that 10% full time workers, there is another 5-10% who actually work one day or more from home. So there is a baseline of around 15-20% of workers who are trying to be productive from home.
We interviewed a Fortune 50 company recently who had a goal of giving 20% of their workforce the option of working full time from home as a quality of life issue (e.g. young children at home, an elderly relative who needs care, etc.). They wanted a symmetric, non-blocking 50 meg connection between every home-based worker and the corporate network. They wanted to be able to support a minimum of 4-way uncompressed HD videoconferencing for each home-based worker.
I've been saying for fifteen years now that neighborhoods are business districts, and from a broadband infrastructure perspective, you need to design and build networks that can deliver business class services anywhere. The concept that you can put inferior fiber networks in neighborhoods to shove entertainment down a largely one way pipe is an antiquated business model
Technology News:
Apple Watch reviews starting to appear
Some early reviews of the new Apple Watch are starting to appear. This review discusses battery life. I had to chuckle at this comment:
Geoffrey Fowler, The Wall Street Journal:
"The battery lives up to its all-day billing, but sometimes just barely. It’s often nearly drained at bedtime, especially if I’ve used the watch for exercise. There’s a power-reserve mode that can make it last a few hours longer, but then it only shows the time."
Oh, no! "...it only shows the time..." Goodness...imagine that. A watch that only shows the time....oh, the horror!
Technology News:
No broadband = No tourist dollars
The "slow or non-existent" broadband service in and around Loch Ness in Scotland is driving tourists away, who flee in horror, not from Nessie, the once and future Loch Ness Monster, but from un-usable broadband.
Broadband is basic infrastructure for community and economic development.
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