Your Competition Says That Your Coverage Sucks….. There’s A Lawyer For That

If you’re AT&T, you’ve been forced to listen to Verizon ads which parody the “there’s an app for that” iPhone ads with ads that say “there’s a map for that” such as this one which point out that your 3G coverage sucks. So what do you do? You respond to this in the time honored tradition of suing Verizon to force the ads off the air:

The lawsuit says Verizon’s ads suggest that coverage areas outside of fast AT&T 3G service, shown in maps in the ads in white, provide no service at all. In fact, most of the white areas are covered, but with somewhat slower wireless speeds, AT&T said.

And:

AT&T is seeking an emergency injunction to stop the ads. It also seeks unspecified damages, accusing Verizon of false advertising, and claims the ads harm AT&T’s ability to compete. AT&T also said Verizon’s ads are causing AT&T to lose “incalculable market share” and goodwill with customers.

Good luck with that AT&T. Oh. They’ve also come out with a press release to “set the record straight:”

AT&T’s wireless data coverage reaches 303 million people – or 97% of the U.S. population, where they live and work. Our data coverage consists of 3 different types of technology:

• 3G. 233 million people or 75% of the population are covered by AT&T’s 3G network, the nation’s fastest.
• EDGE. 301 million people or more than 96% of the population are covered by EDGE.
  • With both 3G and EDGE coverage, customers can access the Internet, send e-mail, surf the Web, stream music, download videos, send photos, text, talk and more. The only difference – with some data applications, 3G is faster than EDGE
• GPRS. Covers 303 million people, allowing you to talk, text, e-mail and access basic websites optimized for wireless.

Are you kidding? The best you can do is to highlight the fact that you have slower data access (via EDGE and GPRS) in the areas that you don’t have 3G? Isn’t that the whole point of the Verizon ads.

And then there’s this line:

With both 3G and EDGE coverage, customers can access the Internet, send e-mail, surf the Web, stream music, download videos, send photos, text, talk and more. The only difference – with some data applications, 3G is faster than EDGE

Yeah, 3G is faster than EDGE… BY SEVERAL ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE FOR ALL APPLICATIONS. Trying minimize that difference is like saying that a Honda Civic is competitive with a Audi R8. The R8 is will blow the doors off the Civic on a open road or on a track seeing as it has a top speed of almost 200 miles an hour and the Civic can’t come anywhere near that. So in the end they’re not competitive at all. Perhaps AT&T execs need to read the Wikipedia articles on EDGE and 3G before coming out with a dumb statement like the above.

Face it AT&T. Your 3G coverage does suck, and the truth hurts. iPhone users have been complaining for some time about crappy AT&T service. Often in 3G areas like big cities. Some have created protest videos while others go to the media to complain. That shows up in studies that show that people love the iPhone and hate AT&T. No wonder there are rumors that Apple wants to take away rights to the iPhone and take the iPhone to Verizon ironically.

So AT&T rather than file a lawsuit, how about fixing your network? You might win a few friends if you do that.

Rogers Thinking Of Grabbing Globealive’s Spectrum…. That Sucks!

I guess that Rogers must sense an opportunity to expand their empire as their CEO Nadir Mohamed made it known that they would be interested  in the wireless spectrum that they are unable to use because of their “issues:”

“Spectrum is a very valuable asset,” Mr. Mohamed said Friday after a speech to the Toronto Board of Trade. “It’s the real-estate of our business, so Rogers would be for sure interested in picking it up. I’m sure others would be.”

It makes sense for them to go for that spectrum seeing as Globalive can’t use it. It’s likely the best way to stay ahead of Telus and Bell now that they’re on the GSM standard. Oh, by the way, if you’re going to say that Rogers buying Globealive’s spectrum means less competition for wireless users Canada who are being screwed royally by Canadian wireless providers, Mohamed would disagree:

In his speech, Mr. Mohamed said not having Globalive in the market would not mean less competition, noting that two other startups, DAVE Wireless Inc. and Public Mobile were preparing to launch by early next year while established cable giants Shaw Communications and Quebecor’s Videotron were readying their own plans.

You’ll excuse me if I don’t buy that. DAVE Wireless for one has a roaming agreement with Rogers. I seriously doubt they want to piss off the people that provides them with some network access by undercutting Rogers. Besides, the recent launch of the Telus and Bell on the GSM standard proves that the incumbent wireless providers don’t have any interest in providing their services at a competitive price like carriers in the rest of the developed world do. So I have little hope that these new companies will since none have revealed what they plan to do. Of course they could prove me wrong, but I doubt they would.

Intel To Settle Anti-Trust Issues With AMD

Intel has a few anti-trust issues right now, starting with the EU and the State Of New York. But their longest running anti-trust battle has been with rival AMD who sued them back in 2005. It looks like the latter is about to be settled:

Under terms of the deal, Intel will pay AMD US$1.25 billion, and has agreed to a set of business practice provisions, according to a statement from the companies.

AMD and Intel also said they have agreed to a new five-year cross-license agreement, and have given up claims of breach of contract from the previous license agreement.

“While the relationship between the two companies has been difficult in the past, this agreement ends the legal disputes and enables the companies to focus all of our efforts on product innovation and development,” the companies said in a statement.

On its part, AMD has agreed to drop all regulatory complaints worldwide and all pending legal disputes, including a case in U.S. District Court in Delaware and two cases in Japan. The agreement will be made public in filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the companies said.

This news is great for the value of AMD stock which is up by 22% as I type this. Intel stock has barely moved however. Could this be the start of Intel settling the other anti-trust issues that they have? Stay tuned.

Microsoft Exec Says Windows 7 Inspired By Mac OS…. Yes, He Said That [UPDATED]

I sense a disturbance in the force. As if there is a flying chair in the future of Simon Aldous who is Microsoft’s partner group manager. Here’s what he said in a recent interview:

One of the things that people say an awful lot about the Apple Mac is that the OS is fantastic, that it’s very graphical and easy to use. What we’ve tried to do with Windows 7 – whether it’s traditional format or in a touch format – is create a Mac look and feel in terms of graphics. We’ve significantly improved the graphical user interface, but it’s built on that very stable core Vista technology, which is far more stable than the current Mac platform, for instance.

Okay, so a Microsoft exec admits that they take ideas from somebody else and make them theirs. Sounds like business as usual at Microsoft to me. And how about the line about “that very stable Vista core.” I guess it is stable. But the Vista OS was pretty much DOA, so I don’t really think it’s a good idea to remind the public about an OS that Microsoft would rather that the world forget about.

In the end, at least someone at Microsoft was honest. Even if they were too honest by Microsoft standards.

UPDATE: That didn’t take long. Microsoft has disavowed him in a Windows Team Blog posting:

I hate to say this about one of our own, but his comments were inaccurate and uninformed.

I hope he’s cleaned out his desk. I’m thinking he won’t be employed by Microsoft for long.

HP Plans To Drop $2.7 Billion On 3Com

Here’s another big buy from HP. The word on the street is that they plan on buying network gear maker 3Com. Why? This is what their press release said:

This combination will transform the networking industry and underscore HP’s next-generation data center strategy built on the convergence of servers, storage, networking, management, facilities and services. The resulting business outcome will help customers simplify the network, deploy a unique and innovative edge-to-core network fabric for the enterprise and improve IT service delivery capabilities, all delivered with best-in-class price-performance.

“Companies are looking for ways to break free from the business limitations imposed by a networking paradigm that has been dominated by a single vendor,” said Dave Donatelli, executive vice president and general manager, Enterprise Servers and Networking, HP. “By acquiring 3Com, we are accelerating the execution of our Converged Infrastructure strategy and bringing disruptive change to the networking industry. By combining HP ProCurve offerings with 3Com’s extensive set of solutions, we will enable customers to build a next-generation network infrastructure that supports customer needs from the edge of the network to the heart of the data center.”

This must be a shot across the bow at Cisco who recently announced a server product with very strong networking abilities. The potential loss of server income to Cisco must have freaked HP out. Thus they went out and got 3Com as HP must have come to the conclusion that they can’t compete against Cisco as they stand right now with their ProCurve stuff. 3Com was pretty much on life support anyway having falling for being the king of networking in the 1980′s and early 1990′s (3c503 or 3c509 network cards anyone?),  so HP spending $2.7 billion to scoop them up was easy.

The question is, will it work out? The jury is out on that one.

 

New Marware Exploits Jailbroken iPhones

If you thought having your Jailbroken iPhone Rickrolled was the wost thing that could happen to you, think again. Security firm Intego has found a piece of marware that will allow hackers to access personal information stored on certain jailbroken iPhones. Oh if you have an iPod Touch and you’ve jailbroken that, you’re in trouble too. The marware works by being installed onto a computer and then scanning the computer’s network to find vulnerable iPhones:

This hacker tool could easily be installed, for example, on a computer on display in a retail store, which could then scan all iPhones that pass within the reach of its network. Or, a hacker could sit in an Internet café and let his computer scan all iPhones that come within the range of the wifi network in search of data. Hackers could even install this tool on their own iPhones, and use it to scan for jailbroken phones as they go about their daily business.

Lovely. The best way to defend yourself against this is to change the root password of your jailbroken iPhone. An even better defense is to not jailbreak it in the first place. Why? Here’s why:

We would like to stress that users who jailbreak their iPhones are exposing themselves to known vulnerabilities that are being exploited by code that is circulating in the wild. While the number of iPhones attacked may be minimal, the amount of personal data that can be compromised strongly suggests that iPhone users should stick with their stock configuration and not jailbreak their devices.

You’ve been warned.

EU Throws Spanner Into Oracle’s Attempt To Buy Sun

You might recall that back in April Oracle wanted to get its hands on Sun in the worst way. But that purchase has run into a bit of a problem because the European Union has decided that it doesn’t like the deal. According to the 8K form that Sun filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the EU is objecting for this reason:

“The Statement of Objections sets out the Commission’s preliminary assessment regarding, and is limited to, the combination of Sun’s open source MySQL database product with Oracle’s enterprise database products and its potential negative effects on competition in the market for database products,”

That sucks if you’re Oracle. Needless to say they are not happy about this and issued a press release to let everybody know why they’re ticked:

The database market is intensely competitive with at least eight strong players, including IBM, Microsoft, Sybase and three distinct open source vendors. Oracle and MySQL are very different database products. There is no basis in European law for objecting to a merger of two among eight firms selling differentiated products. Mergers like this occur regularly and have not been prohibited by United States or European regulators in decades.

So what happens now? As usual, lawyers will get involved, this will drag out for some time. But it will get sorted out in the end and the lawyers will become very rich in the process. In other words, it’s business as usual. But the uncertainty that this delay causes won’t be good for Oracle, Sun, or their customers.

 

Jailbroken iPhones Open To Exploits…. Oh Noes!

From the “WTF” file, comes the news that iPhone users in Australia who have jailbroken their phones are wide open to a new worm that upon finding an jailbroken iPhone that still has the default root password on it, changes the background to a picture of Rick Astley and then tries to copy itself to other jailbroken iPhones. This is apparently the second such hack in the last few days and comes after a hacker in Holland did a similar stunt. Instead Rickrolling the phone, the hacker asked for five Euros to “secure” the iPhones that he (or she) just hacked.

If you haven’t jailbroken your iPhone, you can rest easy. This worm won’t be able to affect you. But if you have jailbroken your iPhone, you might want to change root password on it just to be safe.

Parallels Desktop 5 Vs. VMware Fusion 3: Fight!

The two titans in Macintosh virtual machine software market have both kicked up significant updates in the last little while. Parallels Desktop 5 and VMware Fusion 3 both want your hard earned dollars, but is one better than the other? I had a look at both and here’s what I think about them:

Installing Windows: It’s a wizard driven install that makes the process dead easy. This is a tie from where I sit.

Overall Speed: Both products claim that they’re faster than ever, but for me Parallels Desktop “feels” somewhat faster than VMware Fusion in my “seat of the pants testing.” For what it’s worth, both products were on the same computer and the virtual computers had the same configuration. I’m not going to assign a winner to this category as clearly, your mileage may vary when it comes to subjective items such as speed.

Graphics: Both products have significant upgrades to their graphics abilities as they now support DirectX 9 and Open GL. That means that you can do Aero and Flip 3D in Windows Vista and Windows 7, not to mention run your favorite game as well (although IMHO, that’s better done in Boot Camp). I tried a few video games in both products and had no problems running them well in either product. This category is a tie.

USB Support: My usual test of the USB support is to plug my MobiKEY into each product and see how it handles it as the MobiKEY is a rather complex device that sometimes makes USB problems in a computer show up. Parallels Desktop 5 had no issue with the MobiKEY. I plugged it in and it worked. VMware Fusion didn’t see it at first. So I did some Googling and found this VMware Communities discussion thread that explains how to enable support for the MobiKEY. Even though it was referencing an older version of VMware Fusion, it worked. But the solution was not end user friendly at all. Advantage: Parallels Desktop

Eye Candy: If you’re an eye candy sort of person, Parallels has way more eye candy than VMware Fusion. You can make Windows apps look very Mac like and there’s a feature called Crystal View which hides all your icons in the Dock and the OS X Parallels menu bar, moving access to menu items and a newly created folder icon in the Dock which has all your windows shortcuts. I personally hate eye candy so I tend to turn this stuff off. Besides, it likely frees up memory if you do that as well. VMware has made some significant changes to their user interface that are subtle but useful. For example, one interesting new feature is the Applications Menu which lives on the OS X menu bar. You can do everything you’d do within the Windows Start menu so I can see it being handy for some users. Bottom line, I find the eye candy that VMware has more useful than the stuff that Parallels Desktop has. Advantage: VMware Fusion

Technical Support: The last time I wrote about support for both VMware Fusion and Parallels Desktop, I basically said that technical  support for both sucked. Now with their new versions, here’s what they offer. First here’s what VMware offers for  VMware Fusion:

For Fusion 3.x, installation assistance is offered for 18 months after product registration or until product end of life. Submit support requests either online or via phone; responses are targeted within one business day.

Now here’s what Parallels Desktop offers :

Customers upgrading to Parallels Desktop 5 to Mac or purchasing a new version of Parallels Desktop 5 for Mac are eligible for the following complimentary support options:

• 18 months free installation support by Email, starting with November 4th 2009
• 30 day complimentary Chat and Telephone support

Clearly they’re finally starting to get the message that software sold to end users requires support that easy to access. Bravo! I’m declaring this a tie.

So who comes out on top? In my mind there isn’t a clear winner as it depends on what you need virtual machine software for. If you need USB support, go with Parallels. Hands down it has better USB support. If you simply need to run Windows or some other OS on your Mac, you can’t go wrong with either product. One thing that helps is that trials for both products are available, so you can try each out and see which one suits your needs better.

Telus Launches HSPA Network…. And The Disappointment Begins

So, today is the day that Telus launched it’s HSPA network. Oddly, there was no press release announcing this fact. I guess that’s because they also released their pricing for the iPhone and much like Bell yesterday, it was underwhelming:

• $50/month: 100 local anytime minutes; 50 bonus anytime minutes; and choice between 5 local favourites or 1,000 outgoing and unlimited incoming SMS or double anytime minutes; unlimited nights and weekends; 500 MB data
• $65/month: 200 local anytime minutes; 50 bonus anytime minutes; and choice between 5 nationwide favourites or unlimited incoming SMS or double anytime minutes; unlimited nights and weekends; 1 GB data
• $80/month: 350 local anytime minutes; 50 bonus anytime minutes; and choice between 5 nationwide favourites or unlimited incoming SMS or double anytime minutes; unlimited nights and weekends; 2 GB data
• $100/month: 450 local anytime minutes; 50 bonus anytime minutes; and choice between 5 favourites or unlimited incoming SMS or double anytime minutes; unlimited nights and weekends; 3 GB data

For those of you keeping score at home, that pricing is very similar to Bell’s pricing. Which means that if you’re a Rogers iPhone customer, you have absolutely no reason to switch as you’re not going to save any money.

It’s really too bad that Rogers, Bell, and Telus don’t seem interested in competing against each other. As a result, Canadian cell phone rates are some of the highest in the world and the Canadian consumer gets screwed. I was hoping with the HSPA networks being introduced by Bell and Telus, some relief to Canadian consumers would arrive. But clearly that is not to be the case. So Canada gets screwed once again by the communications cartel of Rogers, Bell, and Telus.

I guess that Canada’s only hope is the Canadian Government overturns that craptastic CRTC decision and allows Globalive to enter the market. If that doesn’t come through, then Canadians are truly screwed.