Tag Archives: main stream media

Aircel Wifi: Is something being done?

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Demo showing seamless handover of a voice call...

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I have always supported Community Wifi Access. This is because mobile broadband is useless for heavy duty applications. 3G access is a passe’.

Aircel has not responded to my queries and neither I am interested to follow them up. I had earlier emailed them about the promotion of mobile apps. It isn’t clear how they were developed and what platform is supported.

But I was genuinely surprised to see their advertisements in main stream media for Wifi access through smart platforms (phones/laptops/tablets). Although the adverts did allude to a “rosy picture”; it is not entirely clear as to how they propose to pull it off with no identified “backend”. More so, it is important that Wifi needs to be scaled up to residential areas so that they enough traction to call the shots as well as have a positive spin off on their recently launched 3G options.

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Community Networks

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This is response to one of the readers who has very kindly consented to write about it. Building and owning community networks is a fascinating idea but the major reason why they work or fail is the participation of the people around in the project.

There have been some attempts in the past (this post beautifully highlights what has been covered in India) However, practical suggestions apart, barring a mention in the media for the same, I have no clue about their present status.

One of the biggest obstacle in community funding is the funds. It’s impossible to get people excited about a shiny new broadband because of huge capital expenditure. One easy way out of this mess is to involve the Government to invest after negotiating long term rates with suppliers. This would make it easier and technically, BSNL and MTNL are public owned entities in their own right. It is a separate matter that their decision making is isolated from what is required to what is actually provided.

Hence, I don’t remain convinced about the community networks. There are ownership issues; we know in Indian model of “board membership” means a permanent way to swindle funds. Indians unfortunately, have lost touch with community participation and has remained in the hands of few well meaning NGO’s; some of them might get a mention in main stream media but no one talks about their failures.

However, running an Internet cafe on community lines is different from owning the actual line. Barring a nominal amount of capital expenditure (one needs funds for everything!), there is no other way any such model could sustain itself.

Year end blues

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The year is drawing to a close. Customarily, most of us tend to look back at what happened and have hopes for a better year. Yet, as it draws to close and drives us in the moronic schedules, I often wonder, why the hoopla at the end of each year anyway?

Yet, as pandora’s box at the end of the story revealed a beautful fairy called as Hope. I hope and therefore I look forward to.

Blogging has clearly established itself as an alternative means of information dissemination. It may not reflect the true picture; that’s because of the inherent biases. Yet, we DO need these alternative information channels. Governments of the future may try and scuttle the access but then there are always ways and means to circumvent them. Certain individuals like one Chaudari from a “respectable” management institute may have sued certain individual for “dispaaging comments”- yet none from the main stream media dares bite off it’s advertising cash cow.

We might well see a new form of entertainment stream open up- if Amit Khanna’s (Reliance Entertainment Division) hallucinations come true. It’s no small measure that he has been able to get column space for his rants and paint a rosy future about Broadband access- given the fact that the division he heads is clear laggard in the broadband game. In that case, 2006 may well be different with the entry of Reliance. Most of his posts seem to be culled from Internet; I won’t say pliagrised but still they don’t seem to have any truth to them.

BSNL might well get rid of the “ole geezers” like Dube who famously claimed that you need Pentium 4′s to run broadband. It would go as the most ridicolous statement of the year 2005. BSNL doesn’t have egg on it’s face and no one from the official line refuted my statement in Business Standard. Well, they seem to be saddled with such simple folks. And public paying for their existence.

Tata’s may well salvage their pride; they have been at the end of the stick on this blog. Let’s hope that they might better their performance in the coming months. They seem to reflect truck making mentality in manufacturing cars; similarly there is no refinement in their cellular services. This might as well change for other operators too. Hopefully.

The next year we would see the entry of foreign players in the muddled telecom market. Vodafone is already in here, albeit through back door. In fact, it isn’t India’s story that’s rocking. Vodafone has been on an acquisition spree. They have recently acquired a controlling stake in state run telecom company in Turkey. Despite the assertions to the contrary here, we might well see 3G services in vogue too. Vodafone seems perfectly poised for the same.

I believe that next year is going to be the year of Wireless. Since the last mile hassles still remain and BSNL sitting pretty on miles and miles of useless copper loops, companies would have no option except to scale up wireless solutions. Would that be suffice? I have my doubts. Wireless can’t support broadband access and there is no point in scaling up investments in a technology that hasn’t been standardised as yet widely. WiMax seems to be in the horizon; yet again, that’s for 2007 when it would make it’s debut.

Looking forward, I sincerely hope that we have some authoritative source for telecom. Most of the news written is simply a press handout, covered by rookie reporters and edited by those who have no specialised domain knowledge. At this point of time, I can only recommend, to a limited degree, Business World and Sunil Jain’s posts in Business Standard. These are measured write ups and written by people who have a clear insight in the issues.

Finally, I may have something good to write about on a regular basis. Personal blogging is dead; I wouldn’t call this as a “niche blog”, yet there is no other term for broadbandblog.in! I am seriously toying with the idea of expanding my horizons a bit to include media and perhaps lampoon other people who try to “blog” on telecom. Seriously, it would be fun! Specifically bunch of jokers in broadband.org.in They had copied and pasted my posts without giving any credit or linking to the source.

Let’s hope.