Communications Technology

"We don't focus on megabits, we don't focus on gigabits, we focus on activities," Frontier CEO Maggie Wilderotter stated at an investor conference last week, clearly trying to counter some of the buzz around Google Fiber. "We go to the activity set to get a sense of what customers are actually doing and the majority of our customers fit into that 6 Mbps or less category." Granted many Frontier customers in our forums will tell you they're lucky if their copper and loop length supports anything more than 3 Mbps, and those who can get faster speeds may not be able to justify paying Frontier's steep price premiums. Frontier's massive deal to acquire Verizon's unwanted DSL networks also left them in a financial position where "focusing on gigabits" is somewhat of a pipe dream anyway. Many telcos (like CenturyLink) are suddenly having to explain why companies presumably focused on offering broadband services are incapable of offering the kind of speeds now being offered by a search engine company. Granted a big reason these companies aren't offering anything faster or cheaper is because they face no real competitive pressure to do so, something Google Fiber is helping to painfully highlight in some markets. Frontier is currently using a talking Buffalo to pitch a 6 Mbps DSL line for $20 a month -- if users tack on costly landline voice service and sign a three year contract. read comment(s)

How fast are America's wireless networks? techhive.com Kim Dotcom accuses Google, Facebook, and Twitter of violating his two-step security patent theverge.com Hackers Find China Is Land of Opportunity nytimes.com Wary of China, U.S. Steps Into Sprint's Board wsj.com Tablet use soars among U.S. airline passengers usatoday.com Telecom s Big Players Hold Back the Future nytimes.com Internet Service Providers Are Now The Most Hated Companies In U.S. huffingtonpost.com Upcoming Auctions Key to Wireless Internet Future huffingtonpost.com GM commits to in-car apps by the end of the year theverge.com How digital camera technology took out Kodak huffingtonpost.com Why won t Bitcoin die? theverge.com

Cablevision has spent the last few years deploying Wi-Fi to NYC metro region commuter areas, and now says they're getting close to offering service on the trains themselves. Speaking on their recent earnings conference call, Cablevision executive Tad Smith stated the company is "in active, productive, very positive conversations with the trains" but that deploying such technology has been "complicated." The company filed a proposal with the MTA back in 2010 and originally hoped the project would be up and running within twelve months. Still, Smith says the company is "optimistic for the future" of the project, which is making slow but steady progress. Whether commuters (most of whom now have an LTE connection in their pocket) will need or use it might be something else entirely.

Porn copyright trolls like Prenda law already do plenty of sleazy things in their attempt to frighten BitTorrent porn downloaders into ponying up extortion settlement money. While Judges are just now starting to take aim at these firms, the trolls remain busy trying to frighten porn downloaders into ponying up cash. Torrent Freak points to a new round of letters being sent out by the "Anti-Piracy Law Group," the latest incarnation of Prenda Law. In those letters, the group ups its game by threatening to call a user's neighbor unless they pay up. From the letter:"The purpose of this step is to gather evidence about who used your Internet account to steal from our client. The list of possible suspects includes you, members of your household, your neighbors (if you maintain an open wi-fi connection) and anyone who might have visited your house. In the coming days we will contact these individuals to investigate whether they have any knowledge of the acts described in my client s prior letter."Granted Prenda and its various tendrils don't want these cases ever actually going to court, and if they send out letters in enough volume, it's more than enough to pay off the rather small legal penalties incurred so far.

Speaking at the J.P. Morgan Global Technology, Media and Telecom Conference earlier this month, Verizon CFO Fran Shammo stated that the company's earliest FiOS markets are now reaching penetration targets and that most of their new customers are signing up for faster speeds. According to Shammo, 60% of new FiOS Internet subscribers added in the first quarter chose Quantum speeds of 50/25 Mbps or faster. He also stated that Dallas, Verizon's first FiOS launch market, is now reaching 50% penetration. Previous Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg once suggested he'd wanted to see 40% penetration in most existing markets before continuing FiOS expansion. Subsequent CEOs (and Shammo) have made it pretty clear that another big FiOS expansion push will probably never happen.

Clearwire: Shareholder Group Says Sprint $3.40 Bid Still Too Low barrons.com Report Unveils Mobile Data Pricing Trends lightreading.com Verizon Wireless and Jennifer Lopez join forces to launch Latino-targeted carrier Viva Movil mobileburn.com Wireless Consumers Aware of Cyberthreats and Know They Should Protect Themselves, Yet Many Don't yahoo.com New Wireless 'Family Plan' for U.S. Government Saves $300 Million: GSA secures AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon for first-of-its-kind wireless service and device consolidation plan yahoo.com Cricket Wireless guns for Verizon, AT&T customers cnet.com Xbox One confusion: Microsoft leaves used games and 'always-online' requirement unclear theverge.com More and more phone firms sell data on cash cows customers; Verizon has it's collection system down pat, AT&T still working on a better way wsj.com Ethernet inventor: Online education poised to transform the world, like iTunes did to music theregister.co.uk Verizon: Content providers see value in toll-free data model fiercewireless.com Leap suggests its LTE roaming deal is with Sprint, hints at more device financing options fiercewireless.com CenturyLink dips its feet into the 1 Gbps FTTP waters fiercetelecom.com Coming to Terms With a Global Digital Divide huffingtonpost.com Scripps Reporters Called 'Hackers' For Stumbling Upon Massive Security Flaw While Doing A Google Search huffingtonpost.com read comment(s)

DirecTV is contemplating embedding an antenna into their set top boxes in order to offer live over the air broadcasts, thereby circumventing retransmission fees. Speaking at the JP Morgan Technology, Media and Telecom conference in Boston, DirecTV chief financial officer Patrick Doyle stated they didn't have a timeline on the project, but that it makes financial sense due to the soaring price of retrans fees and the landscape shift that's occurring courtesy of Aereo. He also stated that whenever it does get deployed, it would only be initially made available to new customers. "We ll probably test in some markets an over-the-air integrated tuner set-up and make sure the customer experience is there," insists Doyle. read comment(s)

Microsoft this week introduced the company's long-awaited successor to the Xbox 360 video game console: the Xbox One. According to Microsoft, their new console will come with 8GB of RAM, USB 3.0 ports, built-in 802.11n, and support for Wi-Fi Direct -- but that's about as technically specific as Microsoft was willing to get. Like Sony, Microsoft held back most of the details ahead of their full reveal at E3, though unlike Sony -- Microsoft did actually show what the console looks like. The company also highlighted how the new Kinect sensor will be dramatically more sensitive and supposedly useful, as well as a new redesigned game pad. Microsoft's full announcement can be found here.read comment(s)

Intel Awards 2nd place winner, 18-year-old Eesha Khare of California invents 30-Second Phone Charger.

For years Verizon has marketed their FiOS fiber to the home service as a superior alternative to cable. Part of that sales pitch has been the argument that the service doesn't require bandwidth caps -- though Verizon has historically always chosen their words very carefully to leave the possibility open sometime in the future. That doesn't mean Verizon doesn't warn users whose usage can get borderline ridiculous. One user in our FiOS forum proudly crows that he managed to get a warning phone call from Verizon for excessive use. How excessive? One month the user claims he clocked in over 75 terabytes of data usage, and other users in the forum say they see similar usage resulting in similar phone calls. Verizon would obviously like the user, who runs servers out of his home, to upgrade to a business-class connection.read comment(s)