Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Google - AT&T battle

Today, FCC will decide the rules of their new auction of 700 MHz wireless spectrum. This spectrum has the ability to provide broadband access on cellphone to everyone and is able to transmit through walls and houses.  
In short, watching online videos/movies on cellphone will be a reality soon. Or will it? Many of us (who do not own an Apple iPhone!), never feel like going online through cellphone 
and watching a video on YouTube.  Not only because it is so expensive to do anything online on a cellphone, 
but also because our phones do not support it. And my phone is just an year old. 
It sounds ridiculous because internet is now more than 10 years old 
and phones have been talking about providing internet access since then. 
Hopefully, things could change!
Google is asking FCC for providing open access to this new spectrum. This open access means 1) Users can use any mobile device on the spectrum 
(so no worries about switching to AT&T for an iPhone!)
2) User can download and install any applications on their mobile devices
(real messenger support could be a reality) 3) Users can visit any websites. Another important aspect of open access that Google is bargaining is that the winners  have to sell the part of their spectrum to other players at only wholesale rate. This means that other new players can also buy small chunks of wireless spectrum later and introduce their services. This means that we will no longer be limited to only a few service providers who  charge 
anything from an arm to a leg to provide limited internet access. 
Hopefully, FCC members will see the light. If they accept Google conditions for open access,
we will have another internet revolution on cellphone. 
 

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