In the last year, millions of people have snapped up new smartphones, filled them with apps and promptly found out that they couldn’t actually use them.

The problem? Either the much-hyped 3G pipeline was clogged with other users, or the cell connection wasn’t even good enough to ring the 3G bell in the first place. AT&T users have had it the worst, thanks to the network’s iPhone data hogs.

Carriers are quickly adding high-speed network capacity, but in the meantime, AT&T and T-Mobile are throwing another lifeline to customers in the form of Wi-Fi. Both are making it easier to connect to wireless hot spots with their phones, in an effort to deliver fast data and clear calls in areas where neither might be possible.

In this respect, AT&T has been the most aggressive of any carrier. The company said this month that customers with a Windows Mobile phone could now connect freely at any of the company’s roughly 20,000 hot spots.

AT&T claims to sell more Windows Mobile phones than any other carrier, and with the introduction of Windows Mobile version 6.5 next month and new Windows phones like the HTC Touch Pro2, it stands to sell more. Now all Windows Mobile users can duck into a Starbucks, among the many other locations with AT&T Wi-Fi, and the phone will automatically route data and calls over a high-speed Internet connection.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/24/technology/personaltech/24smart.html?em

The changes I would like to see the carriers implement on 3G would be called “traffic management”, more than the intrusive Deep Packet Inpsection and app blocking. It’s no business of the carrier’s what apps and services the subscriber is using, it is only their business that the individual customer not create so much data traffic as to stifle the traffic of other users.

Thus, bandwidth shaping, traffic management are probable in the near future, but I hope that they will be agnostic as to the application (P2P, tethering, video, web, or email) and related to the traffic (stream, chatty, batch, total transfer, peak hours).

From a consumer perspective, if I pay for 5GB/mo at best effor speed, then I bloody well expect it. Don’t filter, block, or impede my P2P of Slingbox use. If I’m not in violation of my ToS, then leave my packets alone. That’s a neutral network.

Net neutrality doesn’t mean “anything goes”. You can manage traffic and still remain a neutral network. It just means that there is no prejudice against the app that generates the traffic (Sling vs. Opera) or the server that is being used (Youtube vs. Vcast). Packets from all sources and all apps are managed equally based on network performance implications.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/24/technology/personaltech/24smart.html?_r=1&hpw

Good for consumers, bad for big wireless telcos (ATT, VZW)

http://news.cnet.com/8301-30686_3-10357806-266.html

“I don’t want to talk badly about any of our competitors, but the reality is the 3G network is not built for the broadband data speeds we’re talking about,” Morrow said. User experience with wireline (cable, fiber, DSL) broadband has caused wireless customers to become impatient with delays in accessing content, and after a few seconds of waiting, customers often give up accessing a site, multimedia file or application. Morrow cited studies showing that half of the data usage on the iPhone came from its WiFi connection, not its 3G connection. “Are we really enabling the full power of the mobile Internet if we’re restricting ourselves to the 3G network?” he asked rhetorically.

Morrow also said that the applications of the 3G world are just as applicable to “4G” networks (like CLEAR). In particular, he said, smartphones have quickly outgrown the 3G network.

Do you agree or disagree? As no smart phones have been announced for mobile WiMAX, what’s Morrow’s point about exploiting its potential on CLEAR?

For more on Professor Odlyzko’s thoughts on this subject, see:

http://www.wimax.com/commentary/blog/blog-2009/august-2009/mobile-internet-data-implications-for-the-wireless-industry-0816

Everywhere you go, you see people fondling their iPhone, caressing it like a loved one. In one sense, maybe it is a substitute or an extension of our loved ones, as it provides connections to our real and virtual loved ones. Maybe this emotional attachment is why people are willing to spend so much on data plans for their phones that, just a few years ago, would have been hard to believe.