Tero, GPRS is vital to GSM because it will enable GSM operators to get into data for teleputers at reasonable cost and that investment will get them through 3 years and possibly 5 if they are lucky. They can't wait until the hopes for EDGE and VW40 are proven illusory [or even proven well-founded]. If those EDGE and later attempts at CDMA systems fail, it would be crazy for the GSM world not to have built GPRS. If they succeed, the investment in GPRS will have been well worthwhile.
There are such serious risks for the W-CDMA dream of a technical and commercial nature that it will be a brave service provider who waits around for it.
As already pointed out, the Hagfish world was very icky, dishonest, wrong, and generally not likely to be given Sainthood by the outgoing Pope. It's easy to see why people don't believe anything they say.
Nokia has been relatively 'clean' though a gang member of the 'let's steal Qualcomm's IP' club run by ETSI, NTT, Ericy and co. Tero, I'm sure you understand that when there is common interest, it doesn't take any complex 'conspiracy' to get people acting in concert. The simple model [and very accurate one] is that people act in what they think is their own best interests [though they will deny that till they are blue in the face and tooth]. That leads to riots and mobs. There is no need for a conspiracy for a mob to riot. They just see their interests and individually act. It LOOKS like concerted action, but it isn't.
You are enough of a scientist to understand that correlation is not causation or even association. Sure, there is plenty of mysticism in the USA [and even in the Coming Into Buy Range stream of consciousness]. That doesn't mean that all people who live in the USA subscribe to those manias. Not all put on Nikes to fly up to the spaceship on the other side of Hale-Bopp. Or joined David Koresh or Janet Reno for the shootout at the Wacko OK Corral.
GPRS will be good for teleputers as a start. But when HDR comes screaming through the sky at 2 Big Ones per second, GPRS will look like a sad joke. When GSM IPR is sold to Qualcomm at say 2% [a bit cheaper than CDMA since GSM is an outgoing technology of rapidly reducing value], you'll find there is a nice easy way for Vodafone to start overlaying their GSM networks without cutting off GSM customers, while giving them and upgrade path to the future [which will be HDR and cdma2000, not EDGE and VW40].
Do you think 2% royalty fee for GSM is cheap enough or should it be 1%? CDMA is apparently extorquerationate at 5% although it can handle 2 Big Ones per second, whereas GSM is a crusty old technology which can barely break 10 micro bits per second and does that inadequately. If ETSI and co seriously believe CDMA is expensive at 5%, it will be interesting to see at what price they sell GSM technology.
What a joke the whining about CDMA royalties is! Can those whining like a fleet of 747s seriously not understand how absurd their position is?
Maurice
PS: By the way, those numbers for CDMA, TDMA, GSM, Analog were spot on.
50m subscribers for CDMA now.
250m for GSM
etc...
CDMA growing to at least 20m handset sales a quarter during 2000. GSM doing little better than that. Maybe worse.
KZ Nerd, Tero means me [by 'the New Zealand effect']. He thinks I poison the well of sensible thinking with crazy ideas arising de novo from a deranged mind. He thinks exceptions about cruel and unusual punishment should be made for special cases involving the odd person. |
