Telecom

CES 2013 Dazzling Innovations - Why Cablecos Should Care

This year, I joined the crowd in Las Vegas for the all-important event that kicks off everything tech for the year - the 2013 International CES. It's a week where geeks and geek-wannabes from around the world seek inspiration and recharge their creative juices. Consumer brands of all types came out in full force, even with the noticeable absence of Apple and Microsoft's presence. More than 150,000 attendees made the trek to what became a technology mecca for the week... But why should MSOs care about a "consumer" electronics show? more

Some Observations on Reachability of Egyptian Networks and Providers

Different media are reporting that Internet and other forms of electronic communications are being disrupted in Egypt. Presumably after a government order in response to the protests. Looking at BGP data we can confirm that according to our analysis 88% of the ‘Egyptian Internet’ has fallen of the Internet. In this post I’ll share some observations I made with regards to the reachability of Egyptian networks and providers. more

Is Teleworking Here to Stay?

Broadband networks are stretched thin today due to the large numbers of adults and students working from home. There are many stories on the web that indicate that a lot of employees are not going to be going back to the office when the pandemic is over. Here are two stories about a trend towards more teleworking from the dozens that a Google search uncovered. more

Content - The Next Regulatory War Zone

At the 2014 TelSoc Charles Todd Oration the former Chair of the ACCC, Graeme Samuel, warned against the looming content monopoly... "There is a constant risk that the exclusive tie-up of rights to content for new and emerging markets will allow the right holders to shut out competition across a wide range of services delivered over new networks." He didn't think that the current telcos have the right expertise to enter the content market... more

Somalia’s Extended Internet Outage Results in Millions of Dollars of Loss per Day, Says Government

Somalia's internet connection was finally restored on Monday after weeks of outage due to a severed undersea cable. more

ITU Becomes Trans-Sectoral

Very little was said about telecommunications during the official speeches and forums at ITU Telecom World 2009. The industry is even talking about changing its focus from telecommunications to ICT [United Nations Information and Communication Technologies Task Force], Discussions are now focusing on how ICT can be used to underpin the various socio-economic developments that are taking place. more

Renesys Chronicles Today’s Internet Blackout in the Sudan (Now Restored)

The team over at Renesys has once again provided a great analysis of an Internet outage in a country, this time in Sudan. In the article simply titled "Internet Blackout in Sudan", Doug Madory writes: A few hours ago, we observed a total Internet blackout in Sudan and, as we publish this blog, the Internet remains largely unavailable. By count of impacted networks, it is the largest national blackout since Egypt disconnected itself in January 2011..." more

Be Wary of 5G Hardware

We've now entered the period of 5G competition where the wireless carriers are trying to outdo each other in announcing 5G rollouts. If you believe the announcements, you'd think 5G is soon going to be everywhere. Device manufacturers are joining the fray and are advertising devices that can be used with the early carrier 5G products. Buyers beware -- because most of what the cellular companies and the manufacturers are hyping as 5G is not yet 5G. more

Trump Orders Cyberattacks by US Companies

It is supremely ironic. A rogue national leader with the stroke of a pen, dictates that its companies will expose a foreign company's end users to cyberattacks. This is the net effect of denying security patches or operating system updates pursuant to Trump's order. In the US Great Rogue Leader's bizarro world, this is the very behavior that he claims makes his actions necessary. In fact, this Trump malware attack is worse because of the mass exposure to exploits. more

The Exponential S-Curve Hastens Decline of Asset Values

At the moment we are facing the end stage of a relatively large range of traditional products and services. The reason for this is that for a long time traditional industries have been able to delay the arrival of the decline phase of many of their products, basically because of the monopolistic, or at least dominant, structures of many of the industry sectors -- and in particular telecoms, media, energy and banking. more

“Non-Discriminatory” Broadband: Just Carriage, or Miscarriage of Justice?

The foundational idea behind "net neutrality" is one of fairness by constraining ISP power over network mechanisms. The theory is this: if there is "non-discriminatory" local traffic management, then you have "fair" global outcomes to both users and application providers. There are thousands of pages of academic books making this assumption, and it is the basis of recent EU telecoms law. more

Reaching Critical Mass for Gigabit Connections

The statistics concerning the number of gigabit fiber customers in the US is eye-opening. OpenVault tracks the percentage of customers provisioned at various broadband speeds. At the end of 2019, the company reported that 2.81% of all households in the US were subscribed to gigabit service. By the end of the first quarter of 2020, just after the onset of the pandemic, the percentage of gigabit subscriptions had climbed to 3.75% of total broadband subscribers. more

The Issue of Market-Initiated Competition in Telecoms

Many political discussions are taking place all over the world about how to best stimulate national or provincial telecommunications infrastructure investments against the background of current market dynamics. In this context the question often revolves around whether there is a market failure and, if so, does the government have a role to play here to address the matter, or can it be left for the market to sort out. more

Loon Balloons Restore Internet After a Massive Earthquake Strikes Remote Parts of Peru

On Sunday, when a magnitude 8.0 earthquake struck remote parts of Peru’s Amazon region, at the request of the government of Peru and Telefónica, Alphabet re-directs a group of its Loon balloons to the impacted area to restore Internet access. Within 48 hours, people on the ground had wireless broadband communication, reports Alphabet. more

Aircell vs. VoIP

Last week American Airlines launched their Aircell wireless Internet access on a limited number of flights. It didn't take long before a few folks tried to make voice and video calls (in violation of Aircell's terms-of-service according to their PR folks), and it didn't take long before someone figured a way around their voice/video blocking efforts. more