cell carriers and WiFi

[Tom Metro]

Rich Braun wrote:
> It's interesting to see how the US technology marketplace has developed vs.
> that of other countries.  The whole VoIP thing might wind up being a moot
> point because Americans are jumping into mobile phones, leaving behind
> landlines and their long-distance pricing scheme.
...
> Our future direction will instead probably require TCP/IP apps on our
> mobile phones, to bypass the oligopoly.
> 
> Unless Verizon figures out a way to stop it.  Hmmph.

The technology is available now for VoIP phones that work on WiFi. The 
cell carriers, if they wanted, could shift their focus from providing 
cell service to a paid WiFi service. But that seems unlikely to happen. 
They like the control they have now. And it wouldn't surprise me to see 
them use patent lawsuits and everything else at their disposal to try 
and stop such products and services.

Given the way cell carriers act as gatekeepers over the kinds of phones 
(and software that runs on those phones) consumers see, I'm surprised to 
read that there are actually a few phone manufacturers that are starting 
to incorporate WiFi capability.

But I expect most of the innovation in this area to come from small 
phone manufacturers that don't already have ties to the major cell 
carriers. Like OpenMoko, for example, which is a mostly open source cell 
phone platform being developed by a Taiwanese company:

http://www.openmoko.com/

The infiltration of European standards, like GSM, which allows you to 
get a phone that isn't tied to a carrier, is the first step towards 
giving some control back to the consumers.

  -Tom

-- 
Tom Metro
Venture Logic, Newton, MA, USA
"Enterprise solutions through open source."
Professional Profile: http://tmetro.venturelogic.com/

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