Deregulation Blues

I was just reading “Skype on iPhone may signal end of voice plans” and a thought occurred to me: well, yeah, duh.

The truth is that the technology exists, and has existed for a very long time, to usurp the stranglehold that telcos hold on the voice telecommunications industry. The only holdback is consumers, who have demonstrated through their behaviour that telcos are not so much businesses as social institutions, corporations that have been regulated into our very emotional consciousness like security blankets.

People have actually asked me: “What do I do without Northwestel/Bell/Telus,” their eyes filled with fear. (My answer: pay less, love life.)

The truth is, we don’t need them anymore. That whole market has matured beyond requiring any support, regulatory or otherwise. It’s to the point that telcos in Canada behave like babies protected by their mama (aka, the CRTC), which is just sort of embarrassing for all involved, even consumers. It’s corporate day care. But that time is done. The federal government demonstrated that even they recognize this when they overrode a CRTC decision and let the foreign-owned Fart Mobile into the exclusive, traditionally Canuck-owned-only Canadian marketplace.

Bottom line: companies are coming in, competing: may the strong survive. Breaking the average consumer’s socio-emotional dependence on Ma Bell is all that really holds them back.

But it’s going to happen, whether it’s Skype sneaking in through the backdoor or Flatulate Mobile forcing a landmark. One of these companies will figure out how to break down the barricade and make telephone users feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

Then once a mass of consumers embraces services like Skype or Truphone or even Vonage, whatever, the entire industry will fall into a tailspin as regulatory agencies that drive the industry, like the CRTC, become irrelevant. And, yeah, lots of Canadians will lose jobs.

I’m not saying it’s a good thing. I’m just saying it’s gonna happen.

So if you’re in the telco industry, start learning a new trade. Because I don’t see telcos, at least in Canada, preparing for the inevitable. Instead, they seem to be dependent on the historical status quo: lackadaisical in their dependency on the CRTC to just prop them up when they feel sad or threatened.

Good luck with that. Layoffs ahead, captain!

Is iPad the end of geek culture?

It’s a smallish chunk of glass, plastic, and silicon that has stirred up debate about computer technology like no other device before it (not even the iPhone).

Apple fanboys, as one would expect, are almost embarrassing themselves in their earnest efforts to hail the device.

Meanwhile, folks from the other side of the tracks are relentlessly attacking it as though it were some sort of heretical anti-computer. Which it is; but that’s the point.

This latter group’s actions are so reckless and violent, in fact, that they resulted in the temporary closure of the public forums on the internet’s largest technology blog, Engadget.

All of this for a device that almost no one has seen or, more to the point, held.

But it isn’t so much the iPad itself that has everyone worked up, though the debate centres on this device.

It’s more about the future that beckons (or threatens, depending on your perspective), should the iPad’s driving philosophies take hold.

Detailed Tour of iPad Touch UI Shows Why It’ll Be More Important Than iPhone

But one of the most interesting things Apple said has about the iPad is how it improves the “experience” of doing everyday computing tasks — email, web browsing, making photo slideshows.

He’s exactly right. The  desktop/laptop  is basically a bastardization of the original computer terminal, even the typewriter. The variety of media present for manipulation on the modern computer is unsuited to the keyboard/mouse paradigm.

Even if the iPad isn’t quite right, we need somebody to push us onwards out of this rut.

via Detailed Tour of iPad Touch UI Shows Why It’ll Be More Important Than iPhone | Cult of Mac.

Microsoft’s Creative Destruction

As they marvel at Apple’s new iPad tablet computer, the technorati seem to be focusing on where this leaves Amazon’s popular e-book business. But the much more important question is why Microsoft, America’s most famous and prosperous technology company, no longer brings us the future…

One word answer: Ballmer.

Lose the schoolyard bully CEO, establish some proper forward-thinking leadership, and the company will pick up again.

Yes, it’s as simple as that.

via Op-Ed Contributor – Microsoft’s Creative Destruction – NYTimes.com.

Authors join fight in Macmillan’s battle with Amazon

Authors are fighting back against Amazon.com in its battle with Macmillan after the retailer had failed to restore a host of major titles from the publisher to its online bookshop by this morning.

My son said his grade one class is having a great time running Amazon.com. They’re learning so much! Tough for these authors, though.

via Guardian: Authors join fight in Macmillan’s battle with Amazon.

Daring Fireball: What if Flash Were an Open Standard?

The problem for Flash is just like the problem for IE — the web has already moved on.

Amen.

via Daring Fireball: What if Flash Were an Open Standard?.

All The Many Ways Amazon So Very Failed the Weekend « Whatever

Leaving aside the moral, philosophical, cultural and financial implications of this weekend’s Amazon/Macmillan slapfight and What It All Means for book readers and the future of the publishing industry, in one very real sense the whole thing was an exercise in public communications, a process by which two very large companies made a case for themselves in the public arena. And in this respect, we can say this much without qualification: oh, sweet Jesus, did Amazon ever hump the bunk.

Yeah, I was watching this over the weekend and wondering to myself just when Bezos handed off management of his company to my son’s grade one class. A strange, ride indeed. Read this whole post to understand the insanity Amazon fell into.

via All The Many Ways Amazon So Very Failed the Weekend « Whatever.

Let’s fashion a made-in-Canada approach to the burka – The Globe and Mail

Khan has composed a thoughtful and reasonable discussion on a matter that I, for one, can’t understand the furor over. Why the French would ban the burka is way beyond me, likewise why anyone would even get upset about it.

To my mind this is simply an issue of individual right. It’s no different than making a decision on how one selects any other form of clothing. (And, being agnostic, that’s how I perceive the burka: a piece of clothing. The religious argument is lost on me.) Other people wear balaclavas while skiing or snowmobiling (and rightly suffer humiliation-by-peers for doing so). Should we also consider banning the balaclava, or limiting its use?

My only concern would be indentity-related. Many systems, like motor vehicle operation licensing and airport security, depend on facial recognition for identity review. Wearers of the burka, under certain circumstances and with a guarantee of respect and privacy, should be prepared to temporarily remove the garment as required to satisfy the requirements of these systems. Otherwise, burka on. And let’s move on.

Let’s fashion a made-in-Canada approach to the burka – The Globe and Mail.