I wanted to see for myself as to what the hoopla about the 3G services is all about. Over the past few months, I have shifted to Linux Mint Debian having given up Ubuntu all together. Hence, I was keen to know about how their product worked in Linux.

There are excellent guides available to enable your wireless networking on your Debian and then choosing Tata’s apn to access the Internet. I would not go in those details. I had used a 3G stick and after ensuring the proper network coverage, on a Windows machine, added it to my Debian based laptop. Although recognized, it failed to connect on to network and neither there was any way to install the company issued dialer.

However, it worked fine in Windows world; it was auto-recognized and I could work on that. What I noticed was the horrible lag and the ping times, clearly making it useless for any one for online gaming. It’s next to impossible. At the same time, the video buffering was relatively smooth although nothing to write home about.

With pathetic “download limits” and huge costs, I had to nix the plan of going in for Tata Docomo; although I must confess that they have a reasonably good customer care. My point of contact has been their on line chat and their email’s work, albeit very late. This, in my opinion, is better than the other companies who don’t give a shit about after sales.

Would you go in for an expensive hardware and huge recurring monthly expenses? 3G is NOT for the data but for more efficient spectrum utilization. The voice market dominates because these operators have no intention of improving on the value added services.

Thats where their bread and butter lies. If 3G data services were really to become “cheap”, to so called “market forces” would determine the outcome. I find it amusing when people crow about prices coming down eventually. There would never be an “unlimited plan” because shoring up the capacity on wireless networks is a huge sunk in investment which is not easy to recover.

For the time being, this is a worst case alternative to a proper wireline/wifi model. If you don’t have any other frigging option in this heartless world, go for it.

 

Tags: 3G, 3G, Broadband, data services, docomo, GUI, Internet, laptop, Linux, Mobile Service Providers, Opera, Personal Experiences, Spectrum, Tata, Tata, US, Value Added Services, Value Added Services (VAS), Wifi, Windows, Wireless

Opera Mini‘s reports on the state of mobile web are likely to be a true reflection of the mobile access and hence a surrogate marker of what’s popular at the given point in time. I am reproducing the snapshot of the Internet traffic here:

http://imgur.com/PZwCF

If you look carefully, bulk of the developing and the underdeveloped countries utilize the mobile web to access social networking sites. US (and some other developed economies) are lower down the scale.

Interestingly, the data transferred per user is a pathetic 7 MB (averaged over the month perhaps?) which means that operators are still being generous with their limits. However,  this is a crude approximation. For once, we have a clear proof that mobile internet is definitely a part of their value added services kitty but is NOT the revenue driver for them. They are offering it because there is no alternative.

This also explains their aggressive stance to get the 3G spectrum; primarily to add more voice customers than to offer data services.

If you look at the snapshot of the popular phones, Nokia is still leading the pack but majority of them are NOT smartphones. These java based handsets are pathetic in terms of functionality and at best useful for “checking the status updates” on Facebook.

A surprise entry is that of “Micromax” handset; they have capitalized on aggressive marketing and low price entry point.

Unfortunately, this does not portend good for the broadband initiatives. A cursory glance at the top sites (Google leads the pack) is only indicative. Google has benefited from being the default search engine on the browser and hence the port of call for any search. I barely use my handset for GPRS (or EDGE) for web surfing because smartphones (and their form factor) is basically useless to transact anything useful. For me, the only reason to invest is for email.

Nevertheless, this report can again be questioned in terms of “growth of users”. It is not clear about how the methodology has been arrived at and what has constituted the “growth in real terms”. However, one thing is clear. Most of the web sites focused on Indian content don’t have mobile strategies to counter the growth in the user base. Pathetic.

Indeed, with majority of the young adults unable to read/write or even engage in meaningful conversations on Indian polity, this “dumbification” was expected.

Facebook, although shows some presence (in terms of mobile access), mobile broadband is still “not hot” in US of A. There could be myriad factors but then Opera’s state of web access is best a “snapshot” of the handsets and it’s deal with the OEM‘s to bundle the product.

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• New mobile Web Google Maps highlights sorry state of native iOS app (arstechnica.com)
• Small world on small screens (opera.com)
• Google Maps For Mobile Updates With More Features (techie-buzz.com)
• Half of India uses Internet only through Mobile [Infographic] (trak.in)
• Mobile Web Content in East Africa [Report] (whiteafrican.com)
• Mobile Web in India grows 308% – Micromax one of the most popular mobiles to access Internet (trak.in)
• Opera to supply its mobile browser solution to Spreadtrum (opera.com)
• Book Review: Professional Mobile Web Development (books.slashdot.org)
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• Maxis customers to surf the Internet up to six times faster with the Maxis-Opera Mini browser (opera.com)
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• More Features in Google Maps for Mobile Browsers (mt-soft.com.ar)
• Google revamps Google Maps browser edition for iOS and Android (mobile-ent.biz)
• Saatchi mobile marketer: Mobile web is better value than apps (briefingmedia.wordpress.com)
• State of the Mobile Web (francescofederico.net)
• Why I’m Not Excited About Mobile Applications (samirbalwani.com)
• 58% Of Mobile Web Users Get Their Content Fix Through Browsers: Jumptap (techcrunch.com)
• Mobiltel joins the Opera Mini adventure (opera.com)

Tags: 2G, 3G, 3G, android, API, Broadband, conversation, data services, default search engine, Digital Divide, DoT, East Africa, EDGE, Facebook, Google, GPRS, handsets, India, Internet, Internet Access Devices, internet traffic, Java, Media, Micromax, Mobile, mobile access, Mobile Browsers, Mobile Service Providers, mobile web, Mobiles, NOK, Opera, Opera Mini, Proprietary Software, search engine, Smartphones, smartphones, Social, Spectrum, Spectrum, techcrunch.com, Telecommunications India, traffic, underdeveloped countries, US, Value Added Services, Value Added Services (VAS), Web Sites, web surfing

For long, I have felt the need to do a “consumer survey” which is motivated by real customers than the paid for shit stuff that most telecom operators crow about. It is impossible to capture data from the cross section of the user population and the retards who crowd on the forums would not be able to grasp the import of this exercise.

I realize the difficulties inherent in this exercise immediately. First and the foremost is lack of actual “complaint data”; TRAI does put up the figures online but there is a mechanism where these operators have to report back the action taken on the complaints. This is a good mechanism but I don’t see it enforced or whatever TRAI does, they are clueless idiots to make this data work for a better policy formulation.

Ditto for the existing delivery of the complaint mechanism. An aggrieved customer calls the operator in call center, is given a complaint number (not always) and no time frame for the resolution. I am presuming that their workflow is designed for the said purpose. Like any corporate organization working on “cost savings”, this is possibly “outsourced”. A smart team utilizes “dumb terminals” clogging up the bandwidth for most of “executives”. All the while, these brainless sods make the customers wait even more utilizing the spectrum.

This is a “presumption” but this workflow is bound to keep the customers “unhappy”. Billing and metering issues are definitely top of the list; unfortunately, even these thorny issues are not resolved in their entirety.

What needs to be done? Actually, this could easily be a dissertation exercise, capture and visualize the data and present a solid case report to the telecom companies. However, the implementation needs money and I am unlikely to see any movement on that count.

I could help with some possible criteria; reach me on the email (under “contact”).

One more thing. Reliance, Aircel and Airtel easily top the shit list.

Related articles

• TRAI: Maximum Subscriber Complaints Over Last 3 Years Against Airtel Followed By Reliance and Vodafone (telecomjunction.wordpress.com)
• India sends notices to Aircel over network roll out – official (reuters.com)
• India’s Telecom Regulator Proposes Quota for Local Equipment (pcworld.com)
• DND registry (manavaidurai.wordpress.com)

Tags: Aircel, Airtel, DTH, Idiots, India, Media, Opera, Reliance, Spectrum, Telecommunications India, TRAI, Vodafone