The technology panorama is moving towards convergence. At one end is the race on size and at the other on the mobility, but with this interesting read from telephonyonline.com thing would be different. Nokia and Intel plan a role reversal – i.e. Nokia plans to explore laptops where as Intel intends to go for smart-phone.
Nokia and Intel appear to have market envy. While Intel’s intentions to scale the laptop down to the smartphone were made clear at Mobile World Congress last week, Nokia, the world’s number-one handset maker, confirmed yesterday that it is exploring moving from the smartphone to the laptop.
WIRED magazine asked Vint Cerf about innovation and opportunities for entrepreneurs. Interestingly Vint started by mentioning Google Apps, about which I wrote just a few days ago. Reality is that innovation and creation of new ideas is the only way out of current economic trouble. Vint also talks about how “capital is scarce and cautious” but the availability of seed money because it’s small amounts despite the high risk.
Here’s Vint Cerf’s response to the question about innovation in the areas of Energy, Health care and Education.
You have touched on three areas in which Google not only has interest but has already begun to express it. Google Apps for Education is a suite of applications intended to be helpful to higher level educational institutions but in the long run, I think Google has a role to play in helping to assemble relevant content for classroom use. It seems highly likely to me that even in its present posture, Google’s resources are being used for teaching purposes or to help students prepare homework.
Energy, health care and education are just three examples of areas in which information and information management are critically important. How are we using our energy? What appliances in homes or business are consuming the most energy? When do they consume it? Can the load be shifted? How efficient are these devices?
On the health-care side, health care is information. Diagnosis, treatment, patient history, knowledge of pharmaceuticals and surgical procedures — it’s all information. Our own personal medical records represent incredibly important information to each of us because it can be crucial in helping to diagnose or treat a medical condition. It might be needed in a hurry should there be a need for emergency treatment, especially at a hospital you have never been to before.
Given the state of economy, there is a larger than usual number of upcoming entrepreneurs. Depending on where you are on the journey of your career entrepreneurship may or may not work out for you. A recent Wall Street Journal article sums it quite well by asking 10 pointed questions. I’ll give you a concise list – leave a comment if you are interested in full text. I invite the entrepreneurs among the readers to challenge this list and to provide their views.
1. Are you willing and able to bear great financial risk? 2. Are you willing to sacrifice your lifestyle for potentially many years?
3. Is your significant other on board?
4. Do you like all aspects of running a business?
5. Are you comfortable making decisions on the fly with no playbook?
6. What’s your track record of executing your ideas? 7. How persuasive and well-spoken are you?
8. Do you have a concept you’re passionate about?
9. Are you a self-starter?
10. Do you have a business partner (who complements your skills)?
Nokia’s Ovi Store (to open in May 2009) has the goal to personalize content according to a person’s social connections and physical location or what Nokia calls Social Location. The trend, as I see it, is to add location to the whole range of services, keep social connections in the context of applications, support email and mobile web and allow applications to be developed and offered direct to consumers.
The Ovi Store provides developers potentially lucrative opportunity to offer applications to Nokia’s global consumer base. Content providers will sell through Publish.Ovi.com, which opened for content from February 16. With a dedicated community of 3.5 million developers in Forum Nokia creating hundreds of thousands of apps, the Ovi Store should bring out some interesting results.
The question is – What is Nokia doing to encourage developers in countries like Pakistan?
“These solutions will make it easier for people to find and prioritize the things that really matter to them in their personal and professional lives, through cool new applications, improved mobile navigation and one-touch email access,” said Nokia President and CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo.
Both Samsung and LG showed concept phones recently. Pictures via Engadget. Charge 10 minutes and get 3 minutes of talk time. It will be a while before these phones become ready for mass consumption but this is the kind of breakthrough which the world needs.
I thought that this was worth mentioning here for two reasons. First, it underscores the importance of privacy, something for which awareness remains low in Pakistan. Secondly, it shows that how regulator of telecommunication services can help with consumer rights protection. There are lessons for our own “telecom authority” which has lately been busy increasing rates for calls to Pakistan and going after VOIP companies.
Federal regulators proposed $20,000 fines on more than 650 small telecommunications providers for not abiding by new rules designed to protect consumer phone records.
Michael Copps, the FCC’s interim chairman said: The broad nature of this enforcement action hopefully will ensure substantial compliance with our (privacy) rules going forward as the Commission continues to make consumer privacy protection a top priority.
About 2 years ago the FCC tightened privacy requirements on phone companies in response to consumer complaints about data brokers selling phone records they’d illegally obtained through “pre-texting,” or getting information under false circumstances..
Two recent announcements from Gemalto, a digital security company, caught my attention. First was Smart Device Management service offer for devices such as 3G/HSPA USB modem. As USB modems become popular, there is a need to be able to manage them remotely and efficiently.
This universal solution from Gemalto provides a means for operators to conveniently deploy their mobile services on the PC environments of their subscribers, via a 3G/HSPA USB modem, and remotely update them over the mobile broadband internet connection. The SDMC can also deliver automatic USB modem firmware updates in a manner which is completely invisible to the user.
Second item from Gemalto was SIM-Based Windows Live Mobile Instant Messaging to a South American mobile operator. Just recently the SIM-based mobile banking application was a topic of discussion here.
Now if they had a SIM-based solution for catching fraud and spam, it would be great for Pakistan!
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is a California based not-for-profit corporation created on September 18, 1998. ICANN is responsible for coordination and policy making of two most critical Internet resources i.e Domain Names and IP addresses. Some of the major tasks performed include Internet Protocol (IP) address space allocation, protocol identifier assignment, generic Top Level Domains (gTLDs) and country code Top Level Domains (ccTLDs) name system management, and root server system management functions. Presently ICANN is going through a transition period of becoming an independent private sector lead organization based on a multi-stakeholder model. In this regard U.S. Department of Commerce has signed a Joint Project Agreement (JPA) with ICANN for the purpose of the joint development of the mechanisms, methods, and procedures necessary to effect the transition of Internet domain name and addressing system (DNS) to the private sector. The agreement was signed in December 2006 and will terminate on September 30, 2009. A broad consultative work for re-shaping post JPA ICANN in underway.
ICANN organizational structure mainly comprises of Board of Directors, Supporting Organizations and Advisory Committees. There are three supporting organizations namely Generic Naming Supporting Organization (GNSO) dealing with generic top-level domains (.com, .net, .org etc), country code Names Supporting Organization (ccNSO) dealing with country-code top level domains (.uk, .pk, .ae etc) and Address Supporting Organization (ASO) dealing with IP addresses. Primary role of these supporting organizations is to assist ICANN’s policy making process. To cater the concern and needs of various stakeholders ICANN also relies on different advisory committees. These committees include Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC), composed of representatives of national governments around the world; At-Large Advisory Committee (ALAC), composed of individual Internet users or groups; the Root Server System Advisory Committee (RSSAC) advising on the operation of the DNS root server system; Security and Stability Advisory Committee (SSAC), composed of Internet security experts and the Technical Liaison Group (TLG), composed of international technical organizations.
Two of the most significant activities presently being carried out by ICANN are a) Introduction of Internationalized Domain Names and b) new generic Top-Level Domains (gTLD) program. Both of these activities along with associated matters were topics of hot debate during the 33rd ICANN International Public Meeting held at Cairo, Egypt.
As indicated in previous fun post by Babar, Huawei Technologies, a leader in providing next-generation telecommunications network solutions worldwide showcased its first Android-powered smart phone at the GSMA Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. This smart phone will be commercially available in the third quarter of 2009.
Huawei is delighted to showcase its much anticipated first Android-powered smart phone. As a terminal solutions provider with all-round capabilities, Huawei has an acute insight into the drivers of the communications industry and in-depth understanding of operators.A pioneer in mobile broadband devices, we look forward to expanding a compelling mobile communications experience for end-users whilst providing customized services to our operator partners via the Android smart phone.
Mr. James Chen,
Director of Huawei Terminal Marketing Department
With things coming from China, technology will definitly get cheap. “Sab China” :)
The United Nations Foundation and The Vodafone Foundation have partnered to harness the power of mobile technology in support of United Nations programs across the globe. Since 2005 this £15 million Technology Partnership has funded the use of wireless communications to advance global health and disaster relief work, and to further public discourse about how wireless technology can address some of the world’s toughest challenges. In the latest report about mobiles for health development, the case study of HealthLine Pakistan, which I covered earlier, is included.
The potential to create a positive change is huge and I wish that Pakistan does more in this area.
This fourth publication, “mHealth for Development: The Opportunity of Mobile Technology for Healthcare in the Developing World,” in our Access to Communications series evidences, through its research and selection of case studies, the potential of mHealth—the use of mobile communications (mobile phones and PDAs) for health services and information. This field has the potential to transform the approach to a variety of healthcare challenges in the developing world by accelerating the collection and storage of patient data, training rural professionals with health updates and guidance, and personalizing to new levels the process of patients receiving and engaging in available medical treatment.
Reference: mHealth for Development: The Opportunity of Mobile Technology for Healthcare in the Developing World. Washington, D.C. and Berkshire, UK: UN Foundation-Vodafone Foundation Partnership, 2009.
Many Pakistani bloggers and software industry leaders have raised concerns about the lack of a payment processing gateway in Paksitan. Now – there are some indications that PTCL is working with Wateen to offer one in the coming days. Better late than never!
Assuming that this did happen, what are some of the things that will change? Will we see a flurry of innovative solutions? Will electronic and mobile commerce in Pakistan get a big boost from this? It certainly will remove one of the absurd obstacles which should not even have been an issue.
With increasing availability of broadband connectivity in educational institutions, cloud computing is making inroads. Google applications for the education sector enables new ways for students, staff and faculty to collaborate and be productive. In case of Pakistan the recently introduced offline components of google applications are important in particular. The Google Apps suite is not as comprehensive as its desktop competitors but offers many other clear benefits (as shown in the clip below) and comes out ahead in terms of economy and the conveniences of software-as-a-service. This article in CIO magazine mentions some of the academic instituions using Google Apps:
The Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS) Alumni also runs Apps for their users and integration onto their site. Other institutions include Virtual University, FAST-NU, University of Central Punjab, Karachi University, Aitchison College, CASE, Kinnaird, University of Gujrat and IBA Sukkar.
As I see it, students and young professionals will adopt lighter, connected netbooks with most applications residing in the cloud.
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