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The Telecom Digest for July 1, 2012
Volume 31 : Issue 159 : "text" Format
====== 30 years of TELECOM Digest -- Founded August 21, 1981 ======
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Telecom and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) Digest for the
Internet. All contents here are copyrighted by Bill Horne and
the individual writers/correspondents. Articles may be used in other
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We must fight spam for the same reason we fight crime: not because we
are naive enough to believe that we will ever stamp it out, but because
we do not want the kind of world that results when no one stands
against crime. - Geoffrey Welsh
See the bottom of this issue for subscription and archive details
and the name of our lawyer, and other stuff of interest.
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Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2012 22:30:41 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Your E-Book Is Reading You
Message-ID: <p062408d1cc1414cf9bb1@[10.0.1.6]>
Your E-Book Is Reading You
Digital-book publishers and retailers now know more about their
readers than ever before. How that's changing the experience of
reading.
By ALEXANDRA ALTER
June 29, 2012
It takes the average reader just seven hours to read the final book in
Suzanne Collins's "Hunger Games" trilogy on the Kobo e-reader - about
57 pages an hour. Nearly 18,000 Kindle readers have highlighted the
same line from the second book in the series: "Because sometimes
things happen to people and they're not equipped to deal with them."
And on Barnes & Noble's Nook, the first thing that most readers do
upon finishing the first "Hunger Games" book is to download the next
one.
In the past, publishers and authors had no way of knowing what
happens when a reader sits down with a book. Does the reader quit
after three pages, or finish it in a single sitting? Do most readers
skip over the introduction, or read it closely, underlining passages
and scrawling notes in the margins? Now, e-books are providing a
glimpse into the story behind the sales figures, revealing not only
how many people buy particular books, but how intensely they read
them.
For centuries, reading has largely been a solitary and private act,
an intimate exchange between the reader and the words on the page.
But the rise of digital books has prompted a profound shift in the
way we read, transforming the activity into something measurable and
quasi-public.
The major new players in e-book publishing - Amazon, Apple and Google
- can easily track how far readers are getting in books, how long they
spend reading them and which search terms they use to find books. Book
apps for tablets like the iPad, Kindle Fire and Nook record how many
times readers open the app and how much time they spend reading.
Retailers and some publishers are beginning to sift through the data,
gaining unprecedented insight into how people engage with books.
...
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304870304577490950051438304.html
***** Moderator's Note *****
The Wall Street Journal site requires a subscription to read an article.
Bill Horne
Moderator
Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2012 22:05:59 -0400
From: danny burstein <dannyb@panix.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: "tell me" no more
Message-ID: <Pine.NEB.4.64.1206292203560.10429@panix5.panix.com>
The "tell me" service, 800 555-tell, which was established
a decade or so ago to demonstrate IVR and gave out
directory info, stock prices, news, weather, and
other useful material...
... has gone offline as of Fri 29-June-2012.
If you call the number you get a message saying
to pull out your computer and bring up "bing.com".
_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
dannyb@panix.com
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]
Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2012 22:58:54 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: For iPhone Users, Plans Get Cheaper
Message-ID: <p062408d9cc141bc83e06@[10.0.1.6]>
For iPhone Users, Plans Get Cheaper
By Anton Troianovski and Andrew Dowell
June 7, 2012
The economics of the iPhone are changing fast.
For years, cheaper, contract-free offers from prepaid wireless
carriers got little attention from many consumers because those
companies weren't offering the most highly desired phones. That is no
longer the case, which means that for people in the market for a new,
high-end smartphone, month-to-month plans could be worth another look.
On Thursday, Sprint Nextel Corp.'s Virgin Mobile said it would start
offering the iPhone, becoming the second prepaid brand after Leap
Wireless International's Cricket to carry the Apple Inc. device. The
price at Virgin for a 16-gigabyte iPhone 4S is an eye-popping $649.
But because Sprint isn't discounting the phone, the company is able
to offer monthly plans at much lower prices-as little as $30 a month.
As a result, while your up-front cost is higher when signing up with
Virgin Mobile, the savings start adding up after about a year.
Using plans that offer unlimited voice as a comparison, you'd save
$400 in the first year picking a Virgin iPhone over one offered by
AT&T or Verizon Wireless. After two years, the savings grows to more
than $1,200.
AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said last week that the savings are
compelling, but buyers seem to be very sensitive to increases in the
initial cost of the iPhone. AT&T would look at offering such plans if
demand holds up, he said.
Here's a comparison of how much you'd spend on an iPhone and a
wireless service plan with the major U.S. carriers that offer it
today:
...
http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2012/06/07/for-iphone-users-plans-get-cheaper/
Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2012 23:01:14 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Why the Apple Demographic Is So Important to Orbitz and Retailers
Message-ID: <p062408dacc141c2653fc@[10.0.1.6]>
Why the Apple Demographic Is So Important to Orbitz and Retailers
June 26, 2012
Many products attract certain personality types. Apple is practically
creating its own demographic - one companies like Orbitz are starting
to target.
Orbitz found that Apple Mac computer users spend more money than
their PC counterparts on hotels per night, and stay in higher-ranked
hotels. So it has begun showing Mac users costlier hotels in some
search results. (Orbitz notes that it doesn't show higher prices for
the same hotel that a PC user sees, and all users can sort search
results by lowest price.)
A variety of researchers have taken a crack at defining the
characteristics and behavior of the Apple demographic. The average
household income for adult owners of Mac computers is $98,560,
compared with $74,452 for a PC owner, according to technology market
data firm Forrester.
A survey of 24,000 people over the age of 18 in the U.S. from October
to December found Mac owners tend to be younger, too, according to
consumer data provider BIGinsight.com. Over 41% of Mac owners were 34
years old or younger, compared with 32% for wireless laptop users and
23% for desktop owners, the study found.
Owners of other Apple devices had similar traits, with higher incomes
than users of BlackBerrys or smartphones running on Google's Android
software, according to BIGinsight.
...
http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2012/06/26/why-the-apple-demographic-is-so-important-to-orbitz-and-retailers/
-or-
http://goo.gl/mtGVz
Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2012 22:56:43 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Multiple Missteps Led to RIM's Fall
Message-ID: <p062408d8cc141b2b193c@[10.0.1.6]>
Multiple Missteps Led to RIM's Fall
By WILL CONNORS
June 28, 2012
WATERLOO, Ontario - As the BlackBerry smartphone fell steadily further
behind app-loaded rivals like the iPhone in recent years, it was time
for an unambiguous response from the chief executive's office.
At Research In Motion Ltd., however, that was complicated. The
BlackBerry maker had two chief executives. Moreover, their offices
were about a 10-minute drive apart. Meetings with both of them present
were rare, say former RIM executives and people who dealt with the
company.
Many forces have combined to bring RIM to the point of reporting a
quarterly operating loss, as is expected on Thursday, but one of them
was a split personality in the executive suite, former executives
say. As investor pressure mounted at the company recently, one CEO,
company founder Mike Lazaridis, was focused on a make-or-break push to
launch a next-generation BlackBerry with a new operating system. His
co-CEO, Jim Balsillie, started pursuing a separate strategy that
envisioned licensing out some of the company's proprietary
technologies.
Both men are gone from the CEO suite now, replaced in January by
former Lazaridis lieutenant Thorsten Heins. He is slashing costs. RIM
says it is committed to seeing through the rollout later this year of
its next BlackBerry. But Mr. Heins has hired investment bankers to
explore options and hasn't ruled out a sale of a company, whose stock
has tanked nearly 70% in 12 months and pushed its market value, at
under $5 billion, to less than one-fifteenth of its peak.
...
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304458604577488610583090408.html
***** Moderator's Note *****
The Wall Street Journal site requires a subscription to read an article.
Bill Horne
Moderator
Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2012 22:54:15 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Twitter's Mobile Ads Begin to Click
Message-ID: <p062408d7cc141a8cf3ec@[10.0.1.6]>
Twitter's Mobile Ads Begin to Click
Majority of Revenue on Social Network Comes from Phones; One
Advertiser Calls Results Staggering
By SHIRA OVIDE
June 28, 2012
Twitter Inc. is showing early signs of success selling advertising on
mobile devices, an area that is bedeviling Internet companies
including Facebook Inc. and Google Inc.
On most days, Twitter is now generating the majority of its revenue
from ads shown to its users on mobile gadgets, rather than from ads
on Twitter.com, company executives said. One key reason: People who
see a Twitter ad on their phones are more likely to click or interact
with it in some way, which is how Twitter gets paid for
advertisements.
The San Francisco company has only been offering mobile ads in
earnest since April, and some companies buying Twitter ads said they
haven't kept tabs on the effectiveness of their campaigns on mobile
devices.
But P.F. Chang's China Bistro Inc. is among the advertisers that say
they were surprised at how many people are clicking on Twitter mobile
ads.
...
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304458604577491170573156612.html
***** Moderator's Note *****
The Wall Street Journal site requires a subscription to read an article.
Bill Horne
Moderator
Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2012 23:02:53 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: A Cheat Sheet for Verizon's New Shared-Data Plans
Message-ID: <p062408dbcc141c9f7040@[10.0.1.6]>
A Cheat Sheet for Verizon's New Shared-Data Plans
By Anton Troianovski
June 12, 2012
Verizon Wireless has just rolled out a complex set of new plans that
give users unlimited voice and texts and allows them to share a pot
of data among multiple devices.
The obvious question: Should you switch? The answer: Only if you're
already paying too much.
The new plans - which new customers will have to buy after they go
into effect June 28 - are cheaper for smartphone subscribers who use
unlimited voice and text but little data, but more expensive for
subscribers who spend most of their time using data-heavy services.
The data plans begin at $50 a month for 1 gigabyte of data and range
up to 10 gigabytes for $100 a month. You also pay a monthly device
fee of $40 for each smartphone, $30 for each basic phone, $20 for
each laptop and $10 for each tablet.
The many variables at work make it impossible to say flatly whether
the new plans are more or less expensive, but looking at a few
options for individuals and families show the dynamics at work.
...
http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2012/06/12/a-cheat-sheet-for-verizons-new-shared-data-plans/
Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2012 23:04:29 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Five Years of Walt Mossberg's iPhone Reviews
Message-ID: <p062408ddcc141d1d8de4@[10.0.1.6]>
Five Years of Walt Mossberg's iPhone Reviews
June 29, 2012
As the iPhone turns five years old today, here's a look back at WSJ
columnist Walt Mossberg's reviews of each iPhone over the years.
Click on the links [inside the following article] for the full reviews:
...
http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2012/06/29/five-years-of-walt-mossbergs-iphone-reviews/
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