AT&T Distributes "PayPal Here"

PayPal Here, PayPal's point of sale dongle for smart phones and tablets,  is now available at 1,800 AT&T retail stores across the United States. 

You might wonder why AT&T would do so, since it is not a formal partner of PayPal Here in other respects. In fact, the move is not directly part of the Isis mobile wallet service, either. 

AT&T began selling the Square mobile point of sale dongle in August 2012 as well. 

The obvious upside for AT&T is that Square and PayPal Here dongles only can be used on Apple iPhone and Android smart phones, and that the availability of the dongles helps AT&T sell some incremental number of devices and service plans, to customers who generally represent higher average revenue per account.

At the same time, the move better positions AT&T as a supplier of small business mobile solutions. 

New Google, Apple, Microsoft Devices Coming Week of Oct. 23, 2012

Apple’s ‘iPad mini’ release on October 23 will be followed by Microsoft’s Windows Phone 8 introduction on October 29, will be matched by Google's introduction of  a number new devices. The new Google devices include a 10-inch tablet "Mini."

Google Results Show Mobile Danger to PC-Based Revenue Models

Eric Jackson, founder and managing member of hedge fund Ironfire Capital, has argues that it is not impossible for Google to substantially fail in five to eight years, as advertising shifts to mobile apps. There are two angles to the looming danger.

First, people now are "finding things" using apps other than search. That threatens the search advertising business that underpins Google's current success. The other angle is that attention and advertising revenues already are starting to shift to mobile formats, as opposed to "PC-based" online venues. 

Jackson's forecast  might be a bit more aggressive than some others think, as search continues to grow, as a percentage of total online ads. But there is widespread thinking that mobile is where the growth will occur. 

But mobile is going to be a game changer, virtually all application providers believe. 

According to the company’s earnings report, Google's profit losses in the quarter were caused by flagging ads revenue, in which the amount paid by advertisers to Google’s click-per-click has decreased by 15 percent, earnings report suggests.  

On the other hand, some might counter, Google is making a transition rather well. About half of all U.S. mobile ad spending goes toward search ads, more than the roughly 47 percent of total digital spending in Web search, according to eMarketer Inc. 

Google takes a 95 percent share of mobile-search revenue in the U.S., estimates eMarketer. 

U.S. Consumers Pay More for LTE, But What Does it Mean?

U.S consumers pay more for their Long Term Evolution service than consumers in other markets, a study by the GSM Association shows. 

LTE data is pricier in the United States than in Europe, according to a recent report from London-based GSM Association subsidiary Wireless Intelligence. 

On average, Europeans pay about $2.50 for 1 gigabyte of data downloaded on an LTE, or Long Term Evolution network, according to Wireless Intelligence. 

 In contrast, Verizon Wireless charges $7.50 per gigabyte  in an unlimited shared data plan and $5.50 per gigabyte in a regular, data-only plan. 

Analyst Roger Entner argues that scarce spectrum explains the pricing differences.

	USA	Germany	France	Spain	UK	Italy	South Korea
Subscribers in millions	322.8	109.8	63.2	57.3	75.7	91.2	51.8
Spectrum Assigned in MHz	409.5*	615	375	625	375	270	270
Potentially Usable Spectrum in Pipeline in MHz	50	Recently auctioned 350	250	59.6 and recently auctioned 250	310	250	120
MHz/million subscribers	1.3	5.6	5.9	10.9	4.9	3.0	5.2
* Figure includes AWS‐1, 700 MHz spectrum not yet in use and 55.5 MHz of spectrum at 2.5GHz

Source: 4G Americas, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, regulatory and company websites, press reports and Recon Analytics



Others might argue that mandatory wholesale policies account for the retail price differences. 

Even if you think U.S. wireless data prices are “too high” today, the competitive process should work, over time, as it has with other services. 

Consider the competition for wireless voice services, which has played out over a decade. 

According to Merrill Lynch, the United States enjoyed a lower price for voice services on a per-minute-of-use basis ($0.03) than France ($0.10), Germany ($0.08), or the UK ($0.08) in the fourth quarter of 2011.

Still, as a rule, retail service prices are priced in some direct relationship to costs of creating the underlying networks. And costs are higher in the United States. 

Others have argued that "lack of competition" has in the past accounted for higher prices. 

  Broadband Service Speed and Price (High Tier)

Country	Downstream	Upstream	Price
Canada[3]	25	7	$67
Denmark[4]	40	2	$72
Finland[5]	24	1	$67
Hong Kong[6]	100	Unlisted	$38
Japan[7]	200	100	$60
South Korea[8]	100	Unlisted	$29
Sweden[9]	100	100	$46
Taiwan[10]	100	5	$37
U.K.[11]	50	Unlisted	$57
United States[12]	50	20	$145

Some have noted that in 2010, for example, he United States was the most expensive of the ten countries surveyed for high tier broadband service. 

The broadband services available internationally include prices as low as $26 a month for a 100 Mbps connection in South Korea and speeds as fast as a 200 Mbps connection in Japan for $60 a month.

While broadband service with speeds of 100 Mbps is available in Taiwan for $37 a month, $38 a month in Hong Kong, and $46 a month in Sweden, broadband is half the speed for over three times the price in the United States,  where 50 Mbps service costs $145 a month. 

Other countries surveyed joining the U.S. in the slower half of high tier speeds cost less than half the price

Country	Downstream	Upstream	Price
Canada[13]	2	800 Kbps	$31
Denmark[14]	2	512 Kbps	$30
Finland[15]	1	512 Kbps	$36
Hong Kong[16]	1.5	Unlisted	$13
Japan[17]	1	512 Kbps	$34
South Korea[18]	8	640 Kbps	$26
Sweden[19]	1	1	$19
Taiwan[20]	3	768 Kbps	$14
U.K.[21]	10	Unlisted	$30
United States[22]	1	1	$35

When comparing the low tier broadband service offerings of other countries the United States has in the past faired slightly better with prices closer to the middle of the pack but often for slower speeds. 

The United States was among the most expensive of the countries surveyed when comparing the price per megabit for low tier broadband service. 

All of those arguments have some merit. Still, one still has to account for the relative level of retail prices in markets around the world, as well, as well as the "cost" of products as a percentage of income or discretionary income, for example. 

The absolute level of prices across different countries might be less significant than the relative cost of communications goods in terms of consumer purchasing power. 

In other words, one country might have costs per megabyte that are twice as high as another country, but average income might also be twice. 

Finally, retail pricing might also reflect the underlying cost of construction or operations, inlcludin such matters as government subsidies or funding. 

"The End of Windows?"

Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff quips that Microsoft’s Windows 8 operating system will be “the end of Windows” and that “Windows is irrelevant.” Hyperbole aside, there is a clear shift of consumer interest toward tablet devices for what we used to call "computing." 

Tablets aren't likely to displace PCs for many content creation and work tasks anytime soon, though. 

Windows Phone 8 Phones Could be Delayed On Verizon Network

Windows Phone 8 on the Verizon Wireless network could be delayed or could even be canceled, according to Daily Mobile, because Verizon Wireless wants remote device management and Microsoft seems not to want to do so. 

it seems odd for matters to get this far without being resolved, but that's the rumor. 

Now "Cows Can Text"

"Cows can text,"  thanks to machine-to-machine communication tools supplied by Deutsche Telekom and sensors such as the Vel'Phone and HeatPhone solutions supplied by French monitoring solutions experts MEDRIA Technologies.

The application notifies farmers when calving begins or when a cow is on heat and ready for insemination. 

Deutsche Telekom and MEDRIA have formed a partnership and agreed to cooperate in equipping 5,000 farms around Europe with the application and with Telekom SIM cards.