Walt Mossberg on bandwidth in the US…and oh, yeah, the iPhone

There are lots of people linking this morning to a video in which Walt Mossberg talks about the possible future of TV on the Internet, bandwidth in the US, and yes, the iPhone. While everyone seems to be all excited about Walt Mossberg’s prediction that a 3G iPhone is emminent, I find his words on bandwidth issues in the US much more on target and important.

This is a big issue.

It’s not just about bandwidth to watch TV as he talks about. We need real bandwidth to enable new uses of video streams. We need the bandwidth over landlines. We need to bandwidth over the air. Unfortunately the limited model we’re using so far is only going to get us so far. This is one reason I was so hoping Google–and for that matter Intel and Microsoft–would step in with the recent spectrum auction. We need more competition. We need to spur innovation.

Walt Mossberg is proposing that the government step in because bandwidth and view it as something important to the nation like the highway system is. I’m not so sure if this the way to go, but I agree with his focus on the importance. Done well it will enable a new wave of innovation and businesses.

One additional area that Walt doesn’t get into and is also important is on how wireless carriers are charging for bandwidth.

First, the regulate it way to much–excluding this or that use. They shouldn’t. Broadcasting a low-quality video stream should not be “against the rules.” And what if you want to “serve up content” from your cell phone? Why not?

Second, the rates are way too high–and the pricing model is biased towards one plan for one device per person. This is become more and more of a problem, especially as MIDs and other devices make their way into the marketplace. They will have connectivity, along with your notebook and cell phone. So what are you going to do, buy three separate 2-year broadband contracts, one for each device? You’ve got to be kidding. Not only would it become a management nightmare, people aren’t going to afford it.

If I were Intel I’d be doing everything in my power to solve the bandwidth power. They’ve dabbled a bit, as Google has, but they’re not stepping in far enough. It’s a big deal, because it’s going to throttle back their potential sales if they leave things the way they are.

People are going to purchase fewer connected devices, because they won’t be able to afford to connect them.

Here’s where Walt Mossberg might be correct. If the government steps in and opens things up, it would be a huge shot into the arm for connected devices. We’d see a plethora of new businesses and a bunch of new rising stars. So maybe he’s right.

I sure wish Microsoft, Google, and so on would lead in this area more. It’s time to ruffle some feathers.

The iPhone: a true convergence device?

This article points to something I’ve been trying my best to communicate to others about the iPhone–you’ll find yourself using it like no other device.

For instance, I find myself checking stock prices–simply because it’s so easy to do with the iPhone–even when I don’t really care what they do one way or another.

I also use the iPhone as my personal weather checker—I’ve given up on TV and online weather services, except when I need a live radar map. Hint, hint, hint, hint, hint.

I also use the iPhone every day as my personal alarm to remind me to take my medication. Works well so far.

And more often than not I go to my iPhone to keep up to date on news listed on ">Techmeme and Thredr. This goes the same for following Twitter.

I also use the iPhone as my primary camera, but that’s quite typical I think for most cell phone users today.

One thing I don’t do is email a lot with my cell phone. I don’t know why. I just don’t.

Now there are some things I think are missing:

1) Flash. I can’t live without it. There are too many sites I want to visit that have Flash videos nowadays. I can’t see them on the iPhone. The lack of Silverlight support is increasingly going to become a problem too. It’s a bummer.
2) Weather radar maps as I hinted at above.
3) Better navigation through the map program. It crashes less today than it used to, but it’s not quite right.
4) Listening to music is OK, but why isn’t there a free radio station I can listen to wirelessly?
5) When I’m actually using the iPhone as a phone, why can’t I leverage WiFi when the wide area network is too weak? Dropped calls or no signal strength happens to me all the time. It’s quite disappointing.
6) I want to broadcast live video. The Nokia N95 is looking better and better every day because of this.
7) Where’s speech recognition-slash-TTS–slash–audio recording?
8 ) And, and, and…You get the point, the iPhone is not perfect, but then again, what is? Lots of room for experimentation and future features.

Microsoft says yes to XP but no to ink on low cost PCs?

Microsoft is giving more breathing room to XP on low-cost PCs by extending the time that it will make XP Home able to OEMs for these devices through at least June 30, 2010. It refreshing to see this, although in my mind Microsoft is not going far enough to address the challenges at hand.

There’s no doubt that Microsoft has missed the boat when it comes to low-cost PCs, MIDs, and even its own UMPC. It’s in a catch up game. Microsoft is getting challenged on the low end by the hardware and cost frugality of Linux and on the coolness side by Apple’s iPhone. Lots of body punches. No knockouts, just draining body punch after body punch. As a tech enthusiast and long time user of Microsoft products it’s hard to watch. (But I know time will heal all wounds, as I sit here typing this on my Mac Pro after reading about the announcement on my iPhone. Heh.)

It’s not that Vista is terrible on these machines although in some cases it’s sluggish, it’s that these low-cost systems simply often don’t have the drive space to hold the larger Vista. But that’s only part of it. Solid state drives, for instance, will get bigger. The bigger issue is that Vista is biased towards the desktop and large displays. XP is for that matter too, but not as bad (no sidebar, for instance). Yes, Vista can be set up like XP, but it would need to be stripped down to really make a good comparison. I’m not sure if Microsoft would want to take the engineering and test time to strip Vista down though.

What I hope Microsoft really understands is that it’s not simply a matter of XP over Vista. The user experience matters too and simply giving the nod to XP doesn’t address this issue. As Linux-based MIDs and low-cost PCs running optimized shells are going to demonstrate and the iPhone excells at, a good OS needs a good user experience. XP is so-so when it comes to small displays. For instance, some windows need at least 600 pixels high or they won’t fit. OEMs have addressed this by bumping up the display resolution. But then everything is itsy bitsy. Fine for young eyes, but not mine. Actually it’s not the number of pixels that’s the real issue, its how the pixels are used. Tiny buttons are hard to target, for instance. And frankly, small displays should have a different shell. It’s fine for Windows Explorer to be an option or the desktop to be front and center, but that’s not the best user experience. And then there’s the whole issue as to whether everything should be mouse and keyboard oriented on small devices. Try an iPhone and you’ll see.

Here’s one other thing that’s troubling me about this whole announcement: Mary Jo Foley is reporting that the XP extension will not apply to “higher-priced and more robust UMPCs.” Wow, this is a misreading of the UMPCs space. So soon Microsoft itself forgets that the whole idea of the UMPC was to build a low-cost device. Further, these new low-cost PCs are essentially UMPC-like systems with a keyboard and without touch and for lower price. They are UMPCs. I’m hoping that this is just a bit of miscommunication. UMPCs are supposed to be low-cost devices and they will run on low end hardware. The OEMs messed this all up, which is why in part the sales have been lackluster. (Although I think it’s also because the user experience wasn’t all the inspiring either.)

One more thing: Microsoft I’m sure is focused on competition along the OS front–both from Linux and OS X–and the web too for that matter–but it’s important to not lose sight of Intel. Intel really defines what the industry does, in large part because it makes the processors and chips that many systems use. Here’s the thing, for the last year or so and at least the next year or two Intel’s roadmap is about “portable” processors, not power house notebook systems. In other words, I would not be surprised to see the growth on the low-end systems to outpace most others–simply because this is where Intel is putting its energy. Microsoft I assume knows this and I expect the next version of Windows will address this…maybe? If not, we’ll be hearing the slam of more body punches.

Now here’s the part that really erks me: it appears from Microsoft’s announcement that XP Home addition is all that Microsoft is giving extra time for. But what about ink? There’s no Tablet PC edition. So in other words, the low-cost PCs, which are great for young students on up, which is exactly where ink makes a lot of sense, won’t have it built in. Amazing.

Now here’s the real kicker. There is a way around this: the browser. Using Silverlight and web services to handle recognition, you can build ink enabled applications for XP Home. So essentially Microsoft is saying no to ink and yes at the same time. It doesn’t make sense. (We have yet to see how good Silverlight will be on Linux systems though. Depends on what Novel comes up with.)

Microsoft needs to think a bit harder about its commitment to ink and the ink ecosystem. It appears that it’s getting too defensive, trying to separate out its value at the high end. Come on, what about the kids? If for no other reason, Microsoft should be doing the right thing to make the education experience better for students–no matter what the lost revenue at the high end–which is a stupid argument in itself, because ink is essentially given away for free in several higher versions of Vista and under marketed across the board at that.

If I were Microsoft I’d flip this whole notion of technology exclusivity and license the heck out ink and its top-notch recognition. Why not? Go make some money from it. Get it out there. People will know that it comes from you. Isn’t that a good thing? Make some money. Get some exposure?

So I’m sitting here, shaking my head, realizing that as a Tablet developer I have to keep thinking beyond Microsoft’s immediate strategies. I hope they change or at least Microsoft blows me away with the next version of Windows–because if it doesn’t my head and shoulders are going to get mighty sore from shaking and shrugging and squinting my eyes every time–BAM–there’s another–WHAM–body punch. Ugh.

Update: Not everyone agrees with the idea of extending XP. Joe Wilcox blogs that he’s been advocating to shutdown XP for awhile in order to boost Vista sales.

Intel talks up MIDs

At Intel’s IDF event in China, Intel is talking up its forthcoming MID-enabling technology–namely the low-power, Atom processors.

I’m quite excited to see how this market pans out, but as I’ve blogged about in the past, I see a tough road ahead for Intel and its partners in this category. The two biggest challenges? The running start of the iPhone and iPod Touch as well as the fact that Intel’s MID component is missing a strong software partner. The iPhone/iPod Touch illustrate the importance of this. For instance, not only is the iPhone well designed at the user level, one should also check out the SDK. There’s nothing on par with it.

Now some could argue that Apple isn’t an enterprise expert and so there’s room for others. Yep, but I think it’s clear that Apple’s going to keep growing into this area too. But Apple has the distinct advantage of also having the respect of many early adopters. This is going to be a big challenge for Intel.

There are a few things Intel can do. They are:

1) Get a strong software partner. I think there are only two winning choices: Microsoft or Google. Either one will work. One is needed.
2) Think even cheaper. Lowering prices will eat into revenues, but Intel is behind. It’s going to take more than low power to win here. My concern is that if Intel lowers its prices the OEMs will take the opportunity to increase their profit since numbers probably won’t be as good as they want. The workaround is for Intel to give rebates to consumers. I’m thinking of something substantial for the early buyers. Maybe $100 dollars. The amount drops would drop off after 30 days.
3) Leverage the X86 community. Give away dozens if not hundreds of devices to leading bloggers. Invite them to your conferences. Get them talking.
4) Leverage leading, online trends. For example: Encourage at least one partner (or do it yourself) to build a MID device that’s very, very good at live video streaming. Think Nokia N95 without the phone–which can get in the way and cause streams to drop anyway. Think great lens. Think great image sensor. Think good chat readability. Think good battery life better than 20-30 minutes.