Exploring the impact of broadband and technology on our lives, our businesses, and our communities.
Are Internet ads about to collapse?
This analysis of the current state of Internet ads suggests that some of the big ad brokers on the Internet (e.g. Google, among others) may be near an inflection point with respect to ad demand. Lookery, a firm that sells ads on sites like FaceBook and MySpace, just lowered the cost of its ads by 40%, suggesting very soft demand. And Google's AdWord system, according to the article, seems to be propped up financially by Google's practice of setting very high minimum cost per click fees.
I have always maintained that Google is making a lot of money from businesses that are willing to pay modest amounts month after month for a few ads. When times are good, it does not look like a lot of money. But when the cost of other business necessities like fuel and shipping go up, unproductive ads producing few results may be the first to go.
Technology News:
NATOA calls for local government action, fiber
The National Association of Telecommunications Officers and Advisors (NATOA) has called for a range of policy changes and investments that includes a guaranteed right for local governments to invest in broadband and fiber as the preferred mode of access.
Technology News:
Why the airlines are broke, Part 7
Fuel prices may be a proximate cause of airline financial problems, but insanely inefficient reservation systems and insulting fee structures are structural problems that less expensive fuel won't fix. I just spent over an hour and a half trying to make a simple change to an existing flight reservation. A full hour was spent on hold, with periodic updates from the reservation agent, who said the change was being "processed." The call was finally disconnected by a recorded message telling me to hang up and try again. Huh? An hour and a half just change a few bits in a computer, and it could not be done!
The cost of the flight doubled, and there was no change in the locations, just a change in the time. So the airline strategy is to treat customers with contempt and bad service--at the same time. It's baffling, and one can only conclude that airline executives never have to deal with their own reservation systems.
Technology News:
Design Nine: Top 100 broadband firm in the U.S.
Design Nine has been named as one of the top 100 broadband firms in the United States by Broadband Properties magazine.
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Technology News:
3G iPhone smashes all records
Apple's second generation iPhone was released for sale last Friday, and promptly broke every consumer electronics record. Apple and AT&T sold an astounding one million phones in just three days, making it not only the most popular cellphone in history but the most popular consumer electronics device ever. Even more incredible, there are still long lines of buyers waiting for phones--according to numerous reports, all 1800 AT&T stores are completely sold out, and most Apple retail stores are out of stock.
What accounts for the phone's popularity? It is not the hardware; the phone has some incremental improvements over the previous model, but nothing groundbreaking. A combination of lower price and an open platform seems to be the appeal. As the iPhone was released, Apple also rolled out thousands of free and low cost applications and programs for the iPhone, making the phone not just a phone/PDA but a true platform that can be customized by the user. This is the key difference now between the iPhone and most other cellphones. The Palm Treo and the RIM Blackberry have had this ability, but both devices have been relatively expensive. More importantly, both the Treo and Blackberry have small, cramped screens and low quality interfaces. The large, very high resolution iPhone display is startlingly clear and easy to use compared to any other portable device.
Samsung and LG have rolled out new phones that look a lot like the iPhone, and cellular providers like Verizon are advertising them heavily. But you can only have what the cellphone provider will let you have on those phones, and many of the add-ons come with steep per month subscription fees. The iPhone App store offers hundreds of free programs, and hundreds more programs that average about $5 in cost. Over time, the other cellphone providers will have to move to this model, or everyone will end up as an AT&T customer and an iPhone user.
Technology News:
Tennessee is ready for electric cars
Tennessee legislators have done a very simple and very smart thing. They have passed legislation that allows small electric cars with limited speed (e.g. up to 35 mph) travel on roads where the posted speed limit is 40 mph.
This may not sound like a big deal, but it is, as it opens the possibility for a lot more people to purchase small electric cars (think "golf carts with doors") and use them for around town commuting and errands. These small cars are inexpensive, economical to operate, and don't use a drop of gas. With the right attitude at state and Federal levels, they could contribute to a significant reduction in the use of imported oil over time. Every state should adopt a version of this law--according to the article, only three states (Tennessee, Montana, Washington) allow this use right now. At the Federal level, relaxed licensing and safety standards would also accelerate the use of alternative energy vehicles. A car that can only go 35 mph does not need to meet interstate highway safety standards.
Technology News:
Community news and projects:
Terabyte hard drives are here
Seagate, a big manufacturer of hard drives, has released a new hard drive that breaks yet another capacity record--the firm now has a 1.5 terabyte hard drive. This is 1500 gigabytes. It was less than fifteen years ago that I agonized over the enormous expense (at the time) of buying a one gigabyte drive. It cost a whopping $1200. This new Seagate drive, with 1500 times the capacity, will probably cost less than a third of that old 1 gig drive.
Technology News:
Comcast in trouble over service blocking
Comcast has been reprimanded by the FCC for blocking certain Internet services without telling customers and without regard for the level of use. Service providers can be as arbitrary as they like in managing their Internet access services, but they have to tell customer what they are doing. A service-based network would not need to penalize customers for doing something they enjoy, but they would probably pay more. Today's broadband model is upside down for service providers because they make the most money when a customer never turns their computer on; they make the least if the customer is on the Internet all day long. That is the exact opposite of every other business in the world, and it's why broadband is such a mess in the U.S. Fortunately, communities like Danville, Virginia are changing that model.
Technology News:
Google lets everyone be Big Brother
Google is busying driving cars with cameras mounted on top all over England, taking pictures of every single house in the country. Google promises to obscure significant details, which has led to bizarre photos with people's faces blurred out. A lot of British citizens are outraged, since anyone with a Web browser will be able to snoop around the front of your home from a distance. It sounds like a lovely tool for burglars, who will no longer have to risk driving through neighborhoods to case houses--they can do it from the safety and security of their own home.
Ditto with nosy neighbors, stalkers, and anyone else who might be disgruntled or angry. It's hard to understand what value Google is adding here. One might argue this might be quite useful for stores, who want customers to be able to find them easily, but the main effect of this new Google service would seem to be just another opportunity for Google to sell ad space. Google's corporate motto (Don't be evil) more and more just seems to be a sick joke. Google seems determined find a way to usurp every kind of information in the world, turn it into proprietary intellectual property, and then sell ad space.
Knowledge Democracy:
Do dial up users want broadband?
The Pew folks have rolled out another hilarious study that suggests most dial up users don't want broadband.
I have observed this phenomenon for fifteen years now--much longer than the Pew folks. It is very simple, really. People that have never had a broadband connection are, in fact, likely to believe it is something that they don't want or need.
But here is the problem. The Pew folks have never asked broadband users if they would go back to dial up. And you need to ask that question in order to be able to understand the survey results of the dial up question in the appropriate context. We all know the answer we would get from broadband users: no one wants to go back to dial up. In fact, I've been asking that question to rooms full of people for many years, and I have never had a single broadband user stand up and say, "Oh yea, broadband is waaaay too fast for me. I'm switching back to dial up next week."
You need to query both groups with the complementary version of the same question if you want to be able to draw any useful conclusions.
Technology News:
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