The Wireless Association president and CEO Steve Largent sadly announced today the sudden death of Mark Desautels, 56, the association's Vice President of Wireless Internet Development.
Gay-friendly American Airlines is taking its experiment with Wi-Fi out of the trial stage and has decided to install "Gogo Inflight Internet" on more than 300 domestic aircraft over the next two years.
In December, Harris said it was looking at options for the majority-owned subsidiary, which included a possible spin-off, split-off, secondary public offering or the sale of all or part of its shares.
Comcast is suing a provider of wireless Internet service to condominiums for what it claims is the company’s practice of stealing its high-speed Internet service and re-selling it to others.
Comcast filed the lawsuit Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Baltimore against Frank Clark and his company, OceanNet in Ocean City, Maryland. OceanNet charges users $199 for 1 Year of service (about $16.58 a month for shared WiFi service) or $8.95 a day.
The lawsuit claims that OceanNet’s business model is to illegally tap into Comcast’s primary service lines and then resell the signal to OceanNet customers. Comcast claims Clark had taken out residential Internet accounts in his name at 35 different addresses. Comcast alleges Clark used the modems from these residential accounts to set up commercial accounts for OceanNet.
Comcast’s residential terms of service contain a provision that the service can only be used at the address of the user.
Ira P. Rothken, an Internet law expert and founder of the Rothken Law Firm in Novato, Calif., said he thought that would be one of the toughest arguments OceanNet would have to overcome.
“It sounds like Comcast has a strong case here,” Rothken said. “Especially since it deals with consumer accounts and monetizing them like he is an Internet service provider — basically reselling bandwith.”
On Thursday, Clark said he planned to fight the lawsuit and declined to comment on the specifics of the case. However, he said Comcast signals are often used to power wireless networks at places like Internet cafes and other businesses that charge users for access.
“This is a practice that happens throughout any city,” Clark said.
Clearwire’s terms of service, by contrast, appear much more liberal and actually encourage individuals to create WiFi hotspots using their wireless broadband backbone.
Clearwire today issued a press release launching the Clear Spot. With the Clear Spot, any “off-the-shelf” Wi-Fi enabled device such as an iPhone, notebook computer, or Nintendo DS among others, can connect to the Internet via the Clear 4G mobile WiMAX network. The CLEAR Spot router, manufactured by CradlePoint, will be available for $139 at CLEAR stores and authorized dealers or online at www.clear.com in early-April.
CTIA 2009 starts April 1st with Google, Microsoft, Nokia and RIM looking smart. Meanwhile, optimistic projections of cellphone growth just six months ago, are now looking foolish.
The cellular industry now claims 4 billion people on the planet are connected wirelessly. But the trillion dollar industry cannot avoid the global economic crisis. IDC recently reported that handset sales were down some 12.6 percent in the 4th quarter of 2008. Strategy Analytics predicted last month that the global mobile phone market would shrink 9% in 2009.
At the Mobile World Congress last month in Barcelona, Microsoft’s AppStore was largely sidelined by Android and Symbian, and even Palm’s WebOS. But at the US equivalent, this week’s Cellular Telephone Industry Association convention in Las Vegas, Microsoft is talking up its agreement with LG, which will result in 50 new Windows Mobile products over the next three years. And their Windows Marketplace for Mobile (video).
Monday announced more than two dozen partners for its upcoming Windows Marketplace for Mobile, including EA Mobile, Pandora, and Netflix. Users with Windows-based phones will be able to buy apps with their credit cards or have the purchases posted to their mobile phone bills.
Windows Mobile 6.5 will have improvements to the user experience, including a greater emphasis on touch controls; “dramatically better” mobile Web browsing; expanded music, video and other consumer-oriented capabilities. It will be on the LG-GM7300 and HTC’s Touch Diamond 2 and Touch Pro 2 which will be upgradeable to Windows Mobile 6.5. Version 7 is set to come in 2010.
CTIA 2009 will showcase mobile web stores and applications.
C/Net is heading to Las Vegas for CTIA 2009. Take a look at what they’re expecting to see there.
Google News has more stories including, Microsoft’s AppStore, AT&T Announces Six Phones with Keyboards such as Samsung’s Impression and Magnet, Airvana’s ‘Connected Digital Home’, Motorola’s LTE eNodeB, Hot Trends at CTIA and CTIA exhibitor news
American will move from the trial phase by installing Aircell's Gogo Inflight Internet on 300 domestic aircraft over the next two years, the company said Tuesday.
Thousands of passengers traveling on more than a dozen of American's Boeing 767-200 airplanes have had access to the in-flight Internet service on nonstop flights between New York's JFK and San Francisco, Los Angeles and Miami.
"Our trial over the past six months offered customers the choice to remain connected to work, home or elsewhere when flying on American Airlines," said Dan Garton, American's executive vice president of marketing. "And it also gave us the ability to study customers' willingness to take advantage of high-speed, onboard connectivity and to gauge how the service performed technically in a variety of settings over an extended period of time."
"Customer feedback was extremely positive and, as a result, we will be working with American to bring Gogo to domestic MD-80 aircraft and B737 aircraft as quickly as possible," said John Happ, executive vice president of airlines at Aircell. "We are pleased that the results were positive and that we have decided to move forward."
Live Access
Aircell's Gogo service, which uses three antennas installed outside the airplane to connect to Aircell's mobile broadband network, allows passengers to surf the Web, check e-mail, send instant messages, and also gives passengers access to a corporate virtual private network.
Once the plane reaches 10,000 feet, passengers get the okay to turn on Wi-Fi devices, including PDAs, smartphones and laptops. Cell-phone and Voice over Internet Protocol services are not provided.
"In-flight Internet is extremely important to travelers, evidenced by American's decision to expand Gogo service beyond their existing Gogo-equipped aircraft," Happ...
Based on Intel's Nehalem microarchitecture, the new Xeon 5500 processors have showcased groundbreaking advances in performance, virtualization and workload management, according to Intel Senior Vice President Patrick Gelsinger. "As the Internet expands toward our vision of 15 billion connected devices by 2015, the Xeon 5500 will also be a foundational technology for the transformation of Internet infrastructure," he said.
The industry is currently aligned on a cloud-computing vision in which applications are served from optimized hardware -- making them available on demand and scalable, Gelsinger noted. "Executing to this vision requires underlying technology that incorporates the adaptability, capability, and intelligence of our newest Xeon processor," he said.
A Big Play
More than 230 systems based on the Xeon 5500 processor are already in the works at more than 70 system manufacturers around the world, including Cisco, Dell, Fujitsu, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Sun Microsystems, and others. One reason is that Intel is making "a big play" when it comes to processor power consumption, said Matthew Wilkins, a principal analyst at iSuppli.
"Successive generations of microprocessors are now delivering more performance and consuming less energy," Wilkins said. "If your organization runs a data center or server farm with hundreds, even thousands, of systems or microprocessors, moving to newer, more efficient microprocessors can deliver cost savings through a reduction of power consumption."
The Xeon 5500 integrates automated energy-efficiency enhancements that provide users with greater control of energy expenditures. For example, achieving a processor idle power level of only 10 watts will enable a 50 percent reduction in system idle power compared to the previous chip...
American Airlines announced today that it’s joining rival Delta Air Lines (DAL) in making Wi-Fi Internet connections available to most domestic passengers, and across its entire fleet of some 600 aircraft, reports USA Today.
American was the first U.S. airline to launch the Gogo service last August. Since then, thousands of customers traveling on 15 of American’s Boeing 767-200 aircraft have enjoyed Inflight Internet service primarily on nonstop flights between New York JFK and San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Miami.
American, No. 2 in the world in passenger traffic after Delta acquired Northwest Airlines last year, says it will install the Aircell system on its domestic MD-80 and Boeing 737-800 aircraft fleets, beginning with 150 MD-80 aircraft this year.
Delta plans to roll out Wi-Fi across its entire fleet in 2009 using the Aircell system. Virgin America expects to have its fleet of 28 planes outfitted with Aircell’s Gogo Wi-Fi by the end of June.
Southwest Airlines is using a satellite connection from Row 44 and Alaska Airlines may follow while JetBlue is using its own flavor of wireless with complimentary email, shopping and instant messaging. JetBlue and other airlines, such as Continental, use LiveTV’s satellite-based television programming service. JetBlue, which owns LiveTV, won rights to 1 MHz of the 800-MHz spectrum last year for their internet service.
Aircell’s price for the Gogo service ranges from $7.95 to $12.95 based on length of flight and whether the device is a handheld PDA or a laptop computer. Aircell’s pricing plans are:
The service will be available only after planes reach 10,000 feet so it doesn’t interfere with communications between the cockpit and air traffic control.
Related DailyWireless stories include; Alaska Airlines Tests Wi-Fi, Southwest Air Tests PlaneFi, American Airlines Launches Wi-Fi, Aircell WiFi on Delta Airlines, Aircell: We Be 4G, Aircell Takes Off, Row 44: Cleared for Take Off, Bill Banning Airplane Calls Moves Ahead, JetBlue Buys Airfone, FAA: Go For Aircell Launch , Aircell Vs Row44: Two for Two, FlyFi Takes Off, Lufthansa & AA Trying WiFi — Again, Inflight Phones Banned by FAA?, AirCell on Virgin by 2008, Wireless Voice on Airplanes? Yes & No, AirCell Demos Inflight WiFi, Aircell for Planes, FCC Rules on Airplane Cellular, Connexion On Again?, Dis Connexion.
Google has pulled tethering apps from the Android Market, reports Android Community. According to at least one developer, who contributed to the WiFi Tether for Root Users app (for the Android DevPhone 1), Google are citing their distribution agreements with carriers as the prompt for removal:
“Google enters into distribution agreements with device manufacturers and Authorized Carriers to place the Market software client application for the Market on Devices. These distribution agreements may require the involuntary removal of Products in violation of the Device manufacturer’s or Authorized Carrier’s terms of service” Google Developer Distribution Agreement
That agreement, when taken with T-Mobile’s terms of service that do not permit tethering, has given Google reason to pull the software from official distribution. It’s a decision that has raised more questions over just how “open” the Android platform is:
“Android phones are supposed to be released for other carriers in the future, right? Does this mean that apps in the Market have to adhere to the ToS for only T-Mobile, even when other carriers sign on? Will all apps have to adhere to the ToS for every carrier that supports Android phones?”
As wireless carriers begin to subsidize computers that come with wireless Internet access, they're faced with a quandary: What do they do if the buyer stops paying his bills? The company can cut off the computer's wireless access, but the carrier would still be out a couple of hundred dollars.
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