VoIP-Facts.net: The Blog

T-Mobile’s Fixed Mobile Convergence

Cellular provider T-Mobile USA now has a trial offering of a landline based VoIP service in Seattle and Dallas-Fort Worth, according to an Associated Press release on Thursday. Dubbed Talk Forever Home Phone, for a $10 addition to your $39.99 cell phone bill, customers can make free local and domestic long distance calls over their broadband Internet connection using T-Mobile’s $50 router, which has two connections for standard corded or cordless phones.

Last summer, T-Mobile launched their HotSpot AtHome service, allowing customers to make calls over a WiFi connection with a dual mode WiFi/Cellular cell phone. One phone, one number, anywhere!

The Talk Forever Home Phone plan is aimed at getting customers to drop their traditional landline service, by offering the less scary option of having a “real” telephone at home.

Duke to Deploy 802.11n

In what is deemed to be the largest planned deployment of next generation WiFi technology, Duke University taps Cisco Systems to rollout a campus wide 802.11n wireless network at their Raleigh Durham location.

Over 2,500 Cisco Aironet 1250 series access points will blanket the campus pumping broadband Internet access to every nook and cranny.

During testing, Duke says it experienced a reliable average throughput of 130Mbps per client with the Aironet access point. Legacy 802.11g laptops gained nearly twice the throughput of older wireless networks, indicating that backwards compatibility should not be a problem.

Broadband Balloons? Not Just a lot of Hot Air

This one blows my mind.

A company in Phoenix Arizona has caught the eye of Google, and could be in for a ride as wild as the transceivers they send to the stratosphere on a daily basis.

Space Data Corp. currently provides wireless telecom services to truckers and oil companies in the southwest U.S. Everyday they launch 10 latex hydrogen balloons with a shoebox size payload of what is essentially a miniature cell phone tower. In about two hours they reach their target altitude, between 65,000 to 100,000 feet. The balloons are only good for about 24 hours, when they burst and disintegrate from lack of air as they climb up to 20 miles into the stratosphere. Before that happens, engineers at ground control in Phoenix release the payload from the balloon, which parachutes back down to earth.

The transceivers cover a range of thousands of square miles as they drift over Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and Oklahoma, each balloon covering an area equivalent to 40 cell phone towers. Wow!

Seems pretty labor intensive, since the balloons have to be launched so often. So just how cost effective can it be?

The balloons cost $50 dollars to make, and are launched from airports and farms across the area. The company pays airport mechanics and dairy farmers $50 per launch. Space Data CEO Gerald Knoblach says dairy farmers are “very reliable people,” They have to “milk the cows 24-7, 365 days a year, so they’re great people to use as a launch crew.”

The electronics payload cost $1,500, and is thus something that you would not really want to lose. Space Data hires “hobbyists” to track and fetch the Styrofoam incased boxes via GPS. The company pays $100 for each box recovered.

Talk about your trickle down economics.

So why would Google be interested in Space Data Corp.? Their main interest is expanding broadband internet coverage everywhere they can. This method covers huge areas at a relatively small cost, making it perfect for serving rural areas, the have nots on the dark side of the digital divide. Googles interest in wireless technology and its open source philosophy has been well documented as of late.

It is rumored that Google is looking to partner with Space Data Corp., or maybe just buy it. Space Data won’t comment on who it’s talking to or about what.

Star Wars Debut?

A little off topic, but noteworthy nevertheless.

This week the U.S. Navy launched a missile that effectively disintegrated a school bus size satellite that was falling to earth anyway.  Some say it wasn’t necessary, but we could, so we did, and everybody knows it now.

Ok, so it wasn’t a fleet of missiles launched to intercept an intercontinental rocket with a nuclear warhead arcing towards the western hemisphere, but now we know we can destroy things in space!

Are we getting too smart for our own britches?