2005

Cardiff First For BT’s 21st Century Network (21CN)
Their glorious football team many not be first at anything much these days, but BT have announced that Cardiff and the surrounding area will lead the UK with the implementation of their 21st Century Network (21CN).
The £10bn investment will roll out the next generation of converged communications, including telephone calls, broadband and Ethernet services delivered through an Internet-based platform.
The investment will end BT’s dependence on telephony through on Ye Olde public switched telephone network (PSTN) and should – in theory – result in cheaper telephone bills for its customers.
What is this 21CN thing, do I hear you ask?
Here’s how BT describe the technology:
“BT’s 21st Century Network (21CN) is a global IP infrastructure, based upon multi-protocol label switching (MPLS), that carries voice, data and Internet services on a single network. The 21CN offers multiple services across a single network, rather than today’s multitude of networks offering specific services.”
“For BT, this will mean fewer network elements overall and require simpler network management. For BT’s customers, the 21CN will deliver more choice, control and accessibility, as well as increased flexibility, reliability and security.”
BT is expected to begin migrating around 350,000 customer lines in the area during the second half of 2006, with the 21CN programme requiring the replacement of equipment in more than 50 local exchanges along with the implementation of new IT systems to make the technology do its stuff.
Ask BT competitors what 21CN is and you’ll get quite a different answer. Their view is that it is effectively the death of meaningful competition in the UK and that once BT has it in place there will be no incentive to try and unbundle exchanges.
Three cool-sounding “metro nodes” (super telephone exchanges) are to be developed in Cardiff, Swansea and Newport, with 10 new transmission sites also being developed across the region. These will be assessed for power supply, space and logistics planning before the ‘on’ switch is pressed.
First Minister Rhodri Morgan purred, “It’s incredibly exciting for us that Wales has been selected to provide the test bed for BT’s new 21st Century Network This investment by BT clearly signifies that Cardiff and central South Wales is one of Europe’s most dynamic and progressive regions. The end result will transform our personal and business lives, and help attract high-tech industry and services to Wales.”
Matt Bross, BT group’s chief technology officer, said, “This roll-out will be the first time anywhere in the world that customers will have communications services provided over such a radical next generation network.”
“The operational experience that we gain in Cardiff and the surrounding area will enable us to move full steam ahead and deliver 21CN to everyone in the UK – migrating a total of 30 million lines – in just four years.”
“It’s an enormous technical and operational challenge, but will enable customers to benefit from compelling new services.”
How the installation and implementation of the service – and the customer feedback – works out will help BT finalise plans to roll out 21CN to customers across the UK by the end of the decade.
BT 21st Century Network
4 July, 2005
DoJ Operation Site Down: Raids In 11 Nations
In a pretty gung-ho move that shows a lot of seriousness, the US Department of Justice (DoJ) have announced the results of Operation Site Down. More than 20 raids occurred in Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Israel, the Netherlands, Portugal and the UK, as well as 70 in the USA.
Four arrests: David Fish; Nate Lovell; Chirayu Patel; and William Veyna were made in the US with them being charged with violating federal copyright protection laws.
Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales was nothing if not stern, “By dismantling these networks, the Department is striking at the top of the copyright piracy supply chain—a distribution chain that provides the vast majority of the illegal digital content now available online, and by penetrating this illegal world of high-technology and intellectual property theft, we have shown that law enforcement can and will find — and we will prosecute — those who try to use the Internet to create piracy networks beyond the reach of law enforcement.”
We’d imagine there’s been a fair degree of celebration at this news in the entertainment world – dinner tables will be booked.
The DoJ reported that hundreds of computers had been seized, leading to at least eight major online distribution networks being shut down.
With the size of the seizures we’d imagine there’ll a big gap left in the world downloading. It will be interesting to see how long it takes to repair itself.
One thing the Attorney General said particularly struck us, “this illegal world of high-technology and intellectual property theft.” Let’s hope the two of these are bound together, and he’s not talking about a separate illegal world of high-technology. Now that would be worrying.
While closing down some file sharing networks for a period of time will temporarily throttle the flow of material over the Internet, we see far more direct financial loss through gangs selling DVD’s around pubs, clubs and streets of the UK, where this has reached such a level that we have seen a pub with “No DVDs” signs on the door.
File trading on the Internet is done by spending the time doing it, but it has no financial gain. The DVDs being sold in public are making someone very rich.
It does make you think that if downloading high-quality movies without seeing the head of someone getting up in the middle of the film to go to the toilet were easy, most of that fiver that people pay on the street would end up in the film company’s pocket. Sadly they’re waiting for DRM to be in place first.
US Department of Justice
4 July, 2005
Ofcom’s BT statement – Legal Issues Examined
Following hot on the heals of yesterdays Ofcom’s notice to BT, under Section 155(1) of the Enterprise Act 2002, Russ Taylor of OfcomWatch takes us through the legal issues.
Ofcom released the details of the BT settlement.
Folks, here are the key takeaways / open issues as I see them from a legal perspective:
* This is essentially a consultation on whether BT has promised enough (‘undertakings’ – spelled out in Section 2 of the document) to avoid referral of this matter to the Competition Commission. Ofcom concludes that BT has, and asks for public comment until August 12, 2005.
* Section 4.14 of the document is the key allegation, and check-out the indirect wording on Ofcom’s part! Ofcom basically say that BT had the incentive to engage in anti-competitive conduct, and later say that it suspects BT ‘may have acted in accordance with the incentives set out above.’ Is that Plain English? Even the title of Section 4 is non-confrontational… referring to the problems of the market, rather than problems with BT.
* Annex E is the basic document (the Annexes are here). It is the proposed agreement between BT and Ofcom. It specifies the undertakings. It looks to me like the Access Service Division (ASD) CEO reports to the BT CEO. So, presumably, the BT CEO can terminate the ASD CEO? That’s not exactly ‘separation’. And more importantly, it does not square with the classic definition of a CEO.
* It’s a lengthy document, and I’ve only skimmed it, but the missing element–in my opinion–seems to be a clear dispute resolution / problem solving element of the undertakings. In other words, what happens if BT shirks its duties, or there is a dispute about one of the undertakings. Are the undertakings self-enforcing? I don’t think so. Sections 12 through 17 of Annex E purport to cover this ground, but I think they are vaguely worded. Section 14, in particular, seems to merely allow BT and Ofcom to agree to disagree, and has no real teeth other than Ofcom’s ability to declare BT in breach of the undertakings. But what then? Does Ofcom then have the power to fine BT? I don’t think so – I think a breach would require Ofcom to go to court to secure a remedy… or threaten another referral? So, would communications policy decisions then rest in the hands of a court? Why didn’t Ofcom require BT, as part of its undertakings, to waive court procedures and agree to a schedule of monetary penalties, etc.
* I also recall that Ofcom initially said that third parties would be able to secure relief under this settlement–for their losses caused by BT’s breaches of the undertakings. How does that work? This element of the scheme seems to be completely missing from the documents.
* Finally, what happens if BT merges with another entity to which these undertakings do not apply. I’m confused… Overall, I think the document accomplishes much by way of technically sorting out a way to limit BT’s market power. But from a legal perspective, it needs some more thought.
* * *
This should be an interesting consultation… stay tuned…
Russ taylor is a co-founder of OfcomWatch
Ofcom
1 July, 2005
HowTo: Play Films on PSP
Sony’s PlayStation Portable is a media hub, but unfortunately, apart from games there isn’t really any content available for it (not forgetting unlucky UK citizens who can’t even officially buy one until September).
It’s possible to put MP3’s on to your memory stick (Duo Pro) and listen to them through your PSP, but an iPod is probably a better system for just audio.
What makes the PSP special is its screen, very bright, lots of colours and wide. When Sony release movies on UMD they’ll sell thousands and you’ll get the public transport commuter zombies staring at their PSPs, earphones stuffed in their ears watching the latest blockbuster trying their hardest to escape from the real world.
Become a Zombie now
Though it’s not possible to get UMD movies yet, the PSP will play MPEG4 movies off the memory stick. A 1GB memory stick costs about £100 (~US$177, ~€148) which will hold about 2 full length movies (more, if quality is compromised).
Making movies used to be complicated, but luckily there are programs out there that considerably simplify the process and make it easy.
Using an Apple Mac has many advantages and ripping DVDs is one of them. Look for an application MacTheRipper, it does exactly what is says on the tin, and takes the MPEG2 information from a DVD while removing region coding, macrovision and other DVD annoyances and stores the resulting files on the hard disk.
In order to make it PSP friendly, just extract the main title.
Now find a nice utility PSPWARE, which links the Mac with the PSP. It backs-up saved programs from the PSP, but from the Mac to PSP it does a whole lot more, like syncing photo albums, playlists from iTunes but more importantly movies.
PSPWARE just takes the movie directory (produced from MacTheRipper) and magically out pops some MPEG4 files. They take a while to convert, but when the PSP is plugged in, they zap across and just work.
They really do look good and are very watchable.
Windows users don’t despair
PSPWARE has just been released for Windows with the same functionality as the Mac version. Unfortunately though there are DVD rippers out there they can be difficult to use.
DVDdecrypter was one of the best (very similar to MacTheRipper) and it’s still available from various sites, but the author has stopped supporting it as he was “put under pressure” from a major corporation.
PSPWARE is available from NullRiver it costs about £8 (~US$14~€11) for a perpetual license (free upgrades).
MacTheRipper is availble from RipDifferent and is freeware.
Windows users will have to do a bit of digging for DVDdecrypter – but it’s out there and free.
NOTE: Incredible as it may seem, making digital copies of films may be illegal in your country, even if for personal use.
1 July, 2005
Gizmo Project takes on Skype
It’s not surprising that when an entrepreneur sees something as successful as Skype has been, (you can’t see over 127m downloads in any other way), that the word opportunity is writ large in their eyes. This is especially when that person likes disrupting legacy business models, such as the phone system.
Enter Michael Robertson, he of mp3.com fame.
After selling mp3.com for a considerable amount of money, Mr Robertson went on to create Lindows. A Linux-based desktop operating system that aimed to take on Microsoft and their Windows product head on. After some huffing and puffing from Microsoft Lindows changed its name to the less controversial Linspire.
During the time of building up Linspire, I was surprised to see Robertson launched SIPPhone.com – his first pop at a VoIP business. When I first saw this it looked like a distraction from his OS business, almost like he saw the great opportunity of VoIP coming and couldn’t resist jumping on top of it.
Well things have move on now, and after 6 months software development, Robinson is publicly showing his Skype-killer, Gizmo Project.
The big differentiator between Gizmo Project (a temporary name – they’re asking for suggestions) and Skype is Gizmo uses the open standard of SIP (Session Initiation Protocol, for those who really want to know), as opposed to the proprietary method Skype uses. This goes after Skype in the only way it can.
Many of the early users of Skype were hardcore Linux/Open source fans. Although using Skype was free, it still stuck in their throats a little that they were talking over proprietary protocols.
Skype doesn’t allow connections to other VoIP service, and as they control all of the inside processing, if they don’t want it to happen, it won’t.
Robertson claims that as Gizmo is SIP-based, it will interconnect to any other phone system.
Using Gizmo Once the software is installed, anyone familiar with Skype will not have a problem quickly adapting to use Gizmo. It runs on Linux, Macintosh and Windows. It appears to have all of Skype’s functions plus quite a few extras.
Useful additional features include a call quality meter, located at the bottom left of the app.
Gee whiz factor is provided by features like the World map that can be summoned up, showing you how far you are calling – good for gloating that you’re not paying a penny extra for calling that distance.
Despite the product being in beta, it’s currently on version 0.8, Gizmo haven’t been slow in holding back on the in and outbound call features – the ones that generate the income. It was surprising to see that the pricing of Gizmo In is more expensive than SkypeIn, with the $30 buying just 6 months of service compared with Skypes – I thought new entrants to a market were supposed to be more competitive not half the value.
Skype has done well in encouraging other companies to build extra software and importantly, hardware including phone handsets (Siemens M34; Cyberphone K). This has been enabled by them publishing the API (Application Program Interface). As to whether/if Gizmo will have an API as Skype does, is as yet unclear.
Trying to unseat Skype is one hell of a tough battle; it’s seriously entrenched in the tech world, and is making pretty strong moves in to the general market.
The fact that it uses open protocols is a big advantage, if that kind of thing is important to you. For the rest of the market what’s important is that they’re able to speak to their friends on the service. As things stand today, that is probably Skype.
Expect a rash of these applications.
Gizmo Project
1 July, 2005
AOL video search; iTunes 4.9 podcasting; 24Mb Broadand in UK – News Round Up
AOL launches video search service
America Online has launched a free, enhanced video search that includes a new lightweight video viewer and speech-recognition technology claimed to give better results based on the audio of multimedia files.
The beta service, called AOL Video, offers free access to search and playback for more than 15,000 “video assets” from Time Warner, news clips from CNN, MSNBC and other sources.
The lightweight video viewer uses the playback engines of popular media players (such as RealPlayer, Windows Media Player and QuickTime) that are already installed on a user’s PC.
AOL reckons that the new speech recognition tools will bring significant improvements to its previous ability to search only closed-caption information provided by content contributors.
AOL plans to announce next week new content partners for its video-search repository with advertisers able to deliver ads relevant to the content chosen by the consumer.
With a demand for video growing as consumers switch from dial-up Internet access to broadband, AOL said that it plans to use video as the primary lure for consumers using broadband connections.
AOL launches video search service [ZDNET]
iTunes 4.9 rockets Podcasting into the mainstream
Podcast subscriptions have rocketed over the one million mark, with figures from Pew Internet and American Life suggesting that over 6 million Americans – nearly a third of the estimated 22 million owners of MP3 players – have listened to podcasts.
Tuesday’s launch of Apple’s iTunes 4.9 software – which lets listeners subscribe to and download podcasts – has left servers groaning under the strain of soaring downloads.
Will Lewis, management consultant for US radio station KCRW talked of a “stratospheric” increase in traffic since the iTunes 4.9 launch, with downloads increasing tenfold.
Podcasting goes mainstream [ENN]
Be* Unlimited to offer 24Mbit Broadband In UK
Life on the Web going to get considerably faster for some denizens of London, thanks to an ultrafast 24Mb broadband connection offered by Be* Unlimited.
The Billy Whizz connection will use a local loop unbundling (LLU) operation to launch a pilot scheme using ADSL2+technology in August.
Planning to eventually un-bundle exchanges throughout the UK, the London based company will be installing its high speed kit in 45 BT telephone exchanges throughout London.
Company founder Boris Ivanovic has already proved the viability of the service after a 26meg broadband venture in Sweden increased its revenue from US$1million (~€837k ~ £564k) to US$55million (~€46m ~ £31m) in just three years.
Be Unlimited First With 24Mbit Broadband In UK [BIOS]
Be* Unlimited
1 July, 2005
Teleport, TV-on-Demand Service Launched By Telewest Broadband
Cable company Telewest Broadband is making Teleport, its TV-on-demand service, available to over 26,000 customers in Cheltenham and Gloucester today.
As we reported last month, this forms the first stage of national roll-out which Telewest claims will “revolutionise” digital TV for more than a million customers by the beginning of next year.
The cable company’s Teleport service gives customers instant, 24 hour access to a vast library films and TV entertainment with users able to pause, fast forward and rewind the content, just like a DVD.
Sofa-loafing customers can access the service via the existing set-top box and remote control, with a simple on-screen menu serving up viewing menus.
Teleport Movies offers around 200 current and library films from FilmFlex, with rental charges costing between £2.00 (~$3.59, ~€3) and £3.50 (~$6.28, ~€5.20) for a 24-hour rental period.
Teleport Replay lets TV addicts users catch up on popular programmes from the previous week, and will include riveting programmes such as Eastenders and Casualty (be still my beating heart!), with Teleport Life offering specialist interest programmes.
Soon to be launched is Teleport TV, which will screen classic BBC series such as Morse and Waking the Dead and music videos on a subscription basis.
Freeloaders will be pleased to learn that Telewest is promising a “substantial amount” of free content, including soaps, comedy and documentaries, along with the usual pay-per-view and subscription options.
Subscribers to the company’s premier digital TV package will get most of the new content bundled in for free, including access to the entire TV package.
Eric Tveter, president and CEO of Telewest, mused: “Teleport has arrived and it’s genuinely going to change the way people watch TV. The schedule normally dictates viewing, but our customers will have the choice and convenience of a service they can tailor – it’s TV on their terms.”
Telewest Broadband has already been scooping up secured content from a wide range of providers including Filmflex, the BBC, Flextech, Discovery Networks Europe, National Geographic Channel Europe, Nickelodeon, Jetix (ex-Fox Kids) and Playboy TV.
Such is Telewest’s determination to snaffle a chunk of the burgeoning Video On Demand market, the company is whipping out its wallet like Ron Atkinson on pay day, investing around £20 million in the development of advanced TV services in 2005.
Telewest
30 June, 2005
Quake, Etch A Sketch And Da Yoot On Mobiles And Bluetooth Security – Newsround
Quake to be ported to 3D-enabled mobile phones
A mobile phone version of the famous 3D Blast ‘Em Up’ from id Software is in development by a company called Bare Naked Productions.
The game is being optimised for a new generation of mobile phones handsets that feature dedicated 3D graphics hardware.
The 3D-enabled mobile phones are expected to be coming out of Korea next month.
Mobilemag.com
Bluetooth group offers security tips to avoid attacks
After a paper published earlier this month revealed how security mechanisms in short-range wireless Bluetooth technology could be undermined, members of the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) have produced a list of precautions for users.
These include always pairing devices privately, avoiding public places; using eight character alphanumeric PIN (personal identification number) codes and repairing connections in private, secure locations
Bluetooth.com
Etch A Sketch makes a comeback on mobile phones
For the technology-poor, time-rich kid growing up in the 1970s and 1980s, Etch a Sketch was the equivalent of Photoshop.
Launched 45 years ago, the device shifted more than 100m units, allowing very patient users to while away the hours creating basic monochrome drawings by moving two dials to draw lines over a screen.
Originally called the DoodleMaster Magic Screen in the UK, a new mobile phone version of Etch A Sketch has been created by the Ohio Art Company and mobile game developers In Fusio.
Initially available in the UK to Orange customers, the mobile version replaces the plastic drawing dials with the phone keypad.
Sadly, shaking the phone doesn’t clear the screen as in the original, but pressing the ‘0’ key will activate the vibrate function of the phone. Nice touch!
In-Fusio
Da Yoot prefer mobiles to Internet. Innit.
A study from mobile media firm Enpocket, asked which medium consumers would give up last if they had to choose between TV, newspapers, mobile phone, the Internet, radio and magazines.
People were most reluctant to give up the goggle box, with 31% choosing to give it up last, followed by mobile (19%), radio (16%), the Internet (13%), newspapers (10%) and magazines (5%) in terms of popularity.
Young adults (18-24 years olds) loved their mobiles above all, with 30% choosing to give up their mobile last, above television (28%) and the Internet (15%).
The survey also revealed that 81% of 18-24 year olds can access the Internet on their mobiles, with 79% able to send and receive MMS picture messages.
The Mobile Media Monitor also revealed how mobile is growing as a marketing medium; 49% of the UK population and 71% of the loyal 18-24 year old age group had received marketing over their mobiles.
Peter Larsen, CEO of Enpocket, said: “The survey indicates how important the mobile medium is becoming for marketing communications, provided these are user-initiated and personally relevant.
Young adults prefer mobiles to Internet
30 June, 2005
Motorola Buy Ashes Of Sendo: Analysis
It’s not everyday a new mobile handset company comes along, so it was sad news to hear that Sendo, a relatively new entrant, had gone into administration. Motorola weren’t slow to see a good buy, and purchased it by the afternoon. Guy Kewney takes us through the reasons.
Sendo is dead; there is now nothing left of it, except a new set of features for Motorola, which has formally announced its purchase of Sendo from the administrator.
Effectively, Sendo went bust because its gamble failed; it should have been the world’s leading provider of smartphones, but had to quit the business when it fell out with Microsoft, and start all over with Nokia/Symbian.
The company was making money, but spending more. It was, say competitors, winning business by two ploys. The first was its breakthrough ploy, and that’s the one which Motorola has bought it for: the ability to produce a phone that does everything the operator wants.
“The difference between Motorola and Sendo,” said one source today, “was that if Vodafone said: “We need these features for Vodafone Live!” then Motorola would say: “Let’s get working, and we’ll have something for you in nine months!” while Sendo would say “OK, we’ll do it now.”
Another source said: “The ‘entire intellectual property portfolio – including 50 existing and 40 pending patents’ which Motorola referred to in its release is half of the reason. The software they want is the software which allowed Sendo to configure a phone for people like Orange for Orangeworld – but almost more important, is getting the people at Sendo who knew how to configure that software.”
Motorola already has a Symbian licence, and the deal doesn’t give them Sendo’s Series 60 licence. Some sources insist that nonetheless, the move shows a significant move away from Windows Mobile, following the cancellation of its long-awaited WM Bluetooth phone recently – but that is almost certainly wishful partisan thinking, since Motorola has both Symbian and WM phones on its road-map.
Partisan thinking is also behind suggestions that Sendo’s collapse owes nothing to Microsoft’s actions in the split between the two corporations.
The most recent disaster, admittedly, was Ericsson’s doing, not Microsoft’s: but the crunch was inevitable, after Microsoft’s attempt to pull the plug on Sendo (analysis shows how easily this could have been deliberate).
At the time Microsoft and Sendo parted company, Sendo was the sole provider of the only Microsoft smartphone in the world; it was literally years ahead of all rivals, except perhaps for Nokia with its Communicator. Because of the collapse of the Microsoft-Sendo partnership, however, Sendo found itself as far behind the mass market as it had been in front.
Smartphones were crucial to founder Hugh Brogan’s strategy. They are deliciously high margin products, and also high profile. Without the smartphone, the only way Sendo could win contracts was:
- by offering to customise them for “added value” services like Vodafone Live!
- by cutting the margins below the bone.
The hope was that the company’s financiers would stand by it until it reached the point where it could start charging market rates, and making profits.
“Actually, they might have managed that,” said one source, who works for a company that contracts to Motorola, “but for the fact that they built some very poor phones. Poor build quality meant they were struggling to win repeat contracts from several networks.”
Guy Kewney’s NewsWireless
Sendo
Motorola
30 June, 2005
MSN IM To Vodafone Handsets
The ability to disconnect from the world has taken a further blow as Vodafone and Microsoft announce a global tied up to offer MSN Messenger IM to Vodafone’s mobile phone customers. People sitting at their MSN Instant Messaging (IM) client on their computers will be able to carry out chats with their Vodafone carrying chums.
The function goes beyond the simple exchange of messages, extending to showing the “presence” of their contacts and exchange instant messages between MSN Messenger on a PC and Vodafone Messenger on mobile phones and vice versa.
It’s the matching of equals – MSN Messenger has 165m customers against Vodafone’s global totally of 155m. Both of them are seeing it as a way to raise additional income – while IM PC-PC is free, this Vodafone/MSN offering will be paid for. Time will tell if the consumers that are the focus of this will be willing to pay for the privilege.
Putting on his best tech-savvy face, Peter Bamford, Chief Marketing Officer for Vodafone glowed, “IM is a growing part of the increasingly important mobile messaging market. By bringing our collective customers together, we’ll deliver more options for staying in touch when messaging. Our agreement will grow IM and SMS, meaning additional revenue for Vodafone.”
This type of PC-to-mobile messaging isn’t new. About nine months ago there was a rash of mobile phone companies announcing PC to SMS messaging, some with more success than others.
Digital-Lifestyles understand that this IM deal will not be unique or exclusive to either party. Vodafone will be working with other IM services and MS will hookup with other mobile phone companies.
The official Vodafone word on the new service didn’t give us any information on pricing of the service, so we went digging.
While we didn’t get to any exact figures, we were able to find out the service will be charged on the basis of each message sent. This will cause current IM users to radically change the way they use IM. No more will they be quickly replying with short witticisms, but will need to become more Bard-like in their compositions – if they don’t want to end up with huge bills at the end of the month.
A finger-in-the-air estimate to the per message cost? A Vodafoner told us it will be around, but under the cost of SMS, which should be made slightly more palatable by bundles being available.
Vodafone Messenger, a form of IM on their mobiles, currently run on Vodafone Live! This WAP-based service is embedded into the latest Vodafone handsets. The new offering will use this, and if it isn’t available, straight SMS will be used.
Trials for the new service will start in July, with the product being introduced in Italy, Spain and the Netherlands in the next two months. Other European countries will follow by the end of the year.
Vodafone Messenger MSN Messenger
30 June, 2005