February 2012

Voice-over-Wi-Fi pioneer Kineto Wireless is trying to convince operators that if they can’t beat the over-the-top VoIP challengers like Skype, they might as well join them.

Kineto is now selling a VoIP client and platform to operators that would allow them to bypass their own voice networks and offer their own cheap IP telephony services over Wi-Fi, LTE and even 3G. AT&T has already started exploring such offerings. In November it began offering a smartphone app called Call International that allows customers to make cheap overseas calls. Verizon partnered with its biggest OTT threat, Skype, in hopes of attracting more customers to its data plans (though the service oddly uses its CDMA circuit-switched voice network). But in both those cases, operators put limits on how the services could be used so customers couldn’t simply move all of their voice minutes over to unlimited or big-bucket data plans.

There are several challenges to implementing a public safety broadband network, including ensuring the network’s interoperability, reliability, and security; obtaining adequate funds to build and maintain it; and creating a governance structure.

For example, to avoid a major shortcoming of the land mobile radio (LMR) systems, it is essential that a public safety broadband network be interoperable across jurisdictions and devices by following five key elements to interoperable networks: governance, standard operating procedures, technology, training, and usage. With respect to creating a governance structure, pending legislation—the Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act of 2012, among other things—establishes a new entity, the First Responder Network Authority, with responsibility for ensuring the establishment of a nationwide, interoperable public safety broadband network.

The price of handheld LMR devices is high—often thousands of dollars—in part because market competition is limited and manufacturing costs are high. Further, GAO found that public safety agencies cannot exert buying power in relationship to device manufacturers, which may result in the agencies overpaying for LMR devices. In particular, because public safety agencies contract for LMR devices independently from one another, they are not in a strong position to negotiate lower prices and forego the quantity discounts that accompany larger orders. For similar situations, GAO has recommended joint procurement as a cost saving measure because it allows agencies requiring similar products to combine their purchase power and lower their procurement costs. Given that DHS has experience in emergency communications and relationships with public safety agencies, it is well-suited to facilitate joint procurement of handheld LMR devices. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) should work with partners to identify and communicate opportunities for joint procurement of public safety LMR devices. In commenting on a draft of this report, DHS agreed with the recommendation.

(GAO-12-343)

Can a person's Facebook profile reveal what kind of employee he or she might be? The answer is yes, and with unnerving accuracy, according to a new paper published in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology.

And if you are smugly thinking to yourself, "I've carefully wiped my Facebook page of any incriminating photos, comments and wall posts," — well, it turns out you may still not have hidden your true nature from future employers: On a rating scale that examines key personality attributes that indicate future job success, you might get rated high in conscientiousness and possibly low on extroversion. Other things a prospective employer might be able to glean from your Facebook profile is openness to new experiences (vacation pictures from a glacier off New Zealand), emotional stability (are your friends constantly offering you words of comfort?), and agreeableness (are you constantly arguing with "friends?")

While the congressional battle to pass spectrum legislation may have ended, the process of actually getting spectrum into the hands of wireless companies and making it available for smartphones, tablets, and other wireless technologies has just begun.

And how much of that spectrum will be available rests in large part on how good of a job the Federal Communications Commission does in persuading broadcasters to give up some of their airwaves. In fact, many of the key provisions in the spectrum legislation that lawmakers passed as part of a payroll-tax package hinge on how much spectrum broadcasters choose to give up and how much money the FCC can generate from selling their airwaves. The money from these auctions would come from wireless operators who will bid for spectrum they say they desperately need to meet the nation's growing use of wireless technologies. The FCC is under pressure to design the auctions in a way that would generate the most revenue possible given that the proceeds have been slated to pay for a variety of proposals. They include $7 billion to help pay to build a national broadband network for public safety officials. At the same time, lawmakers are counting on $15 billion for the federal Treasury after paying off broadcasters for giving up their spectrum. Broadcasters "have leverage and if the price isn't right ... most everything falls flat on its face," said Jeffrey Silva, a senior policy director with Medley Global Advisors.