I am quoting extensively from editorial in Scientific American. There is urgency in the lay press to spur on the debate on a wider scale to have “faster speeds”. We are fucking stuck up with the SAME 256kbps over the past few years WITHOUT any relief.
It could also be argued that it doesn’t apply to us but I’d argue that US and India are part of the same league as far as the issues are concerned. There is only a bit of difference; FCC is more responsive to criticism and at least is seen to “ACT”. Our dear regulator TRAI fails to even acknowledge the emails and act on rational decisions.
Any way, here’s what the rational arguments have to say about it: (emphasis mine)
“The average U.S. household has to pay an exorbitant amount of money for an Internet connection that the rest of the industrial world would find mediocre….The consequences are far worse than having to wait a few extra seconds for a movie to load. Because broadband connections are the railroads of the 21st century—essential infrastructure required to transmit products (these days, in the form of information) from seller to buyer—our creaky Internet makes it harder for U.S. entrepreneurs to compete in global markets>.”
The editorial goes on to say:
The same is not true in Japan, Britain and the rest of the rich world….You can choose from multiple companies, each of which has to compete on price and service. The only exceptions to this policy in the whole of the 32-nation Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development are the U.S., Mexico and the Slovak Republic, although the Slovaks have recently begun to open up their lines.
The slow speeds not only hurt our competitiveness but in the long run lowers the GDP as well. The biggest issue here is to “re-define” the speeds to ATLEAST 2mbps as the “minimum standard”. However, I see a potential rebellion from the cohorts of Tatas, Reliance and the crap companies like Beam/Shyam/Sify etc who provide the proverbial last mile link to the premises.
It is next to impossible to get to admit it but once the consumer awareness comes perhaps then we might see such editorials in our mainstream press too.
The rumored plans are here and a very interesting discussion in on in the forums.
I think that they have screwed it up given the fact that BSNL has upped the ante as far as tariffs are concerned. With the imminent launch of Airtel/ Vodafone and other private players, it remains to be seen how 3G market would shape up. I think that there is a going to be a big market for the data cards given the pathetic landline access.
Interestingly, here’s something from the Tata’s end user agreement:
Mobileinternet is not to be used for other activities (e.g. using your handset as a modem, voice or video over the internet, peer to peerfile sharing). Should you exceed your fair usage limit or such use be detected, TTSL reserves right to take action by restricting bandwidth, and/or suspension of data browsing and/ or temporarily suspend subscriber account in case of data usage in violation of fair usage policy.
Ha ha ha. For all practical purposes, I wonder whether they can actually “control tethering”!!
I shifted to Docomo because of one reason alone. It had a clutter free experience as far as it’s GPRS was concerned. I needed to be connected because of some degree of convenience built in. My documents are in the cloud, I am always connected to my mail (K9 mail app for Android is the best one) and my android handset connects seamlessly to my Ubuntu Desktop as a failsafe mechanism to connect to Internet in case my BSNLWifi conks up.
Docomo was supposed to launch it’s 3G services from today but it remains a classic example of how NOT to do things. First and foremost is that there ought to be a clear line of communication about the services, what it entails, the expected costs and charges and how the existing GPRS users are going to be migrated to 3G. Common sense dictates that customer care should be informed accordingly and be trained instead of a dumb shit moron trying to answer the queries from “educated and enlightened customers”. Instead, Docomo has failed to inform me in advance about the same. I registered for their “newsletter” but it seems that their backend has conked off. Who is their provider? IBM? Pooh pooh.
Spewing out the venom is not going to help here and neither going to make a difference to the dodos sitting at the top. But we have some expectation from a company that has made a big name for itself in Japan. Yet, at the same time, one should not forget that it is a the Tata’s pedigree which is at work and they are known to pick up the worst among the best for manning their services. This is reflected in their thought process, their work and general approach to telecom services.
Ideally, instead of ham handed approach, they ought to have been clear and transparent. They should have clearly mentioned the service areas, the expectations from their service, the expected speeds and network and the possible charges.
I have always opposed the 3G services and instead always argued for stepping up investments in wireline. The major reason is that 3G can support “fast speeds” but is limited to spectrum and when more customers join the party, it is going to be a major disaster for the company. This has been seen in mature markets where 3G is synonymous with pathetic services. Further, high costs for “unlimited access” is plain stealing. No one likes the crap of “fair usage policies”. For most, GPRS is decent approach because mobilebroadband sucks.
Lets see what the company has to offer and how it plans to market it. It has set up a separate page for the same and I am wondering who okayed this kind of pure crap. (with loads of grammatical errors and mistyped words- emphasis mine).
Here’s from the horse’s mouth:
Now DO the new with 3G, at a refreshingly fast pace. Coming from the world leaders in 3G, Tata DOCOMO 3G is an all-new way to experience life on the go!
Life on 3G is definitely fastera, richer & exciting. With Tata DOCOMO 3G, your mobile phone is no more just a device that makes calls – it””s a TV, a theatre, a gaming console and a satellite camera all at once. Do much more with your smartphone than you ever imagined!
Now can anyone of these dumb fucks ever care to explain about “satellite camera”? PMSL
It also makes tall claims about playing “3D games”. And it speaks about “better network security”. WHOA!!
I suspect that some research agency is behind their PR efforts. Here is what one dumb fcuk had to say about Tata Docomo 3G on DNA (Newspaper) and I quote:
Sujay Misra, managing director of AZ Research Partners, says one of the reasons for this is their subscriber-base is predominantly low-end. “You need to have the right instrument (high-end mobiles and smartphones) to get access to 3G services. Also, BSNL and MTNL have not bothered to educate their customers about the 3G services,” he said.
Hence, Tata Docomo is a MONUMENTAL FAILURE even before it has seen it’s commercial activity. There are people crowing about this company getting it’s “first mover advantage” but other companies in the fray are investing in 3G for spectrum and more customers. Data services are not even on their minds. The reason? There is no dedicated system for “apps” and they are sold as “value added services” to shore up “extra revenue” but not at the expense of voice calls. They still make profits on voice calls. This is a heterogeneous market and no one size fits all. Despite the marketing chutzpah, voice still remains bread, butter (and jam) for these companies. Give or take SMS.
