I don’t see how this is necessarily a contradiction. Cable companies and other TV broadcasters claim that there’s a limit to TV bandwidth, but rather than charging networks to put their channels on the signal, the carriers pay the networks to do so.

That there’s a limit to the amount of bandwidth and throughput possible, and that the companies have priced it within that limit so that it’s profitable, are not contradictory.

my bets for now are on clearwire. verizon, AT&T and the others will have a lot of catching up to do fast if they want a piece of the action.

spg

p.s. an economic slowdown means less subscriptions per person. those with fixed(DSL/cable) and mobile(3G laptop cards/dongles) will be dropping the fixed. thus even more demand on the networks.

http://mobilebroadbandblog.wordpress.com/2008/09/11/interesting-chart-on-mobile-broadband-pricing-premium-or-lack-thereof/

All the operators have quota-based broadband plans which is not something new. The intent is to discourage peer-to-peer users from abusing the network. Verizon Wireless has explicit restrictions on how their laptop users can or cannot use the service. The US has always been one of the most restrictive countries as far as mobile broadband is concerned.

http://mobilebroadbandblog.wordpress.com/2008/09/22/deeper-dive-into-mobile-broadband-growth-in-sweden/

When I jumped on Voicestream’s GPRS network way back in the day, I would have no doubt that I was one of the only users in Chicago using it right away. Before that, I was using some ultra-expensive GPRS provider whose name I can’t remember and who went out of business shortly after 9/11 (after trying to charge me $7000 for using my “unlimited national” GPRS during the 9/11 shutdown of the airports). Even back then, it was obvious that there wouldn’t be enough bandwidth overall to support the users that would eventually jump on the network.

3G isn’t making it any better. So called cloud or hive networks aren’t going to help. GPS’s with 3G, iPhones, and notebooks are jumping on the cell networks at record pace, surely. How are they going to handle doling out bandwidth when there might be hundreds of users on just on tower, competing with cell calls, VoIP over 3G, etc?

It ain’t going to happen. Overuse and abuse will happen. When my Comcast cable went out at one of my offices, I plugged in my iMate Ultimate 6150 (AT&T 3G) to the network and let my employees work that way. I can’t imagine how much data 6 users might have used in 3 business days before restoring the Comcast network. It’s an ugly topic.

I do believe that the providers can, and should, sell the bandwidth based on the user’s location and demand for bandwidth in the particular area the user is in. Developing software that would let the user monitor the going rate for data transmission real time is not difficult to develop at all. Until we get the jackboot thugs at the FCC to open up more bandwidth in general, we’re going to hit walls with 3G and all mobile technology (except maybe the femtocell stuff). WiFi doesn’t handle massive congestion of other routers well, and I don’t put my hope to any other wireless technologies out there.

I’ve been with T-Mobile since the day Voicestream hit Chicago, and they’ve promised 3G for years — too many years. We’re still with them for our voice minutes, but I use AT&T for the 3G service which works surprisingly well and I even get HSDPA speeds in many locations. My primary vehicle has an HSDPA/WiFi router 24/7 so clients and employees can go nuts while being driven to meetings, etc. But I do see speed drops consistently, especially during busy lunch breaks in Chicago proper or the 4pm rush to get work done.

In my opinion, mobile wireless is going to be hamstrung by the FCC, primarily, and by monopolization by the Big Three secondly. I’m taking advantage of it while I can, while looking at other realistic options. Currently my PDA phone jumps on FON routers first, open WiFi routers second, and 3G third. It’s a bit of a PITA, but it works decently. Battery life sucks, though.

I’m personally at a loss as to why developers are going the way of dedicated applications. Services which work in the cloud support the efforts of the carriers to push their data services, lower the capacity burden placed on their own servers, and provide developers a bigger footprint based on mobile browser support.

Why take on the overhead of this approach???

Best regards,

Curtis