Posts Tagged ‘cell phones’
Five Billionth Machine About To Plug Into Web
Sometime this month, the 5 billionth device will plug into the Internet. And in 10 years, that number will grow by more than
a factor of four, according to IMS Research, which tracks the installed base of equipment that can access the Internet.
On the surface, this second tidal wave of growth will be driven by cell phones and new classes of consumer electronics, according
to an IMS statement. But an even bigger driver will be largely invisible: machine-to-machine communications in various kinds
of smart grids for energy management, surveillance and public safety, traffic and parking control, and sensor networks.
Earlier this year, Cisco forecast equally steep growth rates in personal devices and overall Internet traffic. [See "Global IP traffic to increase fivefold by 2013, Cisco predicts"]
Today, there are over 1 billion computers that regularly connect to the Internet. That class of devices, including PCs and
laptops and their associated networking gear, continues to grow.
But cellular devices, such as Internet-connected smartphones, have outstripped that total and are growing at a much faster rate. Then add in tablets, eBook readers, Internet TVs, cameras,
digital picture frames, and a host of other networked consumer electronics devices, and the IMS forecast of 22 billion Internet
devices by 2010 doesnt seem farfetched.
Slate Wars: 15 Tablets That Could Rival Apple’s iPad
The research firm projects that in 10 years, there will be 6 billion cell phones, most of them with Internet connectivity.
An estimated 2.5 billion televisions today will largely be replaced by TV sets that are Internet capable, either directly
or through a set-top box. More and more of the worlds one billion automobiles will be replaced by newer models with integrated
Internet access.
Yet, the greatest growth potential is in machine-to-machine, according to IMS President Ian Weightman. Research firm Gartner
named machine-to-machine communications one of the top 10 mobile technologies to watch in 2010.And almost exactly one year ago, Qualcomm and Verizon created a joint-venture company specifically to support machine-to-machine wireless services.
“This has the potential to go way beyond industrial applications to encompass [such applications as] increasingly sophisticated
smart grids, networked security cameras and sensors, connected home appliances and HVAC equipment, and ITS infrastructure
for traffic and parking management,” Weightman said in a statement.
John Cox covers wireless networking and mobile computing for “Network World.”
Twitter: http://twitter.com/johnwcoxnww
Email: john_cox@nww.com
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New Gov’T Guidelines Enable Unapproved Iphone Apps & Jailbreaking.
The decision to allow the practice commonly known as “jailbreaking” is one of a handful of new exemptions from a 1998 federal law that prohibits people from bypassing technical measures that companies put on their products to prevent unauthorized uses. The Library of Congress, which oversees the Copyright Office, reviews and authorizes exemptions every three years to ensure that the law does not prevent certain non-infringing uses of copyright-protected material.
Unless users unlock their devices, they can only download apps from Apple’s iTunes store. Software developers must get such apps pre-approved by Apple, which sometimes demands changes or rejects programs for what the developers say are vague reasons.
The new government rules, however, won’t stop Apple from continuing its practice of disabling jailbroken phones with software upgrades. That means owners of such phones might not be able to take advantage of software improvements, and they still run the risk of voiding their warranty. All the new rules do is exempt the user from legal liability – something Apple does not appear to be pursuing anyway. Apple did not return messages for comment Monday.
In addition to jailbreaking, other exemptions announced Monday would:
- allow owners of used cell phones to break access controls on their phones in order to switch wireless carriers.
- allow people to break technical protections on video games to investigate or correct security flaws.
- allow college professors, film students and documentary filmmakers to break copy-protection measures on DVDs so they can embed clips for educational purposes, criticism, commentary and noncommercial videos.
- allow computer owners to bypass the need for external security devices called dongles if the dongle no longer works and cannot be replaced.
- allow blind people to break locks on electronic books so that they can use them with read-aloud software and similar aides.
Although the jailbreaking exemption is new, all the others are similar to the last set of exemptions, which were announced in November 2006. The new rules take effect Tuesday and are expected to last a few years.
The exceptions are a big victory for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which had urged the Library of Congress to legalize several of them, including the two regarding cell phones.
Jennifer Stisa Granick, EFF’s civil liberties director, said the rules are based on an important principle: Consumers should be allowed to use and modify the devices that they purchase the way they want. “If you bought it, you own it,” she said.
San Francisco Turns Into Floor Zero In Gadget Radiaton Battle
The news that the city of San Francisco will likely require cellphone makers to disclose their products’ radiation emissions could portend a new front in the growth of green IT.
Last week, the city’s board of supervisors voted 10-1 to require cellphone retailers to show how much radiation their phones emit. Mayor Gavin Newsom is expected to sign it, making it the first such law in the nation.
In response, the wireless industry’s trade association, the CTIA, has cancelled its annual, SF-based trade show after the already planned event for fall 2010 in the city because of the move.
“Rather than inform, the ordinance will potentially mislead consumers with point of sale requirements suggesting that some phones are ‘safer’ than others based on radiofrequency (RF) emissions,” Walls said in a statement. “We are disappointed to announce that the 2010 CTIA Enterprise and Applications show in October will be the last one we have in San Francisco for the foreseeable future.”
Sidestepping the question of how big an impact the CTIA’s move will have on the San Francisco economy, and how much impact S.F.’s bill will have on the industry as a whole, this notion of the hidden impacts of technology seems to be one that is steadily moving to the forefront.
Fears about cellphone radiation are enduring and widespread, and despite any number of studies of varying depth and range showing “inconclusive” impacts on human health from cell phone radiation, there’s a pervasive belief in the dangers of cell phones, and a search for the safest possible phones.
And there are signs that these kinds of concerns could expand beyond cell phones: There is currently a movement afoot that is questioning the safety of smart meters for their radiation emissions, and other gadgets in our increasingly wireless world could certainly come under scrutiny.
It’s certainly a conceptual stretch at this point, if concerns about radiation from electronics takes root, I could envision a concerned citizen measuring the levels in your average data center and raising red flags about impacts on IT workers and employees in tech-heavy buildings.
All of which is simply to say: Could measuring and reducing radiation from electronics gadgets be a new facet of green IT?
Although in the U.S. the health and human-rights legs of the three-legged stool of sustainability are often much shorter than the environmental leg, it seems that addressing radiation concerns could be a competitive advantage and market differentiator for the first firm to get their hands around what their gadgets are emitting.
Cell phone tower photo CC-licensed by Flickr user rust.bucket.