Sprint to Launch LTE in Former CDMA Spectrum

Sprint executives now are explaining how they will launch Long Term Evolution services on the Sprint network, using the 1900 MHz spectrum.

If the implications are not clear, it means Sprint has decided to start using the LTE air interface in the same spectrum it presently uses to support its 3G CDMA network.

That means a complete upgrade to LTE across the entire Sprint footprint, cannibalizing CDMA spectrum.

Some had thought Sprint would use the 800-MHz spectrum freed up by the shut down of the iDEN network, or perhaps spectrum made available by Clearwire. It appears Sprint simply has decided it cannot wait, and is going to start pulling 3G spectrum off line as it adds LTE services in the same frequencies.

Sprint executives expect that by the end of 2013, 275 million potential users (PoPs) will be covered by the LTE network, including 100 percent of the area where Sprint's 4G WiMAX services now exist.

The move is highly significant, as it means Sprint is going to move fairly quickly to upgrade CDMA users to LTE.

Sprint to use CDMA bands for LTE

Social Media Can Drive 20% to 40% Higher Spending

A recent survey of more than 3,000 consumers by Bain & Company found that customers who engage with companies over social media spend 20 percent to 40 percent more money with those companies than other customers. They also demonstrate a deeper emotional commitment to the companies, granting them an average 33 points higher Net Promoter score, a common measure of customer loyalty.

Up to this point, a disproportionate share of those results appear to have been reaped the big early adopters.

The gap between the early adopters and those waiting to take the plunge has actually widened. While the average billion-dollar company spends $750,000 a year on social media, according to Bain & Company analysis, some early adopters such as Dell, Wal-Mart, Starbucks, JetBlue and American Express invest significantly more. In some instances, the investment is tens of millions of dollars.

Bain argues that social media can create value at virtually every stage of the sales funnel, from awareness to retention.

Putting social media to work

OSI is a Business Model

The Open Systems Interconnection model (OSI model) is the foundation for the way all software gets written these days. But the OSI model also is, in many ways, a way of describing the current communications business ecosystem as well.

The OSI model idea structurally separates seven functions, with "application" at layer seven and physical layer at layer one. That should strike you as describing the relationship  between  "over the top" applications of every sort and the network used to deliver the app.

As applied to any business using a software-heavy product, that means there can be a separation of facilities, entities using facilities to create "communication" or "content" services, and application creators. The form will follow the function, you might say. 

For software developers, service providers and consumers and users, the advantages of using the OSI model are numerous. OSI Model 

Features and apps can be created or changed without requiring modification of other parts of the complete communications "stack." In other words, a user can switch from one supplier of a word processing or instant messaging app to another without "changing networks." 

If a user wants to switch from Microsoft Office to Google Docs, that doesn't mean a PC or network access provider also has to be changed. 

A user can switch from one device to another without disrupting use of desired apps. Twitter should work on any brand of smart phone, or any brand of tablet or PC. 

At one level, everybody in the ecosystem wins. Because there is a compartmentalization of functions, changing one app for another, or a wireless network for a fixed network connection, should not disrupt use of an application. 

It's harder in practice than it is in theory. It still isn't easy to start a session of some type on a single device, then seamlessly transition to a different network and another device, without disrupting the session.

Some of you will quip here that it isn't always easy to sustain a single session, on a single network, using a single device, either. That's also true, but is not a defect of OSI! 

However, in principle, and over time, in practice, a user should be able to start a session of some sort (voice or video or Web app) and then maintain the session even when switching from one network to another, from fixed to mobile, for example. 

But there also are clear business implications. Though in the past networks got built to support one major application, these days networks are simply built to support any type of application, whether that is voice, video, Web sessions, text, documents, photos, music or any other types of digital information.

These days, it is technologically possible, and increasingly will be possible in business terms, to deliver anything, to anybody, on any device, in fairly elegant way at times, in reasonable ways at other times. That has serious business implications.

It means that firms "not in my business" can get into your business. Competitors increasingly do not need to "own and control" all the assets used at every level of the OSI software stack, including the physical layer assets. 

By the same token, think of collaboration using voice, messaging and web assets as an application. Webex is one example, but so are phone calls. A layer seven app can be run over any compliant network. You might note that bandwidth on every network is not yet consistently sufficient to support a collaboration app in such a way. That is true, but also changing. It won't be a problem much longer. 

And whether it is yet widely understood, or not, sooner or later app providers whose major products include entertainment video, voice, hosted PBX, videoconferencing and messaging will want to deliver those applications over the top. That also has implications.

In the legacy world, physical layer access was a matter of geography. A supplier needed permission from a government authority to operate a network, to support an application. Cable operators needed municipal permission to build a network to sell television. Telcos needed certificates of convenience and necessity. 

Cloud computing and OSI, plus widespread and universal broadband, changes much of that older model. A company that might also be a telco or cable company or ISP, might or might not "own" physical assets when creating and then delivering applications. 

A  product of the Open Systems Interconnection effort at the International Organization for Standardization, the OSI model is a way of allowing developers to create software in an abstracted way, without having to know all the details of other parts of how a particular network works. 

It also is an analogy for the way the communications and entertainment business already is starting to change. "Over the top" is not just something "other companies" do. It is something layer one asset owners also are starting to do. The only question, over time, is when over the top gets embraced more widely as "my" business strategy, not just "the other guy's strategy."

Faster Speeds, Greater Consumption

If new Suddenlink Communications caps on fixed network data consumption bear a reasonable relationship to user behavior, faster access speeds access providers will offer in the future are going to lead to greater consumption. In other words, giving people faster speeds is expected to lead to increased consumption.

The company's new pricing caps consumption at 150 Gbytes for access at advertised maximum speeds of 10 Mbps, with typical monthly consumption said to be 12 Gbytes for consumers buying that tier. For access between 10 Mbps and 20 Mbps, the monthly cap will be 250 Gbytes, with average consumption of about 22 Gbytes.

Services running faster than 20 Mbps will have a cap of 350 Gbytes, with expected average consumption of 95 Gbytes.

Those plans suggest it would be reasonable to expect monthly caps set at higher levels when services are available for very-fast access, and you can make your own guesses about what user behavior might be if services at 50 Mbps, 100 Mbps or 1 Gbps are made available.

Suddenlink Goes Live With Metered Broadband

End Telephone Subsidies, FCC Chairman Says

The overhaul of an "outdated" U.S. Federal Communications Commission program that subsidizes telephone service in rural areas will lead to universally available broadband service in the U.S. by the end of the decade, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski says.

The issue will remain contentious, as rural telcos likely won't be happy no matter what the ultimate outcome. It is fair to note that USF reform has been a problem for decades, and hasn 't been "fixed" yet, since every change creates new revenue winners and losers.

Genachowski's proposal to revamp the Universal Service Fund (USF), unveiled Thursday, would transition the fund away from subsidies for traditional telephone service and toward broadband. The fund, with an annual budget of about US$8 billion, would start paying for broadband deployment to areas now unserved in 2012.

Genachowski called the current USF system "unfair" and "broken" and scheduled a vote on his proposal for later this month. In some cases, USF is paying telephone carriers $20,000 a year to provide service to a single customer, and the system pays subsidies to multiple carriers in some areas, he said.

End Telephone Subsidies, Build Broadband

How an iPad Browser Could Change the Way You Search

Lots of companies have reasons to want to reduce the role "search" plays in helping people find things, for obvious reasons. They compete with Google in some way, so changing the value of traditional search will weaken Google. But end users might have other needs that open the door. Touch screen interfaces might make possible different ways to find information.

Carlos Bhola, the founder of a startup called Kikin hopes to replace it with a “touch to learn” search — one that opens within the page you’re on. touch to learn

Users of Kikin’s new iPad browser simply touch any word or phrase they want to learn more about. A small box appears with a list of search results pulled from a variety of engines such as Google, Wolfram Alpha and the Amazon database. Tapping on a hotel name in a Kayak listing, for instance, immediately pulls up price listings from other travel sites.

How an iPad Browser Could Change the Way You Search

If you use an iPad, Go See This

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