Disqus - Latest Comments for WirelessNorth

Re: Are you crazy not to sign a three year contract?

WirelessNorth — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 15:01:15 -0000

If you value the subsidy at $500, it also so happens the early cancellation fee is $500 as well (Using Rogers as an example $400 ETF + $100 DTF). So even if you cancel at any time, you've had the time value of that $500 in your pocket until you do.

The marketers have discovered that they can sell a lot more product by burying the true cost in a long stream of monthly payments than by advertising a high one-time price of entry.

Re: Ericsson’s wonder 3G/Wifi widget: Bell Turbo Hub Reviewed

WirelessNorth — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 13:55:30 -0000

Think you are out of luck, haven't seen any resources for unlocking a turbo hub. The best you might be able to do is resell it on ebay and pick up the Bell version (or a factory unlocked Ericsson hub)

Re: Ericsson’s wonder 3G/Wifi widget: Bell Turbo Hub Reviewed

WirelessNorth — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 09:19:56 -0000

If Rogers had sent us one, we'd have reviewed it sooner.

Re: Get Your WirelessNorth discount codes for iP3 and CrossMediaTO

WirelessNorth — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 16:49:07 -0000

@Diggitydank this is what happens when you hit post just before jumping on a plane. You miss the post important detail. Anyway I hope you were able to get in touch with the iP3 organizers to get your ticket and a discount. We were traveling but heard it was a great event.

Re: Rogers drops bomb on new entrants with Chatr brand bamboozlement strategy

WirelessNorth — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 17:57:03 -0000

This is a great question. I think there can be only two reasons. Probably both are true:

1. They REALLY want to try and disguise it as a "new" wireless company
2. They want to offer service on a business model that is not compatible with FIDO, or would cannibalize too much of their existing Fido revenues. This means Chatr will have fundamentally different pricing or contract terms or even no contracts in order to compete directly with Wind, Mobilicity or even Koodo

We do know that Rogers for a while has been looking for a way out of ever-escalating handset subsidies. Chatr's business model, whatever it may be, could that out. Just don't expect it to carry the iPhone.

Re: The counter argument on foreign ownership

WirelessNorth — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 11:05:06 -0000

Touche. As it happens, we here like the idea of foreign investment. But we'd agree with the poster that the job doesn't end there. To us that was the good point.

Canada does need a digital strategy, just as we need to set our goals high for what that strategy should aim for, as well as better metrics to tell us if our current or future policy frameworks are getting us there.

Because some people ask, a more optimal digital strategy could include both greater public investment as well as a net reduction in regulation.

We might argue that the this government has done a relatively better job with the digital file than the liberals before them. Certainly the wireless markets has seen huge competitive changes in the last 3 years. But still, compared to what's possible (and what's at risk), the job is not yet done.

Re: Your telco is full of crap: Google to roll out residential gigabit fibre just to show how it’s done

WirelessNorth — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 14:02:55 -0000

Thanks for your comment Michael. Google has since indicated (see our most recent post on google) that they have no intention of entering the ISP business, this is an RFP and open pilot they have announced which they hope to share the results of to the entire industry (and no doubt regulators).

In reality the announcement is a stunt, designed to get the attention of ICT policy makers in a desire to push policy makers, regulators and indeed the industry to aim higher, much higher, when thinking about what our goals should be for broadband.

Of course google themselves have everything to gain by resetting expectations ever higher for faster, more available broadband.

Re: Canadian Wireless Now Open to Foreign Competition

WirelessNorth — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 19:28:00 -0000

Relates to the cost and the availability of capital. A number of participants felt cheated because they "played by the rules" more so than globalive, and because they failed to raise nearly as much capital as they wanted to.

Re: Canadian Wireless Now Open to Foreign Competition

WirelessNorth — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 19:24:00 -0000

You raise a good point, the current government will actually have to be sitting in the house and not prorogued long enough to pass these promises as legislation.

Re: Live blogging Dave Dobbin and DAVE announcements

WirelessNorth — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 10:50:32 -0000

Plans not announced this morning. But they could be soon. Dave did say they will not be matching Wind's "first month free" offer. Says not a good business strategy, customers often drop after their free month. MetroPCS, the US inventor of that model recently dropped first-month-free for that reason.

Re: Live blogging Dave Dobbin and DAVE announcements

WirelessNorth — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 10:44:30 -0000

Sorry, that was hasty typing. What Dave said was he "doesn't foresee any problems".

Re: Is 2010 the year to stop worrying and love the carriers?

WirelessNorth — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 09:36:00 -0000

@tjemartin does Rogers beat AT&T? good questions. two answers for you

1. It's not all about bandwidth, the faster network apps also have better latency (pings), latency you notice as snappier web-apps, this will be important if we want to see cloud-based mobile apps that are as rich and responsive native ones.

Bandwidth, you can get lots of it, "robber's" famous $30 6/GB plan is or was a pretty damn good deal. At least as long as you also have a land-line broadband for your torrent needs or whatever.

2. AT&T is notorious amongst US iPhone users for their terrible and inconsistent network coverage (notice the audience boos at the last mac keynote at the mention of AT&T). That being said, perhaps we were being too charitable to Rogers, in downtown Toronto they've been dropping calls lately like were on fire.

Maybe Skype over a wireless 21MBps data pipe would be more reliable? :)

Re: Is 2010 the year to stop worrying and love the carriers?

WirelessNorth — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 09:20:14 -0000

@somebody thank's for your comment. @Peter is right though, Rogers has 21MBps rocket sticks on the market now. Sure there's some "diminishing returns" to quote a friendly Rogers exec, but 21MBps over the air is pretty cool. Hope to get some comparative benchmarks on that up the site soon.

Re: Corded Innovations

WirelessNorth — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 11:46:41 -0000

Somedays I wish I could just sit a few OEMs down and patiently explain to them the proper way to design a laptop.

I'm pretty happy with my Dell D430 right now, it has almost everything right: 12inches (not 13, I hate 13" screens). WXGA which is just enough resolution to be fairly productive. 3lbs, lighter the better. It accept a modern/aftemarket SSD (I've done this), it has a internal 3G (apple what were you thinking with the MBA to skip WWLAN?) and an SD slot.

The D430 a couple fatal flaws though: no backlit keyboard (ARG), no magsafe of course, no webcam oh and it's a dell so it's ass-ugly.

The SSD was the most amazing upgrade, got a blog post on that coming. (fyi: never buy the crap SSDs the OEMs will offer you at ridiculous prices)

But otherwise, still searching for that perfect machine myself.

Re: Building a better carrier

WirelessNorth — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 13:02:57 -0000

Thanks for your comment. Yep we've heard that, although the contracts are 3yrs the actual device replacement rate averages closer to 18 months and is even getting shorter. And those are for subsidized devices. So from a carrier perspective 3yrs is only the best-case scenario, in reality they have to budget for earning payback on handset subsidy costs within 18 months.

It's managing the customer expectation for getting a free ice cream cone every time they drop it in the toilet that's killing the carriers.

Re: Building a better carrier

WirelessNorth — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 12:55:58 -0000

Thanks for your comments J L. What's important is that $600+ is what the handset makers are charging, whether to the carriers or if you buy direct/unlocked. RIM makes a 40-50% gross margin, apple probably more. The recent trend is that smartphones have been going up in effective price not down. A lot of that is iphone-driven.

So what we need is more competition and compelling platform choices amongst the top end hardware makers. And it's coming, just you wait. The combined forces of moore's law and open OSes (that aren't just windows mobile) will have an effect on commoditizing smartphones.

Re: Telus and Bell to go GSM in 2010

WirelessNorth — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 11:43:03 -0000

Thanks for the confirmation, looks like you need a true HSPA handset to play on the new network.

Re: Building a better carrier

WirelessNorth — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 14:45:49 -0000

Interestingly, heard an exec at major carrier speaking about this the other day. His words "ya, we screwed up as an industry. People think smartphones really cost $200 not the $600 they actually cost (or more for the iPhone) and they don't realize or appreciate what they are getting, our subsidies should have been much more transparent"

Re: Building a better carrier

WirelessNorth — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 13:44:39 -0000

Small correction: "tacit collusion".

Re: I get by with a little help from my readers: crowdsourced corrections

WirelessNorth — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:48:44 -0000

OMG do I (and anyone who has attempted to read my writing over the years would attest) ever need this. Thanks for the tip.

Re: New Canadian cell phone plan comparison tool launches

WirelessNorth — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:58:57 -0000

Forgot a "t".

Notwithstanding our stratospheric editorial salaries this sometimes happens. a lot.

actually that begs a new business model: articles - always free! charge for fixing typos...

Re: How to make money in the itunes app store

WirelessNorth — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 16:25:08 -0000

Sigh fixed for reals. Had the file name right, forgot the http path in the url, then the file extension...

Re: One thing’s for certain about the G-phone

WirelessNorth — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 14:03:41 -0000

We have been trying a tmobile android, and can definitely say that the tmobile G1 is still not supporting 3G in canada. For now, get the rogers version as the real-deal if you want HSPA today on the device. But I'm sure that Rogers will be turning on their chunk of AWS spectrum any day now (right Barry? ;)

Have to say that having played with the phone for a while, it's great. Android, an app market, a good browser and a keyboard is a great combination in a device... at least when you can find some open wifi or when/if you can get on 3G.

But, buyer beware, the one fatal flaw of all HTC androids so far (both tmobile and rogers): the #$@#%! headphone jack. Or lack there of. There is no headphone jack, only a USB plug that you need to use for charging/sync/crappy-htc-usb-headphones. The HTC is not a ipod killer and not a great media player. A bizarre design omission given that the device is good at everything else.

Re: BMV boasts of bigger better backing

WirelessNorth — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 09:15:20 -0000

The editor is not Jevon. ;)

(Except for occasionally when it is)

Re: Toronto Mobile Developers Meetup Thursday

WirelessNorth — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 16:14:19 -0000

Yes! wifi will be provided thanks to WirelessToronto :)

Disqus - Latest Comments for WirelessNorth

Re: Are you crazy *not* to sign a three year contract?

Re: Ericsson’s wonder 3G/Wifi widget: Bell Turbo Hub Reviewed

Re: Ericsson’s wonder 3G/Wifi widget: Bell Turbo Hub Reviewed

Re: Get Your WirelessNorth discount codes for iP3 and CrossMediaTO

Re: Rogers drops bomb on new entrants with Chatr brand bamboozlement strategy

Re: The counter argument on foreign ownership

Re: Your telco is full of crap: Google to roll out residential gigabit fibre just to show how it’s done

Re: Canadian Wireless Now Open to Foreign Competition

Re: Canadian Wireless Now Open to Foreign Competition

Re: Live blogging Dave Dobbin and DAVE announcements

Re: Live blogging Dave Dobbin and DAVE announcements

Re: Is 2010 the year to stop worrying and love the carriers?

Re: Is 2010 the year to stop worrying and love the carriers?

Re: Corded Innovations

Re: Building a better carrier

Re: Building a better carrier

Re: Telus and Bell to go GSM in 2010

Re: Building a better carrier

Re: Building a better carrier

Re: I get by with a little help from my readers: crowdsourced corrections

Re: New Canadian cell phone plan comparison tool launches

Re: How to make money in the itunes app store

Re: One thing’s for certain about the G-phone

Re: BMV boasts of bigger better backing

Re: Toronto Mobile Developers Meetup Thursday

Re: Are you crazy not to sign a three year contract?