Skype's Helping Verizon Stall Wireless Evolution Crippled apps, exclusive deals, and less choice. Good work all around, gents. We've consistently explored how incumbent wireless carriers are terrified of the evolution of mobile networks and being relegated to "dumb pipe" status. The rise of smartphones, mobile VoIP, and push IM clients all collectively not only threaten some huge cash cows (voice minutes, SMS), but also content revenues. Applications like Google Voice even threaten to take core dialing and call functionality (voicemail) out of the hands of carriers. That would mean carriers would exist simply to run the best network possible, which might sound good to some of us -- but not to investors who expect quarter over quarter growth. You'd think that mobile VoIP carriers like Skype would be helping to push us toward this open future, which means more choice for consumers and more opportunity for third party content and service vendors. But as we saw with Skype's recent exclusive, crippled application deal with Verizon, they're actually doing the opposite -- signing deals that appear to limit mobile VoIP's usefulness while helping Verizon resist change. Derek Kerton over at Techdirt breaks the issue down in great detail, offering a nice timeline of Skype's recent behavior in the mobile VoIP front: The result of this exclusive deal is, essentially, to deprive an entire country of the value of a good VoIP service (Skype) on mobile phones, and instead to offer us a crippled version that is designed not to delight any user, but to delight a carrier. How ironic, then, that Skype's Silverman has been at the forefront of the push for more "open" networks. As Kerton notes, this comes even after Skype complained ceaselessly about closed networks, and after AT&T finally relented and allowed Skype full access to AT&T's 3G network. In short, Skype was apparently willing to compromise their principles for some monetary love from Verizon, at the cost of fully functional mobile applications and consumer choice. And the slow and bumpy road toward truly open mobile networks continues...
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 | | What road? "And the slow and bumpy road toward truly open mobile networks continues..."
There's a road? (I don't see it... "signpost up ahead"?) | |
|  | | | Re: What road? It's a little obstructed via tumbleweeds and phone company executives pushing around wheelbarrows full of money, but it's there. | |
| | |  ReformCRTCSupport Your Independent ISP
join:2004-03-07
Canada | Re: What road? In Hazzard County, the road can lead to Roscoe jumping into a pond while the Duke boys zoom on down the road.
Tumbleweeds, indeed. | |
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 ThrowDemsOutIf you can't convince 'em, confuse 'emPremium
join:2002-03-03
Mullica Hill, NJ
kudos:4 |  Pulling Skype from Win Mobile?
»www.rcrwireless.com/article/2010···f-return
Skype's VoIP apps for the Windows Mobile operating system, Skype Lite and Skype for Windows Phones, are no longer available for download, the comp any announced, claiming the apps didn't offer a good enough experience. »www.techdirt.com/articles/201003···12.shtml
Feb. 26, 2010: Skype completely pulls it's very functional Windows Mobile apps with little explanation, and no suggestion of when they might return. The app, which works fine, just goes away. Why pull the most functional Skype mobile app and leave only crippled versions? I don't buy Skype's stated reason for pulling Skype from Win Mobile. Did they cut a deal with Apple to cripple Microsoft? | |
| | | skype skype whined and whined for innovation and now they got greedy and stifling exactly what they fought so hard for.
greedy bastards.
stick to google voice. | |
| |  SLDPremium
join:2002-04-17
San Francisco, CA | Re: skype Uh, all corporations are greedy bastards. Think about it: a headless sociopath. What do you expect? | |
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Reviews:
 ·Comcast
| And Just Who Are Those Investors? Karl, the biggest investors in *all* the telecom providers (cable, telcos including wireless, satellite, etc.) are institutional investors, and the largest single group of *those* are pension plans (and mostly public-employee pension plans, followed by union pension plans). In other words, indirectly (and in some cases directly, through stock purchases and bond purchases) it's *us* that insists on those above bank-deposit rates of return.
We insist on absolutely lowest cost on the one hand, and insist on high interest and dividend rates which *preclude* rock-bottom pricing (and dumb pipes) on the other.
Talk about hypocrisy. | |
| | | | Re: And Just Who Are Those Investors? Frankly, I think the customers are the biggest group of "investors". We're the ones who pay billions upon billions upon billions--Carl Sagan would be proud  --of dollars to these providers... and all we want is good value for our "investment". And, personally, if I don't get that... then I'm going to stop "investing" my money with people who think they're the ones who are doing me a favor by taking my money. | |
| | | SLDPremium
join:2002-04-17
San Francisco, CA | Re: And Just Who Are Those Investors? Here here! That's called voting with your dollars! | |
| | | Reviews:
·Comcast
| said by mod_wastrel:Frankly, I think the customers are the biggest group of "investors". We're the ones who pay billions upon billions upon billions--Carl Sagan would be proud --of dollars to these providers... and all we want is good value for our "investment". And, personally, if I don't get that... then I'm going to stop "investing" my money with people who think they're the ones who are doing me a favor by taking my money. A public company's *first* responsibility is to its shareholders and investors (via it's board). Not the customer. Not even the government. While (in most cases) a company (especially a public company) can't survive by horking off their customers (or breaking the law), the first responsibility is (and should be) making sure the investors (the stock and bondholders) get paid. If you disagree, do business with non-profits (such as cooperatives, credit unions, et. alia.). | |
| | | | | | Re: And Just Who Are Those Investors? Yeah, well, Comcast, for example, receives much more money from customers than from investors, so... do the math: screw your customers--repeatedly, and they will cut you off. Customer unfriendly policies, plans, and prices are just some of the ways for an ISP to cut off its nose to spite its face. You want to keep a balance between shareholders and customers, but of the two customers are considerably more valuable than shareholders. A service that no one is willing to pay for is of no worth at all. | |
| | | | | Reviews:
·Comcast
| Re: And Just Who Are Those Investors? said by mod_wastrel:Yeah, well, Comcast, for example, receives much more money from customers than from investors, so... do the math: screw your customers--repeatedly, and they will cut you off. Customer unfriendly policies, plans, and prices are just some of the ways for an ISP to cut off its nose to spite its face. You want to keep a balance between shareholders and customers, but of the two customers are considerably more valuable than shareholders. A service that no one is willing to pay for is of no worth at all. And a public company that doesn't pay a fair return on the investment (in the opinion of those investors) *gets* no investors, no matter what the customers think. Cooperatives and other not-for-profits are perfectly free to operate differently (after all, neither a cooperative or other NFP is forced to make a profit); however, a public company is faced with that onus.
Can you name a not-for-profit *national* telecom provider that is not a governmental entity, anywhere? | |
| | | | | | | | Re: And Just Who Are Those Investors? Like I said, the key word is "balance". Investors have no more right to decide what is "fair" with regard to ROI, than customers have with regard to prices... well, other than what each is willing to either accept or pay. Of course, if every single investor simply dried up and disappeared from the company's financial landscape, the company could still get by just fine simply by serving its customers in a fair, financially responsible way. Customers are essential for a company to survive; shareholders are not, at least, not for established companies. No shareholders draining off revenue means no need to charge customers more to feed the leeches. (See... I can be simplistic, too. ) | |
| | | | | | | | I think it's funny that you mention only public corporations, not-for-profits, and government entities. What about the privately-owned for-profit company? To me, the overwhelming preponderance of public corporations versus privately-owned ones is the single biggest problem with the American "free-market" nowadays. A privately-owned company can be perfectly content with making the same profit year after year, focusing on product quality and paying attention to its customers' needs instead of screwing them. The public corporation, on the other hand, is forced by its shareholders to constantly grow, no matter what the cost. Like a balloon being steadily filled with air, at some point it must burst. | |
| | | | | | | | said by PGHammer:said by mod_wastrel:Yeah, well, Comcast, for example, receives much more money from customers than from investors, so... do the math: screw your customers--repeatedly, and they will cut you off. Customer unfriendly policies, plans, and prices are just some of the ways for an ISP to cut off its nose to spite its face. You want to keep a balance between shareholders and customers, but of the two customers are considerably more valuable than shareholders. A service that no one is willing to pay for is of no worth at all. And a public company that doesn't pay a fair return on the investment (in the opinion of those investors) *gets* no investors, no matter what the customers think. Cooperatives and other not-for-profits are perfectly free to operate differently (after all, neither a cooperative or other NFP is forced to make a profit); however, a public company is faced with that onus. Can you name a not-for-profit *national* telecom provider that is not a governmental entity, anywhere? Oh please. Don't get me started. People invest in companies and keep their money in those companies no matter *what* the corporation does. Just look at Charter who is going bankrupt or heck even GM. These companies all have incurred serious financial catastrophes, and dumb investors stuck with them until they declared bankruptcy and lost their money.
Look at Google, who made up arbitrary voting rules that gave all the power to the founders and essentially no power to the investors. Despite the rules their IPO was huge, and they've been massively successful, attracting even more investors, *not* gouging their customers for every possible money. | |
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| | | | | Thats a lie the company's like to tell.
If there are no customers, there are no sales, no board to pay and no stockholders to pay. | |
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| | | | Well said.
My buck stops here. | |
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| beaups
join:2003-08-11
Hilliard, OH | Very good point. It would also be interesting to see what % of carrier "x"'s customers are also shareholders...either directly or indirectly. | |
| |  DavidI have a son- d3Premium,VIP
join:2002-05-30
Granite City, IL
kudos:68
 ·AT&T Southwest
 ·DIRECTV
·AT&T Midwest
 ·Google Voice
| said by PGHammer:Karl, the biggest investors in *all* the telecom providers (cable, telcos including wireless, satellite, etc.) are institutional investors, and the largest single group of *those* are pension plans (and mostly public-employee pension plans, followed by union pension plans). In other words, indirectly (and in some cases directly, through stock purchases and bond purchases) it's *us* that insists on those above bank-deposit rates of return. We insist on absolutely lowest cost on the one hand, and insist on high interest and dividend rates which *preclude* rock-bottom pricing (and dumb pipes) on the other. Talk about hypocrisy. It's like a rock and hard place scenario. Is there a way to nurture both in today's demanding (investor and customer) society alike? The short answer I am thinking is no.
--
If you have a topic in the direct forum please reply to it or a post of mine, I get a notification when you do this.
Koetting Ford, Granite City, illinois... YOU'RE FIRED!!
| |
| | | Reviews:
·Comcast
| Re: And Just Who Are Those Investors? said by David:said by PGHammer:Karl, the biggest investors in *all* the telecom providers (cable, telcos including wireless, satellite, etc.) are institutional investors, and the largest single group of *those* are pension plans (and mostly public-employee pension plans, followed by union pension plans). In other words, indirectly (and in some cases directly, through stock purchases and bond purchases) it's *us* that insists on those above bank-deposit rates of return. We insist on absolutely lowest cost on the one hand, and insist on high interest and dividend rates which *preclude* rock-bottom pricing (and dumb pipes) on the other. Talk about hypocrisy. It's like a rock and hard place scenario. Is there a way to nurture both in today's demanding (investor and customer) society alike? The short answer I am thinking is no. David, that is precisely my point. It's even worse when the investor and the customer (in the case of the national telecom providers) are all too often one and the same person.
Here's some interesting data - the job-approval ratings for *Congress* have been at historic lows since the second Bush's second term started. Yet, the two elections since have seen record numbers of incumbents re-elected. It's not just hypocrisy, but the same SORT of hypocrisy. | |
| | | | ricep5Premium
join:2000-08-07
Jacksonville, FL | Re: And Just Who Are Those Investors? The same hypocrisy that has people giving out their phone numbers to join frequent buyers clubs (to get the discounts) but then having the government set up a "do not call" database to block the very people who paid to get your number which subsidizes your discount.
The same hypocrisy that gives tacit approval to a congressman who can "bring home the bacon", but will vote him out if they attempt to raise taxes to pay for "the bacon".
The same hypocrisy that files suit against motorcycle helmet makers when little Jimmy hit a pole and died after running his motorcycle at 100mph.
The list goes on and on. | |
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| | I hate Skype! No, they signed a deal with verizon for a truckload of money. So they released a crippled version for verizon phones only and nothing for anybody else's phones. Therefore if you want skype you have to go to verizon, and once there, you get a seriously crippled skype experience. So now its basically worthless.
Because of them selling out, I'll never use them every again. | |
|  JEJE 's BACK BABYPremium
join:2000-12-15
East Orange, NJ
1 edit | SKYPE SUCKS! Don't care about em, never used em, never WILL!
Any company that deliberately blocks or puts a stop the the usefulness of the end users equipment should be out of business, but you will never have that. Our American base of consumers, as a whole really aren't smart or talented enough to figure it out on their own. Yet, people keep whining about not being able to pay our bills!!! FIGURE IT OUT DROIDS!!!!
JE | |
| skurfa
join:2006-03-10
Yorktown, VA | It's here.......well, in some places.. The dumb pipe mobile network is here if you happen to live in the right places, I believe it's called Sprint 4G or Clear......
This is why I resist the LTE will Kill WiMax argument, if WiMax in the form of Sprint/Clear stays open and unlimited it has a very good chance against LTE,in the VZW form anyway..........
--
Fairtax.org, It's time. | |
| | Reviews:
·Comcast
·AT&T Southeast
| Re: It's here.......well, in some places.. said by skurfa:The dumb pipe mobile network is here if you happen to live in the right places, I believe it's called Sprint 4G or Clear...... This is why I resist the LTE will Kill WiMax argument, if WiMax in the form of Sprint/Clear stays open and unlimited it has a very good chance against LTE,in the VZW form anyway.......... I fail to see how the network protocol has anything to do with it's "open" status. Verizon's "closed" network has nothing to do with signal format and has everything to do with executive decisions. Verizon could be converted to 100% open with literally a single phone call. | |
| | | Reviews:
·Comcast
| Re: It's here.......well, in some places.. Let's look specifically at Sprint - Sprint used to be a CLEC/ILEC and LDS provider (in addition to a small regional wireless provider). Sprint bailed out of the long-distance bsiness (when that became a flat-rate forest; in other words, a dumb pipe), spun off the ILEC/CLEC biz (now Embarq), and is *still* burning through cash at a horrendous rate. (Worse for Sprint, they are still hemmorhaging the customer with the highest pay-through rate for a wireless carrier - the business customer; and they are losing them to both AT&T Mobility and VZW.) Most investors want nothing to do with Sprint's stock (and even fewer want any part of Sprint's debt; it's junk status today); however, Sprint can't afford to raise prices (even though they are already losing their customer base in droves; they have the highest churn rate in national wireless). What have the investors and business customers picked up about Sprint that some of us refuse to see? We've seen two other companies go down this path in this industry - Adelphia and Worldcom. | |
| | | | | | Re: It's here.......well, in some places.. OK - couple of things to correct in PGHammer's comments: 1) Sprint is not burning through cash at a horrendous rate. Sorry - look at 4Q. Cash is going up. There's things all of us can criticize about Sprint, but cash management is not one of them (under-investment in network? You be the judge - look at the PC World data study). 2) Sprint has a CLEC that serves nearly 5 million cable VoIP customers - which, as a couple of analysts have noted recently - throws off a lot of - you got it - cash. They now have a Class 5 and Class 4 (tandem/ LD network that's packet-based and paid for). 3) Sprint had so much problems with the debt holders that they raised $1.3 billion debt in 3Q 2009 (Aug 13th, I believe) to cover the Clearwire top-up. 4) T-Mobile has a higher churn in post-paid wireless (if that's what you mean by national wireless) at 2.11% - overall was closer to 3%. TMOB was higher on both counts. I am not supporting Sprint - there's plenty to be critical about - but please, speak from the facts rather than emotional nostalgic views. | |
| | | | | | said by PGHammer:Let's look specifically at Sprint - Sprint used to be a CLEC/ILEC and LDS provider (in addition to a small regional wireless provider). Sprint bailed out of the long-distance bsiness (when that became a flat-rate forest; in other words, a dumb pipe), spun off the ILEC/CLEC biz (now Embarq), and is *still* burning through cash at a horrendous rate. (Worse for Sprint, they are still hemmorhaging the customer with the highest pay-through rate for a wireless carrier - the business customer; and they are losing them to both AT&T Mobility and VZW.) Most investors want nothing to do with Sprint's stock (and even fewer want any part of Sprint's debt; it's junk status today); however, Sprint can't afford to raise prices (even though they are already losing their customer base in droves; they have the highest churn rate in national wireless). What have the investors and business customers picked up about Sprint that some of us refuse to see? We've seen two other companies go down this path in this industry - Adelphia and Worldcom. You're very good at twisting reality ever-so-slightly to fit your agenda. | |
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| | For once investors aren't the ones stalling change? It's investors that constantly artificially drive up the price of goods and services for everyday consumers ( oil ), and quite possibly was one of the main causes of the current recession. Pardon me if I don't care about investors. | |
| Reviews:
 ·Verizon FiOS
| screw SKYPE you can develop applications for most smart phones which will let you use ALMOST any voip/client provider you want.. it's just a matter of getting mass consumers onboard.. similar to the way functionality expanded for the Iphone/Ipod... and their sales growth ballooned because of that WORD OF MOUTH value added proposition. Normally, a product's popularity fizzles in the 2-3 years after the pop.. however carriers will try to confuse the issue of evolution to play to consumer's hopes (and fears) about the new tech just to get consumers on the 2-year contract bandwagon.. you DON'T see many smart phones being offered on PREPAID wireless plans/carriers-- DO YOU? Even if you paid and UNSUBSIDIZED cost of the handset... the big carriers have a vested interest in not letting you have a wifi app enabled smart phone/handset with prepaid, period-- that's the kind of evolution that WOULD bring pricing lower overall, even in the cost of handset/phones. | |
| | | the key jailbreak your iphone, install 3G unrestrictor, and allow skype it works great. | |
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