Zedian's Tech Roundup

Ten tips for investing in Africa's telecoms market

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 16:58:00 +0000

On the backdrop of India's Barti Airtel's offer to buy Zain's African operations, Telecoms.com looks at what the state of affairs is on the continent.

"Touted for so long as the land of opportunity for telecoms investors, Africa is on the brink of a deal that is could transform its competitive landscape. But what does the long expected deal between Bharti Airtel and Zain say about the state of the African market? That Zain does not regard Africa as profitable and that it wants to focus on its more “lucrative” MENA footprint? Or that Airtel sees such potential that it is prepared to spend almost $11bn as a means of entering this land of opportunity?

On Wednesday, Zain’s board of directors met in Kuwait to discuss Bharti’s offer $10.7bn offer for the Kuwait-based carrier’s sub-Saharan African assets. The due diligence process has been completed and a definitive agreement is expected to be signed in the coming days, Zain said."

Ten tips for investing in Africa's telecoms market | telecoms.com - telecoms industry news, analysis and opinion

Cisco exits WiMAX base station business | telecoms.com

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:10:00 +0000

"IP and core network equipment vendor Cisco has pulled the plug on its WiMAX base station operation, further highlighting the ill health of the sector.

Cisco has been stepping up its game in the telecoms sector ahead of the shift to all IP next generation networks, since it missed the boat during the rollout of 3G. The US company has a presence in both the WiMAX and LTE sectors but more as a provider of packet core networking equipment as well as edge technologies like wifi and femtocells.

Well, make that only as a provider of core and edge infrastructure. “After careful review of our mobility strategy and investments, we have decided to discontinue designing and building new WiMAX base stations,” a company spokesman said this week."

Cisco exits WiMAX base station business | telecoms.com - telecoms industry news, analysis and opinion:

Clinton Endorses OLPC’s Work In Earthquake Zones

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 10:27:00 +0000

"US secretary of state Hillary Clinton has praised the work done by the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) organisation in Central and South America.

Speaking in San Jose - the capital of Costa Rica - last week, Clinton pointed out the adoption of the OLPC scheme in Uruquay and Panama, which she said should be an example for other governments in the region and around the world.

“I have followed the progress that Uruguay and Panama have made towards spreading the benefits of the digital age through initiatives that distribute laptops to children,” she said. “I was just in Uruguay, meeting with the out-going president and now-president Mujica, and their “one laptop per child” program has given a great boost to learning and access to the wider world.”"

Clinton Endorses OLPC’s Work In Earthquake Zones | eWEEK Europe UK:

Broadband tax condemned as 'unfair' by MPs

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 14:24:00 +0000

"A government proposal to charge people with fixed phone lines 50p per month to help fund ultra-fast broadband has been condemned as 'unfair' by MPs.

The cross-party Business Innovation and Skills Committee said most of those who would pay the tax would not benefit from the faster broadband service.

The focus should be on providing basic broadband for all and allowing markets to deliver higher speeds, it said.

"We think the market can be trusted to deliver faster speeds," committee chairman Peter Luff told BBC News."

With all due respect to the honorable members, the UK market has so far NOT produced reasonable broadband speeds. Network operators are facing ever falling broadband prices, while bandwidth demands have never been higher. They just don't have the billions required to run bring FTTX technology to significant portions of the population. It'll take another 10-15 years for British internet users to get the sort of speeds countries like Estonia are now enjoying, if the UK government does not facilitate funding. The US has already availed funds and various high speed internet (HSI) projects are underway in the US.

LTE Connected Car

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 15:45:00 +0000

Manchester to gain public-funded fibre network

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 08:45:00 +0000

BBC News - Manchester to gain fibre network: "A project to build a fibre network in Manchester could offer insights into how the UK can make next-generation broadband pay for itself.

The network will serve homes and businesses in the area known as the Manchester corridor.

It will exist as a testbed for new services and is likely to be watched closely by national government bodies.

The UK has been criticised for being too slow to roll out next generation broadband.

The £1m project, funded by the North West Development Agency, will initially serve 500 businesses and 1,000 homes.

Shaun Fenson is an advisor to the Manchester Digital Development Agency which is overseeing the project. He believes it is the largest publicly-funded fibre-to-the-home rollout in the UK.

It is hoped that the network will allow Manchester to compete with other European cities and reinvigorate the media the technology sectors of the city."

More at the BBC Technology News.

Inspire New Scientists to Retain Innovation, and jobs

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 10:38:00 +0000

America's first woman in space has her sights on a new frontier - making science cool for kids. The BBC reports that Dr Sally Ride's particular focus is to get more girls to stick with science and pursue it as a career.

Dr Ride told the BBC, "In this country [the US] we don't put the priority on math and science education and it's incredible because our society depends on it so much. We are not raising the next generation of scientists and engineers."

I couldn't agree more with Dr Ride, as this is a subject I have written about in previous blogs here, and I think this applies to the UK too. Maintaining the lead in science and technology in the West will not only ensure they retain innovation, but it will also retain jobs and keep that now vital part of their economies thriving. The West cannot afford to cede innovation to the Far East. The present trend of shifting not only call-centre jobs, but R&D departments (which is essentially innovation), all in the name of cost-cutting, has far reaching consequences than the corporations practising it can ever imagine. Yes, in the short term it may bring down costs, but in the long run it's the Western countries economies that suffer due to mass unemployment as a result of whole industry's disappearing.

A lot of companies are now practising policies aimed at transferring ever more work to so called Low Cost Countries. This is flawed and dangerous and must governments must step and urge a rethink of this idea.

Dr Sally Ride and others in this BBC article speak of making science cool and encouraging kids to take up the subject, which I agree with. However, on question comes to mind. How is this going to work when kids are seeing their parents in science and technology companies fast becoming jobless?

President Barack Obama has vowed to devote more than 3% of the gross domestic product to research and development. That's a good start, but he also needs to make sure that jobs stay in the US, just as Gordon Brown needs to do the same.

"The link between math and science education and American innovation and competitiveness is more apparent than ever," said Shelly Esque, vice president of Intel's corporate affairs group.

For a businesswoman like Kim Perdikou, it is a worrying situation. She is the executive vice president of infrastructure products at Juniper Networks, a global information technology and computer networking company.

"From the US point of view, technology innovation will go offshore and that concerns me. We need a talented workforce to keep the jobs here and grow the economy.

"And if the issue isn't addressed, someone else will step up to lead the world in technology and innovation," warned Ms Perdikou.

CD player production ends at Linn - Death knell for the audio CD?

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 22:14:00 +0000

After 3 decades of solid success as the preferred method of storage for digital audio, is the end nigh for the Compact Disc?

"A manufacturer of hi-fi systems has sounded what it said could be the death knell of the compact disc player.

Linn Products has become the first manufacturer to announce it will give up on CDs from the start of next year.

Instead, the niche company, based in East Renfrewshire, will focus on producing digital streaming equipment.

The firm, which makes systems costing from £2,500 to more than £100,000, said discerning customers recognised the superior quality of digital streaming."

Introduced in the early '80s as a robust, durable and portable medium for storing and playing back digital audio, the CD as planned to be succeed the gramophone record as well as audio tape. It uses a 2-channel 16-bit Pulse-Code Modulation (PCM) encoding at a sampling rate of 44.1kHz per channel.

"The selection of the sample rate was primarily based on the need to reproduce the audible frequency range of 20 Hz - 20 kHz. The Nyquist–Shannon sampling theorem states that a sampling rate of more than double the maximum frequency of the signal to be recorded is needed, resulting in a required rate of at least 40 kHz." Reference entry on Wikipedia.

It is that sampling rate and the reproduction of the entire human-audible frequency range that results in that superior sound quality over cassette tape and gramophone. The portability aspect and the idea of storing audio as files has added to that superiority.

However, the advent of even more portable music file formats such as MP3 and improvement in storage technology such as flash cards and miniaturised hard disks, have resulted in very small and portable media players storing large volumes of music files. These music files are portable across various devices from computers, mobile phones, home entertainment centres, in-car systems and just about anything electronic these days. Advancements in wireless networking technologies particularly WiFi and Bluetooth have added the possibility of streaming music from central storage devices either at home, or even from the internet!

Media streaming services such as Spotify are flourishing on the internet. More and more people are now streaming music from the internet and even buying songs and entire albums in MP3 format. Just about every major online store is now offering MP3 music downloads for sale. The BBC even had a chart show for online music sales!

It was only a matter of time, then, that the music CD would be begin to be sidelined for portable music files.

MTN "Fulfills Pledge of World Class Service"

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 18:27:00 +0000

"Accra — IN FULLFILMENT of its pledge to bring world class telecommunication services to clients and subscribers in the Western and Rentral regions of Ghana, a leading telecommunication giant, Mobile Telecommunication Network (MTN), over the weekend launched its 3.5G network, to boost high data services for their subscribers and corporate institutions.

The Western Regional Minister, Paul Evans Aidoo, the Omanhene of the Essikado Traditional Area, Nana Kobinah Nketsia (V), joined the Chief Marketing Officer of MTN, Mr. George Andah, to launch the new telecommunication service.

Speaking at the launching ceremony, the Chief Marketing Officer noted, 'We will go the extra mile to engage our customers, and deliver innovative products and services to meet their needs. Customer satisfaction and reward are our hallmark.'

Continuing Mr. Andah added, 'For the young customers, 3.5G brings endless possibilities and support for new and exciting multimedia services such as video streaming, games, music videos, sports and news among others.' Mr. Andah further indicated that the 3.5 G network would provide customers with DSTV enabled handsets, which would be able to give subscribers the opportunity to watch the 2010 World Cup live on their mobile phones."

Sounds impressive indeed, though it's unclear just what 3.5G technology (WiMAX, LTE, etc) is being used. I am also left wondering what data tariffs would be in place for the intended audience to watch their 2010 games on their mobile devices.

More here.

The Rise and Rise of Mobile Commerce - Over a Million Join M-Pesa

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 19:04:00 +0000

This is the amazing popularity of M-Pesa, the mobile banking service by Vodacom in East Africa. Quite clearly there is a gap in the market, a big gap for that matter, and the ubiquity of the mobile phone once again risen to save the day.

"Over a million people have registered with Vodacom's M-Pesa mobile phone-based money transfer service in Tanzania in the past 18 months, senior Vodacom officials said yesterday.

Addressing journalists in Dar es Salaam, the officials said registered customers make an average of 30,000 transactions worth Sh700 million each day.

'This translates into transactions worth Sh17 billion in a month .we have managed to reach out to Tanzanians who do not own bank accounts,' marketing managing executive Ephraim Mafuru said.

Only about 11 per cent of Tanzania's population have bank accounts, of which 16 per cent are in urban areas and four per cent in rural areas, according to a 2006 survey conducted jointly by FinMark Trust, Steadman Group and the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

Vodacom's head of M-Pesa sales, Mr Franklin Bagalla, said the service had made a significant impact on people's lives since it was launched in April, last year."

More from AllAfrica.com

Free Google sat-nav shakes market

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 09:37:00 +0000

The party may be over very soon for dominant sat-nav makers TomTom and Garmin, after Google announced it's free sat-nav application for mobiles. The BBC reports:

"Shares in sat-nav device companies have fallen substantially after Google unveiled its free live sat-nav for mobiles on Wednesday."

Well it does make sense for Google to provide such software for its Android handsets. It'll just make them even more popular! Microsoft has just come short of doing the same, only having a live GPS tracking functionality in their Bing software for mobiles. That's just one or two steps away from full-fledged navigation functionality. So, my take is that Microsoft won't be far behind Google in announcing their own full sat-nav application. I reckon they've already done it and were either simply waiting for Google to make the first move, (perhaps in order to avoid anti-trust talk), or Google just beat them to it. Watch this space.

Read more on Google's announcement here.

How to Install Windows 7 on a Dell 1721 Laptop

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 07:43:00 +0000

My copy of the fresh Windows 7 operating system from Microsoft finally arrived promptly on the day of release in Europe, 22nd Oct '09. I had pre-ordered it a few months before, and so like most people could not wait to get my hands on it. I had toyed around with Windows 7 RC, though that was only limited to virtual machines (a very wise thing to do), and it all worked very well. But I was about to find out that the virtual world and the 'real world' are, well, worlds apart!

My system specs before:

Dell Inspiron 1721, AMD Turion 64 X2 TL-60 2.00GHz processor
4GB RAM, 300GB ATI StorageRAID hard drive(s), (2x150GB SATA drives configured for RAID 0)
Dual-boot Vista 32bit on 200GB partition, and Ubuntu 8.10 64bit on 31GB partition.
IOMEGA 320GB USB drive

The laptop is almost a couple of years old and originally came with 32bit Vista Home Premium and 64bit AMD processor, so I really wanted to install a 64bit operating system. Would make sense, wouldn't it? So I had scoured the Microsoft website and found a page saying something like if you had a license for 32bit Vista, you could obtain a 64bit copy for the same license and simply pay for shipping costs. I tried registering for that, but didn't get very far. On that page Microsoft had also warned that 64bit operating systems were for serious computing use only (i.e not for everyone), and also warned about the lack of application and driver support. However, those were the early months (not years, because it's not that long ago), and it appears Microsoft's stance has changed quite a bit since then. On this website, Microsoft warmly says:

"Not long ago, almost all the computers you'd find at your local retailer were 32-bit PCs. People who bought 64-bit PCs were primarily technology enthusiasts or people running specialized software that used the large amounts of memory a 64-bit PC can support.

Over the past few years, the PC industry has gradually increased production of 64-bit PCs. We've been working with industry partners on this transition to 64-bit computing, as we did when the industry shifted from 16-bit to 32-bit PCs back with Windows 95.

The shift toward 64-bit PC production has speeded up recently, and that's why you'll be seeing more of these PCs in stores. One reason is that the cost difference between a 32-bit and 64-bit PC has shrunk. For example, we don't charge extra for the 64-bit editions of Windows Vista, and the cost of memory, one of the largest factors of a PC's cost, has dropped dramatically. Now most PC manufacturers offer 64-bit PCs that don't cost a whole lot more than a 32-bit PC."

Ok, perhaps I should try again to obtain my free copy of 64 Vista, for my other PC. Anyway, at least I had my 64bit Ubuntu 8.10. (I started with Ubuntu 7.10 which was absolute hell to install on the RAID 0 drives.) I personally feel Linux doesn't quite have some of those nice to have pretty desktop applications. Desktop applications are a bit of a fudge on Linux, though it has some very nice and serious server applications. Like VMware server, MySQL, etc. Hence my preference is to dual boot Linux and Windows, to get the best of both worlds. It works for me.

Before installation Windows 7 it's advisable to run the Windows 7 upgrade advisor which is available here. The utility advises to plug in all peripherals that you're going to use with Windows 7, such as USB drives and all, which I did because I was going to perform a backup to my IOMEGA USB drive. The result? All good! It seems all my hardware 'could work' with Windows 7. I also made use of the Application Compatibility Toolkit (ATC) 5.5. That's quite useful for corporate environments, which does what it says, though it's a bit of a fudge to use. It also requires a database (SQL express version will do) to store stuff. Lot's to read just before you could use it. Suffice to say, all but one or two of my applications had issues.

Next, run the Windows Easy Transfer application to backup files, system and application settings. For this app to do it's work, it needs sole access to the system so you cannot do anything while it's running, and it takes a while to run. So I left mine running overnight. I chose to backup my files and system settings to the external IOMEGA USB drive. When it had finished, the resultant file was about 44GB in size. Just in case things didn't go perfectly alright with this Windows Easy Transfer application, I had decided to write my files, photos and stuff to DVD. Now that the system is all backed up, time to install Windows 7.

Windows 7 comes with both 32bit and 64bit version DVDs, very sensible of them. Now, it is not possible to upgrade from 32bit Vista to 64bit Windows 7. A fresh (or custom) install is needed for 64bit Windows 7 in this instance. I needed 64bit Windows 7 so I went ahead with that.

The system began with system checks and when it came to choosing the disk or partition for installation, the system reported that it could NOT find any drives! I tried to rescan but it was not having it. What a show stopper. Remember, the Windows 7 upgrade advisor reported all clear. In fact it reported the device as follows:

Devices: AMD AHCI Compatible RAID Controller.
Status: Compatible.
Details: This device is compatible with Windows 7.

So what's was going on? A hard-drive adapter driver problem.

Ok, let's look for drivers then. The laptop is a Dell with an ATI SATA StorageRAID adapter, so I went to the Dell website in the hope of finding drivers there. No luck, as Dell does not support Windows 7 on this model, Inspiron 1721, nor do they support 64bit Vista whose drivers could most probably work with Windows 7. I then went to the AMD website, the chipset maker who owns ATI, but I couldn't find the drivers there either, and not much mention of ATI SATA StorageRAID adapter. However, after a further search on the Internet I came across a Microsoft discussion forum where this problem had been discussed by people who had tried this with Windows 7 RC and fallen into the same problem. Someone there had posted a link to some hacked drivers,which I downloaded on a USB key in desperation, pointed the Windows 7 to search for drivers, and bingo!

It appears there are no official drivers for 64bit Windows 7 for this ATI SATA Storage RAID adapter, which is also found in some ASUS laptops, reading from online forums, yet the hardware is not even that old. I must say this is where Linux does well, in supporting legacy hardware, though it is admittedly also rubbish at supporting the latest hardware. I can only imagine how daunting this could be for non-technical people out there, having to forage obscure websites on the Internet to get fundamental device drivers, without which your new shiny operating system is rendered useless!

I got my installation started, which went rather quick and painless, thereafter. The system found and installed all other hardware apart from the SD card reader. Wireless was painless too. I've re-installed most of the applications I had previously, taking time to take stock of what's really important and leaving out stuff I no longer needed. I got just about all I needed up an running, very happy indeed! Well almost; time to restore my files and system settings now.

I had to create the same username on the Windows 7 system as I had before on Vista, in order to aid restoration. I plugged in my IOMEGA USB drive and it was instantly recognised by Windows 7. Great. So I browsed to and double-clicked the file created by Windows Easy Transfer. I made the obvious selections it asked, and away it went. The file itself was 44GB in size. It started well, but about 4-5 minutes into it, an error popped up saying it could not read from the USB device because the device was unavailable! I unplugged and plugged in again the USB device, restarted the operating system, no luck. It will transfer small files from the device quite happily, but won't restore my files. Is it a driver problem, I wondered? I checked IOMEGA's website and they said this particular device doesn't not drivers to work.However, a check on the mass-storage device driver provided by Microsoft suggests the driver version is 2006. No updates are available from Microsoft. I've tried to check the device-settings, in case there's some obscure setting somewhere, but cannot find anything untoward.

To be continued...

Meanwhile if you have any suggestions, send them in.

Update

After checking Event Viewer, I found some disk errors on the IOMEGA USB Drive, so I invoked a utility to run and fix checks on it. It took the best part of a day, certainly more than 12 hours, trying to fix block/sector errors which I have no clue how they occurred in the first place. I do not recall having knocked the drive in any way, however, there is a remote possibility the errors could have been caused by disk-head movement during an innocent unplugging of the device from the USB connection. I suppose it's best to safely turn off the device in Windows before unplugging.

After the long scan and fix on the drive sectors, I retried restoring system settings and files using Windows Easy Transfer and it worked really well.

Nokia vs Apple: If you can't beat them, sue them!

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 17:12:00 +0000

Nokia may well have a case in announcing today that it is to sue Apple for patent innfingments to do with the iPhone. Funny that it's come right after the iPhone maker announed mega profits, while it's emerged that Nokia made losses.

"Nokia, the world's biggest mobile phone maker, has said that it is suing its US rival Apple for infringing patents on mobile phone technology for the iPhone.

Nokia said it had not been compensated for its technology, and accused Apple of 'trying to get a free ride on the back of Nokia's innovation'.

The ten alleged patent infringements involve wireless data, speech coding, security, and encryption.

Apple's shares dipped after news of the action broke.

The breaches applied to all models of the iPhone since its launch on 2007, Nokia added."

The BBC has the rest of the story here.

Laptop for every pupil in Uruguay

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 21:44:00 +0000

"Uruguay has become the first country to provide a laptop for every child attending state primary school. President Tabaré Vázquez presented the final XO model laptops to pupils at a school in Montevideo on 13 October.

Over the last two years 362,000 pupils and 18,000 teachers have been involved in the scheme.

The 'Plan Ceibal' (Education Connect) project has allowed many families access to the world of computers and the internet for the first time.

Uruguay is part of the One Laptop Per Child scheme, an organisation set up by internet pioneer Nicholas Negroponte. His original vision was to provide laptops at $100 (£61) but they proved more expensive.

The Uruguay programme has cost the state $260 (£159) per child, including maintenance costs, equipment repairs, training for the teachers and internet connection.

The total figure represents less than 5% of the country's education budget.

Around 70% of the XO model laptops handed out by the government were given to children who did not have computers at home."

More from the BBC.

World Bank to invest $215 million in African internet

noreply@blogger.com (The PANEL) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 11:27:00 +0000

Interesting article on the IET Communications website.

The World Bank is going to spend $215 million to bring reliable, high-speed and low-cost internet access to central Africa.

Despite being the fastest-growing telecoms market in the world, Africa's broadband growth has been hamstrung by costly international bandwidth and patchy national infrastructure, impeding development and deterring investors.

This is a step in the right direction. Addressing the prohibitive cost of the international bandwidth is key in bridging the digital divide. A number of African governments have initiated their own projects to reduce this cost and provide more bandwidth. We're therefore all watching the TEAMS project (undersea fibre optic link) in Kenya with interest.

The PANEL

UK Superfast broadband extends reach

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 12:09:00 +0000

"An extra one and a half million homes will benefit from super-fast broadband by 2012, BT has said.

Originally the telecoms firm said that it could only deploy so-called Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) to a million homes because of its cost.

But it now believes 2.5 million can benefit because it will be cheaper to provide than it had first thought.

A farther 9 million homes will receive the slower Fibre to the Cabinet (FTTC) technology by 2012.

Previously BT had said that it could only lay FTTP to new-build sites - with the Ebbsfleet development in Kent is its flagship site - but now it has found a way to make it more widely available.

It will use existing ducts and overhead cables to bring fibre to brownfield sites as well."

Interesting change of mind by BT. Is this a reaction to recent criticism that "UK broadband was not fit for the future?"

The rest of the story is here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8298382.stm

SA govt Calls off MTN-Barty Merger

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 14:42:00 +0000

"A marriage that had the potential to be one of the most influential matches in the industry has been called off, with the parents of the bride-to-be clearly unimpressed by the quality of her suitor. Indian carrier Bharti Airtel’s attempts to woo African regional specialist MTN have come to nought, with the South African government, MTN’s biggest shareholder, understood to have put the kybosh on the whole affair."

More here.

Microsoft launches free security suite

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 20:19:00 +0000

"Microsoft has released its free computer security package to the public.

From 1700 BST on 29 September, Windows users will be able to download the software from Microsoft's Security Essentials website.

The free software gives basic protection against viruses, trojans, rootkits, and spyware.

The Essentials software is Microsoft's second try at making an own-brand security package.

Prior to release, a beta version of Microsoft's Security Essentials (MSE) software, codenamed Morro, has been available to users in the US, China, Brazil, and Israel."

The rest of the story is here.

Orange announces UK iPhone deal; Vodafone too!

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 06:53:00 +0000

At last, Apple has seen the sense in having the iPhone on more than one network, at least in the UK.

"Orange has reached an agreement to sell Apple's popular iPhone in the UK.

The deal ends an exclusive arrangement between UK network operator O2 and the Californian phone maker, which has been in place since 2007.

Orange said its customers would be able to buy the phone 'later this year' but did not specify a date or pricing."

Update: Vodafone has also joined the fray, effectively ending O2's exclusivity on the iPhone in the UK.

Read more here.

Students Get Windows 7 For £30!

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 13:38:00 +0000

"After much criticism of the Windows 7's complex price structure, Microsoft is offering a reduced price for students - but as with other Windows 7 deals, the cost is higher in Europe."

Read more here.

TEAMS - Another New Africa broadband link 'ready'

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 09:16:00 +0000

The BBC gives headline news of a new East Africa undersea fibre which is ready to go live:

"A new high-speed undersea cable connecting East Africa with the rest of the world is poised to go live, Kenya's top internet official has told the BBC.

The launch of the government-backed East African Marine System (Teams) comes as providers face a backlash over slow connection speeds and high prices.

Internet providers have increased speeds and lowered costs since the Seacom cable went live in August.

But users say services still remain too expensive for most ordinary Kenyans."

More on it here.

Interview with Hamadoun Touré, secretary general of the ITU

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 13:45:00 +0000

A fascinating interview by Telecoms.com with ITU's top man.

"Hamadoun Touré, secretary general of the International Telecommunications Union, has a grand vision—one that was born of the current financial crisis. The ICT sector, he believes, has the potential to lead the world out of recession—and the ITU can play a key role in making that happen."7

The rest of the interview is here.

Zambian Minister Accused of Double Standards over TV Licensing

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 12:58:00 +0000

This is what happens when politicians are involved in the issuance of broadcasting or ICT licenses...

"INDUSTRY experts have observed that information minister Ronnie Shikapwasha’s threats against the proposal by My TV pay television to start showing local content broadcast by Muvi Television will work against the government’s intention to phase out analogue technology by 2015.

The experts also accused Lt Gen Shikapwasha of playing double standards by having MultiChoice Zambia to be showing local content of Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation (ZNBC) and for allowing Mobi Television to have both satellite and terrestrial licences.

Currently, Muvi TV has terrestrial broadcasting licence which is restricted only to Lusaka but the company has been linking data or its programme contents to a German company that controls various satellite stations and Muvi is therefore at liberty to sell its content to anyone.

And My TV has a subscription licence that permits the entity to receive contents that was being broadcasted by various sources from across the world."

Read the story here:

South African pigeon 'faster than broadband'

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 13:05:00 +0000

"A Durban (South Africa) IT company pitted an 11-month-old bird armed with a 4GB memory stick against the ADSL service from the country's biggest web firm, Telkom.

Winston the pigeon took two hours to carry the data 60 miles - in the same time the ADSL had sent 4% of the data."

The BBC reports: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/8248056.stm

Fibre To The Home plans survive downturn

noreply@blogger.com (Zedian) — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 08:22:00 +0000

"More than two million people in Europe now have fibre broadband direct to their home, suggests a survey.

The latest figures on superfast broadband delivered by fibre to the home (FTTH) shows 18% growth over the last survey compiled in late 2008.

The continued growth suggests that the global economic downturn has not hit plans to build a fibre infrastructure."

The BBC quotes Karel Helsen, president of Europe's Fibre-To-The-Home Council, as having said that around Europe more than 233 projects were under way to lay the fibres that would connect homes or buildings to the net, and that many of these were being operated by local governments or smaller net firms.

In the UK, BT has said similar things and sometime last year they encouraged local governments to take on such projects, which would leave BT more as a consulting company than a network operator in some areas.

Rather interestingly, Europe's three largest economies Germans, France and the UK have yet to break into the continent's top 10 FTTH nations list.

More from the BBC Technology news website.