Monday Blog Roundup October 15, 2007
Posted by ianmartinez in : General, What's New? , add a commentMore content consolidation: Discovery acquires How Stuff Works for a reported $250 million. It’s apparently a step toward Discovery bringing its video library online — more bandwidth cholesterol, though if you know anything about both of these companies, its goooood cholesterol.
A great debate on Vonage’s place in communications history rages over at Realtime Community | Unified Communications. Garret Smith, through his own blog, takes the tack that we owe Vonage a “thank you.” David Beckmeyer, though, claiming the company “contaminated the VoIP investment pool back in 2003,” basically says “thanks but no thanks.”
Some sad news from O’Reilly: OET will be “winding down” publishing its blog, as well as canceling its 2008 ETel show. The blog was home to occasional diamonds of insight and I greatly enjoyed reading it throughout the week. As for the show, we have seen that trend toward less-ubiquitous trade shows, though I think it speaks well of NXTcomm that it was able to outstrip expectations last year and should do so again this year.
16 GB iPhone “MacRumors” are greatly exaggerated, according to engadget.
Retail broadband at Wal*Mart is a good thing, says Bruce Mehlman at IIA. As it does in consumer goods and prescription drugs, Wal*Mart’s price-cutting model will bring resold broadband to the masses, he argues.
Does new media ad money stop at the river’s edge for smaller players? Ed Sim seems to think so, and yahoo.com seems to agree.
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Housing Boom October 12, 2007
Posted by ianmartinez in : Trends, What's New?, Policy , add a commentWhen I noticed the Internet Innovation Alliance’s new broadband blog, I predicted IIA’s Internet heavyweights would “inform the debates in a major way.”
I think it’s happening.
Bruce Mehlman’s post yesterday on High Speed Housing is the kind of substantive analysis the alleged “experts” — that have no policy experience — simply don’t generate. Also, it’s the kind of consensus, commonsense approach to policy that the best tech wonks and regulators have long taken.
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The Right Way to Regulate October 11, 2007
Posted by Grant Seiffert in : General , add a commentIn the sea of acronyms that is Washington’s regulatory world, it’s easy to become disenchanted with all the agencies, commissions, committees, working groups and think tanks, making regulatory decisions in what sometimes seems like a bubble. But there is a defining line between superfluous bureaucracy and effective governance, especially in a heavily-regulated industry like telecommunications.
Often the difference is as simple as bringing all players to the table on an issue and allowing them to work out a commonsense solution.
The Commercial Mobile Service Alert Advisory Committee, or CMSAAC, is just the kind of working group that might sound like just another D.C. bureaucracy, especially when you hear it’s the product of a legislative mandate. But in fact, it has been very successful at achieving its main purpose — developing technical standards and protocols to help wireless carriers voluntarily transmit emergency alerts to their subscribers. What had once been a dicey and difficult issue with its share of controversies is now ready for rulemaking at the FCC, and CMSAAC was the key factor in shaping consensus.
Established as part of the Warning, Alert and Response Network Act (WARN Act), enacted by Congress in late 2006, CMSAAC consists of technical experts from the Commission, Public Safety, the wireless industry, and handset vendors. TIA is represented on the CMSAAC by Cheryl Blum, from Alcatel-Lucent.
The beauty of such a forum is that it can leverage the Commission’s resources and bring together the best and brightest minds to develop technically feasible standards and protocols, prior to the issuance of a mandate.
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Phone Killers? October 10, 2007
Posted by ianmartinez in : What's New? , add a commentEnglish actor (and voiceover star!) Stephen Fry has a blog.
His first post? An altogether interesting, and extremely long-winded take on smartphone competition. I’ll be checking in more to see if this is a one-off effort for him.
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As long as they keep selling us ringtones
Posted by ianmartinez in : General , add a commentArena-rock band Nine Inch Nails became the latest high-profile rock veterans to jump from their record label this week. This follows Radiohead’s decision to not only jump ship but to offer a unique pricing structure for its latest effort. There have also been reports of second-tier-but-still-big acts Oasis and Jamiroquai may follow. To quote investor Rick Aristotle Munarriz, “unsigned is the new signed!”
Of course, this kind of move is only applicable to big acts with sizeable fan bases. To cite a recent Chicago Tribune piece on Radiohead’s big jump:
“Radiohead’s developed a pretty good brand name over the years,” says Bertis Downs, R.E.M’s manager. “They’re in a position where, of course, they can do something like this. And so could a few others — U2, Pearl Jam, Dave Matthews. These are bands who benefited from the old system. But it’s not really applicable to reinventing the music business.”
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Monday Blog Roundup October 8, 2007
Posted by ianmartinez in : Trends, What's New? , add a commentIt’s like Digg, only softwarier! TechCrunch has an interesting take on CoolSW, a Digg clone for, well, cool software. Duncan Riley asks whether the site isn’t somewhat self-defeating as a business model — but he can’t deny its utility.
From the accidental meltdown files: Engadget documents what happens when we leave our electronics devices on the stove too long.
Laugh of the day comes courtesy of Netscape legend Marc Andreesen’s “second bubble” sendup at pmarca.com. Honestly I’m a little disappointed he had to flag the satire — but that’s the way it is when your words are parsed as closely by the investment community as I imagine Andreesen’s must be.
Ruh roh. Some Sprint gossip, courtesy of MobileCrunch.
Meta-roundup alert! Great compilation of reflections on Skype over at Realtime Community’s Unified Communications. A mixed bag, which basically sums up the company’s public perception to this point. Ed Sim of Beyond VC adds his take, as well.
I’m still a sucker for Jeff Pulver’s baseball analogies, even if it’s more on the Mets going down in flames.
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