| |
 |
|
29
March 2008 |
Almost half of broadband users are unhappy with the service they receive from their internet service provider according to uSwitch, which last week named PlusNet as the UK's best overall provider and Orange as the worst.
Following a survey of nearly 11,000 broadband customers, the price comparison company says that around 4 million broadband users remain unhappy with their provider. It also says 44% of companies have fewer satisfied customers than they did last year.
A recent survey by BroadbandChoic... |
| |
|
|
27
March 2008 |
Rogers Communications Inc. is gearing up to make Internet use more expensive for consumers who have a penchant for chewing up bandwidth by downloading movies or playing video games online.
The telecommunications giant already regulates the flow of traffic on its networks by giving priority to certain content; however, the changes are part of a blueprint to introduce tiered Internet service plans in June that will not only charge users for a designated connection speed, but also cap how much bandwidth th... |
| |
|
|
24
March 2008 |
Retailers and publishers have fought hard to work their way up in the ranking of Google’s search results and refine the search features of their own Web sites to help users once they arrive. Now, Google is taking a greater role in helping users search within particular sites. And some of the same retailers and publishers are not happy about it.
Alan Rimm-Kaufman, an Internet consultant, said Google might be asked at times to turn off a new feature.
This month, the company introduced a search-within-se... |
| |
|
|
20
March 2008 |
The dominant position of incumbent operators may be affecting the European Union's (EU's) efforts to increase broadband penetration.
Eight of the EU's 19 member states are ahead of the US in the race to increase broadband availability, but the rest of the continent risks falling behind, according to the latest report from the European Commission.
Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands and Sweden all achieved penetration rates of more than 30 per cent by the end of 2007. The UK, Belgium and Luxembourg fell ... |
| |
|
|
20
March 2008 |
Australia’s first WiMAX operator, Hervey Bay’s Buzz Broadband, has closed its network, with the CEO labeling the technology as a “disaster” that “failed miserably.”
In an astonishing tirade to an international WiMAX conference audience in Bangkok yesterday afternoon, CEO Garth Freeman slammed the technology, saying its non-line of sight performance was “non-existent” beyond just 2 kilometres from the base station, indoor performance decayed at just 400m and that latency rates reached as high as 1000 mill... |
| |
|
|
19
March 2008 |
British mobile phone users could enjoy the sort of "all-you-can-eat" call packages that are available in the US after the Competition Commission was asked yesterday to consider scrapping one of the most complicated aspects of call charging.
The Competition Appeal Tribunal posed a series of questions yesterday to the commission as part of a long-running spat between the regulator, Ofcom; BT and the UK's newest mobile phone network, 3, about mobile termination rates.
One of the questions was whether the... |
| |
|
|
19
March 2008 |
A Moroccan computer engineer jailed last month for setting up a Facebook account in the name of King Mohammed's brother has been freed after a royal pardon, his lawyer said on Wednesday.
Fouad Mortada, 26, was jailed for three years and given a 10,000 dirham ($1,370) fine on February 23 for falsifying data and imitating Prince Moulay Rachid without his consent.
The ruling sparked protests from free speech campaigners around the world and Moroccan bloggers stopped writing in solidarity with Mortada.
... |
| |
|
|
19
March 2008 |
Google has seen an acceleration of Internet activity among mobile phone users in recent months since the company has introduced faster Web services on selected phone models, fueling confidence the mobile Internet era is at hand, the company said on Tuesday.
Early evidence showing sharp increases in Internet usage on phones, not just computers, has emerged from services Google has begun offering in recent months on Blackberry e-mail phones, Nokia devices for multimedia picture and video creators and busin... |
| |
|
|
19
March 2008 |
Apple is in talks with major music companies to offer customers free access to its entire iTunes music library in exchange for paying a premium for its iPods and iPhones, the Financial Times said.
Citing people familiar with the talks, the paper said the negotiations hinged on a dispute over the price Apple would be willing to pay for access to the labels' libraries.
One industry executive said research showed consumers would pay a premium of up to $100 for unlimited access to music for the lifetime o... |
| |
|
|
19
March 2008 |
Wi-Fi is relatively easy to access in urban areas, but not nearly as ubiquitous in more rural parts of the world. Recognising the problem, Intel has announced its Rural Connectivity Program (RCP) - a new way to receive wireless signals outside of cities.
Intel's new initiative utilises a processor, software radios and an antenna to connect remote areas up to 60 miles (96km) away that otherwise would go without internet access.
According to Intel, the equipment also enables a relatively high throughput... |
| |
|
|
19
March 2008 |
As expected, federal regulators on Wednesday voted to overhaul the way they measure how widely broadband is available across the United States.
For years, the Federal Communications Commission has been drawing up reports on the state of U.S. Internet access availability based on methodology that considers 200 kilobits per second (Kbps) service to be "high speed"--and such access to be widely available even in ZIP codes that may, in reality, house only one connection.
The decision to move away from t... |
| |
|
|
18
March 2008 |
High-speed connections in broadband Britain may be cheaper and faster than ever before, but half of subscribers are unhappy with the service they are getting.
The survey, conducted by price comparison service uSwitch, found that four out of nine providers have less satisfied customers this year than last and that four million customers are dissatisfied with their ISP.
Topping the sin bin list were BT and Orange, which were ranked the poorest for value for money and the worst broadband provider respect... |
| |
|
|
17
March 2008 |
China blocked access to YouTube.com on Sunday after dozens of videos of recent protests in Tibet appeared on the popular US video website.
The blocking added to the communist government's efforts to control what the public saw and heard about protests that erupted on Friday in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, against Chinese rule.
Access to YouTube.com, usually readily available in China, was blocked after videos appeared on the site on Saturday showing foreign news reports about the Lhasa demonstrations... |
| |
|
|
17
March 2008 |
BT has admitted that it secretly used customer data to test Phorm's advertising targeting technology last summer, and that it covered it up when customers and The Register raised questions over the suspicious redirects.
The national telecoms provider now faces legal action from customers who are angry their web traffic was compromised.
Stephen Mainwaring, a BT Business customer in Weston-super-Mare, believes sensitive banking data relating to his online horse racing business was press-ganged into a tr... |
| |
|
|
17
March 2008 |
Japanese customers didn’t buy a single 2G handset during January, which could be why Japanese network operator NTT DoCoMo has decided to stop providing sub-3G connectivity by 2012.
Although just over 4m mobile phones were shipped to Japanese stores during the first month of the year, the Japan Electronics and Information Technology Industries Association (JEITIA) said that it was the first time no 2G handsets were sold.
It’s little surprise, then, that NTT DoCoMo, which was the world’s first carrier t... |
|
