| Art - things were great too for GM when they had a majority of the North American market. Competitors with cheaper, prettier, better designed, more fuel efficient cars have done very well despite plenty of political protection for GM, F and the former Chrysler against foreigners. There are other examples in heavy industry, tech (yes), services too. Better, cheaper, neater, faster, can, and generally does, win out. AT&T is sticking with dying technologies and empty longer term promises, Nokia makes pretty phones which very shortly are going to be shown up the non-European world. The political philosophy in the United States today is free trade (with variations depending of political party in power, and division of unions on particular issues, which no longer break all for one side). Political factors no longer seem too predictable. I too, see the Supremes denying cert to the FCC (but also to Microsoft). Twin government victories are highly unlikely. In two years, Euros who travel the world will see with certainty what they are missing, and how long are the "leaders" in wireless telephony going to stand being the laggards in mobile communications? And what about PDA's, laptops, last mile, medical monitors, households appliances, and other devices yet to come to fill needs and desires yet unrealized? We know they won't be GSM; we doubt in two years they will be GPRS, Edge, WCDMA; so, what will they be? And who will be making chips for and collecting one, perhaps two, royalties from each such device? Could we imagine ten years ago what technologies would exist today? My real concern is that Qcom will not be at the 4G party with a full platter of patents; for today, they do it right and don't have to worry much about the Euros stacking the deck against them. Best, John |
