Operators
We pay close attention to the industry behemoths. Carriers, operators, MNOs, MVNOs — call them what you will — there’s no getting away from the fact that they’re instrumental. In this section we document everything from price plan changes to strategy announcements and good old double-barreled rants.
Well, I’m a chump. I don’t know WHAT I did with my handset. Perhaps I was robbed without me knowing it. Or more likely, I left is somewhere highly stupid. It’s lost, though. Searched high and low.
I phoned Sprint straight away when I realised I’d lost it at about [...]
Discuss.
As told by commedian Lenny Bruce…
Link: Lenny Bruce Quotes
Communism is like one big phone company
Phoneboy’s done a wicked study comparing the services costs between the USA and Indonesia… worth a read
Link: Reality Check: Wireless Service In Indonesia
The CTIA says that other operators worldwide want to become more like the U.S. carriers. No wonder: they’d love to get away with charging for service they don’t provide, and overcharging for the [...]
Consumer Direct — from the UK Government’s Office of Fair Trading, received almost 50,000 complaints last year (up 49% from last year) relating to mobile service agreements. It’s number two in the list of top 10 UK complaints released today. Dear me.
(Thanks Chris)
Alltel, that smallish 5th carrier in the U.S. (albeit with the most coverage by square feet, regardless of how many users are in those feet) has been offering its My Circle plans for a while, with T-Mobile copying them with MyFaves. Alltel’s My Circle feature previously offered subscribers the ability to select 10 different phone [...]
Continue ReadingAlso from The Toronto Star, I came across this one about a very unhappy Bishop…
Link: TheStar.com | News | Porn on Telus phones upsets archbishop
The Roman Catholic archbishop of Vancouver is considering cancelling contracts with Telus after the phone company began making pornography available through its cellphones.
Canada’s second largest phone company now offers pornographic photos [...]
Link: TheStar.com | Business | Telus considers dumping its `Betamax’ of wireless networks
With more wireless competition looming, executives at Telus Corp. are believed to be mulling a pricey swap of the firm’s network technology in a bid to offer subscribers a bigger selection of mobile devices and grab a larger slice of lucrative international roaming [...]
Gamma Telecom has announced that they’ll be working with 3 UK on a deal to get wholesale access to start up its own MVNO, targeted towards small- and medium-sized businesses. Gamma Telecom will use 3’s HSDPA network for voice and data calls with more business-minded handsets. Gamma Telecom is one of the UK’s biggest voice [...]
Continue ReadingThe MVNO kajeet (we mentioned their launch back in May) has gotten a nice little $10 million injection of debt financing recently, and seem to be doing ok, considering they’re a smaller niche MVNO. Kajeet focuses on the tween market and is one of few MVNOs to be offered in nationwide retail chains such as [...]
Continue ReadingFCC Chairman Kevin Martin seems to be on the warpath, and has announced recently that he will be investigating Comcast’s idea last year to throttle its users’ usage of popular file-sharing protocols like torrents. It turns out that a bunch of consumer groups filed a complaint, asking the FCC to fine Comcast $195,000 per subscriber. [...]
Continue ReadingVerizon Wireless wants your old useless handset this holiday season. They’re calling out to anyone who found a new mobile in their stocking this year to bring their old stuff up to any Verizon Wireless location to donate it. Verizon will use the phones in their HopeLine Phone Recycling Program, which uses handsets and funds [...]
Continue ReadingGoogle and NTT DoCoMo, Inc. will be sharing handsets soon. The search giant has landed a deal to provide internet search and email services on NTT DoCoMo’s i-Mode handsets. Google lags behind Yahoo! in Japan, so this is a really big move for them. NTT DoCoMo is Japan’s leading carrier and will give Google a [...]
Continue ReadingThe Palm Treo 750 was gifted with an update earlier this year, offering Windows Mobile 6 and a few other enhancements to AT&T customers. A few of the features of the updated include general speed enhancements, along with better sync support for Vista desktops and support for Microsoft’s direct push technology.
Oh yeah, and AT&T [...]
Link: 3 Italia, Fenacom to launch MVNO for senior citizens - Telecompaper
That’s an interesting move, eh? One one end of the scale you’ve got Blyk addressing the youth… now in Italy, an MVNO for the oldies in the country? Cool! I don’t think Saga, the UK company specialising in services for the [...]
Link: Blog: A spectrum of wireless players - 19 Dec 2007 - NZ Herald: Technology News and reviews from New Zealand and the World
Woosh Wireless, which needs to migrate its technology platform to WiMax also picked up spectrum suitable for these types of services, as did state-owned broadcasting and broadband player Kordia, which likewise has [...]
Word on the street is that AT&T Wireless will launch their MediaFLO-powered mobile TV service in the States ‘as early as possible’ in 2008. Launching with 8 channels - ESPN, MTV, NBC, CBS, and Fox among them, the service has apparently been testing really well. A slight delay is necessary to optimize the user experience, [...]
Continue ReadingHave a read of this one…
Link: Calls for Tax Exemption for Charity Sms Donations
Vir2, a provider of SMS marketing and fundraising solutions for charities, has welcomed the decision by UK politican, Mark Oaten MP to file an Early Day Motion calling upon the Government to stop charging VAT (sales tax) on UK charity donations made [...]
Sprint Nextel today announced that they have chosen a replacement for Gary Forsee, who stepped down in October of this year. Daniel R. Hesse will be taking the helm as President and CEO of Sprint Nextel, effective immediately. Hesse has served in the same position at Sprint spin-off Embarq Corporation, and also has over 2 [...]
Continue ReadingAlltel Wireless is an up-and-coming carrier in the United States, and brings a really cool announcement this morning. They’ve hooked up with Spinvox to bring speech-to-text technology to their voicemail system. The new service, Voice2TXT, is available today to all Alltel subscribers, and is compatible with any phone capable of receiving an SMS.
Voice2TXT uses [...]
Link: http://olive.dominionpost.com/
Joseph, 13, received about 100 text messages from Vodafone over the course of two days, prompting him to turn off his mobile phone.
When he turned his phone on again, the texts — promoting a Vodafone mobile game called The Golden Compass — were still coming through.
After a phone call to Vodafone, he [...]
Joining the likes of ESPN Mobile, another MVNO, XE Mobile, recently posted an announcement on their website letting the world know that they’re shutting down. Effective December 31st, 2007, phone service will be terminated and all account balances will expire, apparently. Users wanting to keep their number should port quickly, or call 611 from their [...]
Continue ReadingSprint and MySpace announced that starting in early 2008, Sprint handsets will ship with a link from their homepage to the new MySpace Mobile website, currently in beta. The deal will also put direct links to other Fox Interactive Media sites on Sprint handsets, such as RottenTomatoes and FoxSports.com.
I don’t really know that this [...]
Rogers Wireless, one of the most backward mobile operators I can ever remember dealing with (”Why would anyone ever want to send a text message to a screen in a nightclub???”), has launched with Spinvox today, proving that the team there is perhaps not as backward as I remember. Good news. If you’re [...]
Continue ReadingCarlo’s posted a rather wicked overview illustrating just how open some of the US mobile operators are.
i.e. they’re not. Not at all. Despite issuing the press releases and presenting reasonably inspiring keynote presentations…
Link: MobHappy » Blog Archive » Is All This Talk Of ‘Open’ Just Lip Service?
So apparently, the message [...]
I was thinking about this issue the other day.
I can’t name the CEO of any mobile phone company … other than Vodafone’s Arun Sarin.
Is that good or bad?
No, wait, wait a minute. Tell a lie. Kevin Russell of 3UK.
Everybody else? Ghosts. Ghosts in the machine. [...]
Mike42 on 