Digital Daily » crisis

OMFG: 4.1 Billion Text Messages Sent Every Day in U.S.

John Paczkowski — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 18:59:36 +0000

Some 740 billion text messages were sent in the first half of 2009 in the U.S. This according to the CTIA’s semiannual wireless industry survey, which helpfully breaks down that astonishing figure to an even more astonishing 4.1 billion texts per day. That’s about double the number sent during the same period last year. And keep in mind, we’re only talking about the United States here, not the rest of the world.

According to the CTIA, there are more than 246 million wireless data-capable devices at large in the U.S. today. Of these, 40 million are smart phones or PDAs, and more than 10 million are laptops. Little wonder that wireless data service revenue rose 31 percent to more than $19.4 billion in the first six months of 2009.

Revenue will no doubt continue that trend in the months ahead as wireless devices become more ubiquitous. Wireless carriers, then, would be wise to put some of their windfall toward building out their networks to cope with future demand lest they end up the butt of a joke in a rival’s advertisement.

Consider these remarks from Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski, spoken Wednesday at the CTIA wireless industry convention in San Diego: “We are fast entering a world where mass-market mobile devices consume thousands of megabytes each month. So we must ask: what happens when every mobile user has an iPhone, a Palm Pre, a BlackBerry Tour, or whatever the next device is? What happens when we quadruple the number of subscribers with mobile broadband on their laptops or netbooks? The short answer: We will need a lot more spectrum. The biggest threat to the future of mobile in America is the looming spectrum crisis.”

Verizon, Microsoft Working on Smart Phune?

John Paczkowski — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 20:00:49 +0000

[ See post to watch video ]

Microsoft Vine: The Zune of Social Networks

John Paczkowski — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 16:09:03 +0000

Think of it as Facebook for the people you actually know and like, those whose health and safety you’d worry about in a natural disaster. It’s called Microsoft Vine and it’s not so much a social network as it is a “societal” one–or at least, Redmond likes to bill it as such.

Announced today and scheduled for beta in May, Vine is a hyperlocal messaging and alert system intended to be used to share information during a crisis. Properly configured, it will gather local news and public safety announcements along with location information, reports and messages from friends–eventually even those posted to other services, like Facebook and Twitter–into a handy little dashboard. This being Microsoft (MSFT), that dashboard will be proprietary and require PCs running XP SP2 or Vista and 600 MB of hard disk space.

So really, Vine is not so much a societal network for people you care about, but for the PC users you care about. A proprietary disaster messaging system… sigh, only from Microsoft.

Anyway…. It’s an interesting idea–not so much as the “societal network” Microsoft touts it as but as a cunning end run around established services. Twitter and Facebook are fun, recreational, but Vine has gravitas. It’s the network you turn to when things fall apart–assuming you meet the proper system requirements–because it consolidates the Tweets and status updates you actually want to read with need-to-know public safety announcements. Of course, Microsoft won’t admit that. “We intend this to be a service of services–to not replace social networking tools that exist today, but embrace them,” Tammy Savage, Microsoft Vine general manager, told TechFlash.

Yeah, embrace and extend and… well, we all know what comes next.

eBay Plans Options Water Safety Course

John Paczkowski — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 19:00:32 +0000

Apparently, fear of a deepening recession alone isn’t enough to maintain tech worker loyalty these days–mounting job losses be damned. This week, Google (GOOG) repriced millions of employee stock options that had gone underwater as the company’s share price declined. Now eBay (EBAY) hopes to do the same. The reason: employee retention.

In a regulatory filing today, the company said it has asked shareholders to approve a plan to offer employees the opportunity to swap underwater stock options for restricted stock. “Like many companies, we have experienced a significant decline in our stock price over the last year in light of the current global financial and economic crisis,” eBay explained in its argument for implementing the plan. “Because of the continued challenging economic environment and the uncertain impact of our efforts to change our business, we believe these underwater stock options are no longer effective as incentives to motivate and retain our employees.”

And this may well be the case. That said, you’d think that the widespread and fast-mounting job losses in the tech sector would be enough to keep most folks still collecting paychecks coming in to work. Nice gesture, though.

GOOG at $398? Clearly, You're Dyslexic

John Paczkowski — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 17:30:45 +0000

The financial turmoil beating the United States economy into submission has finally begun to beat Google (GOOG), the Great and Powerful, down as well. Which must come as something of a shock to CEO Eric Schmidt, who earlier this month claimed the financial meltdown was unlikely to affect Google. “My guess is the drama is in New York, not here,” he said at the company’s Zeitgeist conference. “It’s business as usual at Google. … This is the sixth or seventh cycle I’ve seen in Silicon Valley. I think we’re better positioned than ever. The company has a very large amount of cash in very, very boring and secure investments. That was the right decision then and especially the right decision now. As a company, we’re fine.”

Allow me to be the first to say: Bull Schmidt.

Google’s share price slipped deep into the mud in trading Monday falling below their 52-week low of $406.38 and then below $400 to $398.50. That’s a price not seen since September 2006, and it’s furlongs away from the company’s 52-week high of $747.24. If $398.50-a-share is “business as usual,” then Steve Ballmer is Sergey Brin’s father. Larry Page’s too.

Yeah, the drama is all in New York. … It’s probably just psychological thing, right?

One last point, here: Yahoo shares are also in the mud at $17.51, as are Apple’s which have fallen more than 17 percent to $105.24 as of this writing.

My guess is that the drama is in New York and not here. Pffft.

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Lehman Brothers: $2.5 Billion for a Bankruptcy Well Done

John Paczkowski — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 00:10:18 +0000

Finally, some reassuring news amid all this economic woe. The United States financial system is suffering the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. The Treasury is planning to buy up to $700 billion in bad debt. But things are looking up for the long-suffering employees of investment bank Lehman Brothers.

But wait. Wasn’t it Lehman that filed for bankruptcy just last week?

Yes, it was.

But as luck would have it, that sorry, sorry turn of events apparently had no effect on the $2.5 billion the bank set aside for staff bonuses. So, according to The Independent, Barclays, which is buying Lehman Brothers for $1.75 billion, plans to make good on those bonuses, though it has no obligation to do so.

Two-and-a-half billion. Plus whatever portion of that $39 billion they were given last year. And then there are the pay and severance packages. Lehman Brothers Chairman and CEO Richard Fuld Jr. made $34 million in 2007. He also banked $490 million from selling Lehman stock.

Such is the price of failure.

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Ménage à YHOO

John Paczkowski — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 18:00:03 +0000

[ See post to watch video ]

TRRIST ATTCK! DUK 4 COVR!

John Paczkowski — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 11:30:17 +0000

Well, it’s about time. With 48 billion text messages sent every month in the United States and one of every eight American households using only mobile phones for communications, it’s finally occurred to the federal government that a nationwide cellphone alert system might be a good idea.

And so yesterday the Federal Communications Commission announced plans to develop an emergency-alert system that would broadcast SMS messages to cellphones and other mobile devices wherever a crisis occurs. The Commercial Mobile Alert System, as it’s been dubbed, will deliver three different types of text alerts to mobile phone subscribers: presidential alerts concerning terrorist attacks and whatnot; imminent threat alerts warning of natural disasters; and Amber Alert child abduction warnings.

Sounds like a nice comprehensive program. Too bad you won’t see it for another two years, at least. Unless you happen to live in a region like Contra Costa County in Northern California, where a tech-savvy local government is already hard at work on its own geographically targeted emergency alert system.

Damn You, SkyMall!

John Paczkowski — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 20:07:44 +0000

Well, the champagne bottles must be popping over at SkyMall today. The gadget vendor’s rival, The Sharper Image (SHRP), filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection late yesterday and announced plans to shutter 90 of its 184 stores as soon as it’s able to sell off their inventories.

Seems increased competition and diminishing margins–not to mention that infamous air purifier class-action suit–have taken their toll on the company. Its sales fell 26% during its last fiscal year, which ended Jan. 31. And it’s amassed $199 million in debt. With just $251.5 million in assets, the company (which just last week replaced its CEO with a crisis-management expert) is in dire straits. Said CFO Rebecca Roedell, “Sharper Image is in a severe liquidity crisis.”