Posts Tagged ‘fcc’

Is there new life for the public safety D block of spectrum?

// February 3rd, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

Remember all that planning and strategizing at the Federal Communications Commission about how to set up a national broadband powered public safety network—something that police, fire, and medical first responders could use across the country? Well, the first signs of new life for that long-delayed scheme surfaced a few days ago when the FCC’s Homeland Security Bureau chief announced that a new proposal would be included in the Commission’s National Broadband Plan to Congress, now due on March 17. But the news disclosed by the FCC’s James Barnett is a bit of a downer to the big public safety agencies, who want the government to scratch the extant plan to auction off the spectrum needed for the service, and just give 20MHz of it to them instead. “It would be great to have 20 MHz,” Barnett told attendees at the APCO Winter Technology Summit in Orlando, Florida. “The problem that we have right now as we pursue this is that the D Block is dedicated to commercial use—we’re actually under a mandate to auction it.”

Apple’s smartphone market share dips despite strong sales

// February 3rd, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

Despite 100 percent year-over-year iPhone sales growth in its most recent quarter, Apple saw a 1.5 percent decrease in smartphone market share between the third and fourth quarter of 2009. This, according to an ABI document seen by the Wall Street Journal , came despite a 26 percent growth in the overall smartphone market during the same period. Although total market share dropped, Apple did sell 18 percent more iPhones in the fourth quarter than the third, according to the company’s fourth quarter earnings report . To say that Apple did poorly during the quarter would be inaccurate—instead, while Apple did well, the overall smartphone market did better. Coincidentally Apple’s last drop in smartphone market share occurred in the  fourth quarter of 2008 , leading us to believe the drop may be related to the holiday season and customers giving less-expensive smartphones a shot in a poor economy. Whether Apple’s market share will begin to increase during the first quarter of 2010 remains to be seen. As noted by  Mobile Tech Today , Nokia’s Ovi Store’s growth in Asia-Pacific and Latin America may mean that the company could see accelerated growth in the coming quarters. It doesn’t seem that Apple has anything to worry about at the moment, but the company will need to stay on its toes if it wants to stay at the front of the pack.

New regulatory battle brewing over ISP classification

// February 1st, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

A specter is haunting the Internet, the specter of Title II of the Communications Act — the section that regulates telecommunications common carriers and might eventually be used by the FCC to oversee broadband. “Exactly what kind of companies might get tangled up into this regulatory Rubik’s Cube?” worriedly asked FCC Commissioner Robert M. McDowell during a talk he gave to the Free State Foundation on Friday. “Any Internet company that offers a voice application?” McDowell fretted. “With this newfound authority, why stop at voice apps? Isn’t voice just another type of data app? As the distinction between network operators and application providers continues to blur at an eye-popping rate, how will the government be able to keep up?”

Student grammar failure: capability or context?

// February 1st, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

LOL-speak, fractured grammar, and emoticons are all finding their way into the college essays of Canadian students with increasing and disturbing frequencies, if a report in that nation’s popular press is to be believed. Entitled “Students failing because of Twitter, texting,” the report is based in part on the failure rate of an English language exam administered by the prestigious Waterloo University in Ontario. The failure rate has now approached one third, up from 25 percent a few years ago, and a University administrator blames failure of basic grammar. Emoticons and textspeak have apparently made their way into these exams, and the administrators are horrified. All of which flies in the face of some research that’s only a few years old, which suggests that teens who are heavy texters actually have a reasonable grasp of grammar . One of those studies, in fact, was performed with Canadian teens, some of whom have probably made their way to college in the intervening years. Although it would be tempting to ascribe the apparent differences to those between anecdote (in the form of college English exam scores) and formalized studies, the differences may really be a matter of what’s being measured. The earlier studies focused on how the students were expressing themselves, and focused on the complexity of the communications; these came through despite what our report termed “informal diction and bizarre acronyms.” It’s precisely that informal diction, like replacing “because” with “cuz” and merging “a lot” into a single word, that’s grating on college administrators. At the same time, liberated from the tyranny of character limits, students are apparently sprinkling commas liberally throughout the text. Thus, it looks like students are retaining the ability to express themselves in rich terms, but are either incapable of recognizing when to adopt formal usage, or incapable of doing so when necessary. Either of those should be easier to fix than an inability to express ideas through text. Of course, given the historical evolvability of the English language, chances seem good that the teens won’t so much fix the problem as force those with higher expectations to meet them halfway.

Netflix to FCC: scary loophole in net neutrality rules

// January 28th, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

Netflix, the company that mails out DVDs and streams movies to millions of home theater potatoes, made the rounds to the Federal Communications Commission on Friday. The company’s general counsel told staffers and Commissioners that the movie rental distributor supports the agency’s proposed Internet nondiscrimination rules . But they also include a potentially nasty loophole, Netflix warned—the “managed services” category that the Commission created in its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking back in October.

Engineering E. coli to produce biodiesel

// January 28th, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

Scientists have found that it is possible to alter the genetic makeup of the bacterium  E. coli to and induce it to produce biodiesel. Most microbes, including E. coli , make and process fatty acids, one of the ingredients of biodiesel; however, what they do with it often leaves something to be desired when it comes to fuel production. By modifying E. coli , scientists are able to make it produce fatty esters, which are the primary components of biodiesel. Engineering bacteria to do a scientist’s bidding is a good way to obtain desired materials, such as natural compounds for drugs, or in this case, fuels. Since E. coli is a well known and often-studied microorganism, and is able to produce fatty acids before any alteration, it is an excellent workhorse for synthetic biology.  The changes performed here include removing the enzymes involved in some competing pathways in order to enhance fatty acid production. Additional pathways were added in to convert those fatty acids to fatty esters, which make for better biofuel material. Finally, enzymes that break down the cellulose in plant matter were added in, allowing the E. coli to work directly on biomass. The altered E. coli can receive various inputs, including partially processed material like glucose and ethanol, and produce fatty acid methyl esters, or biodiesel. The bacteria also produce some fatty alcohols, waxes, and simple sugars that may be harvested and used for other purposes. The authors of the paper argue that the process has advantages over corn ethanol and other plant oil-derived biodiesels, as its production doesn’t require the use of anything that could be a food source, which means no issues with higher prices or questionable land use practices. Nature , 2010. DOI: 10.1038/nature08721

FCC demands data on cell phone ETFs from everyone (including Google)

// January 27th, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

When last we left the Federal Communications Commission’s investigation of the early termination fees (ETFs) that wireless companies charge consumers to drop their mobile phone contracts early, Commissioner Mignon Clyburn was concerned . In fact, she was unsatisfied, troubled, and even “alarmed” at Verizon’s explanations for why the company now sets its ETF price tag for smart phones at a hefty $350. “I look forward to exploring this issue in greater depth with my colleagues in the New Year,” her statement concluded. Guess she wasn’t kidding.  On Monday, the agency sent fresh letters of inquiry to just about everyone:  AT&T , Google , Sprint-Nextel , T-Mobile , and Verizon  (again!). And the FCC had some particularly pointed questions about the Google T-Mobile Nexus One.

FCC closes loophole keeping HD programming off FiOS

// January 21st, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

Every time I read about a new dispute between two video companies like the latest betwixt Verizon and Cablevision, I’m reminded of Woody Allen’s famous comment about the entertainment business. It’s dog eat dog, he lamented. “Actually, it’s worse than dog eat dog. It’s dog doesn’t return dog’s phone calls.” That’s pretty much the video biz to a tee—a world of wait-out wars, brinkmanship, and extended bouts of “chicken.”  And the rules of engagement are mostly found in a single law: The Cable Act . By a vote of four to one, the Federal Communications Commission tweaked those rules  this week in favor of Verizon’s position that it should have access to key Cablevision HD sports channels. That doesn’t mean that Verizon has won the fight yet, but now the telco has a much better chance when the agency considers its case.

Amoeboid designs complex transportation network, eats oats

// January 21st, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

For anyone interested in going into engineering, I can offer a warning: prepare to get your butt handed to you repeatedly by nature. Many of the processes at the forefront of engineering technology are just trying to play catch-up with what nature has done an innumerable number of times. Photosynthesis, genetic replication, the creation of joints, even the simple act of flight—nature has done it before, with greater ease, and often cheaper or more efficiently. A paper in the current issue of Science discusses the ability of a single-celled creature to create a robust network while foraging for food—one that mimicked the Tokyo rail system in complexity. Creating a good network is a balancing act; you need to span a large number of nodes with a minimal number of edges (keeping cost low), while being able to function when an edge is lost (fault tolerant). Problems of this type are a shining example of the adage “fast, cheap, or good: pick any two.”

Bioshock 2 DRM: SecuROM, activation limits, and bears

// January 21st, 2010 // No Comments » // Tech News

Bioshock 2 will come both as a boxed retail product and a for-pay digital download if that’s more to your taste. Looking at the game’s page on Steam reveals something disappointing for those of us against invasive DRM: the game will utilize SecuROM and comes with a five-machine activation limit. 2K Games dealt with this decision head-on via its official forum. ” BioShock 2 is using a standard Games for Windows Live activation system, much like other games you have played in the past,” a 2K Community Manager writes . “That doesn’t mean you always have to be online to play or save the game—you can create an offline profile for the Single Player portion of the game (you just won’t earn achievements and you can’t play Multiplayer, of course.)” Of course. “We are using SecuROM only as a disc check method for the retail copy of BioShock 2. That is it’s [sic] only use.” Well, there is also that pesky five-machine limit, which many of our readers find intolerable. Will this lead to lower sales? Who knows. It’s important to know what you’re buying for your money, however. A quick note: Shacknews lists the activation limit at 15 machines, but as of this writing the listing claims five. We’ve included a shot of the screen so you can see for yourself. It’s very possible that could change before launch.

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