Nationalize the mobile broadband industry???

I am going to put forward a brief argument recently made by a member of the 3GPP standards body that will be unpopular with my friends who work with AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile, and anyone associated with the Cell Phone Industry. I’m not in favor of the idea myself, but I know that if I don’t state the case now, someday, someone will make the argument.

It seems appropriate in this time that we are debating the idea of government-run health-care, that perhaps we should look at the idea of nationalizing certain industries. There is one industry that may become a target for nationalization, particularly as more people use it. Is it time to nationalize the cell phone industry and bring wireless cellular communications under the control of one company that is run by the government?

Yes, I know the arguments against nationalizing the wireless industry are legion. And yes, someone will remind us that AT&T was once a monopoly in the wired phone industry that was broken up about 30 years ago. But in the future, someone will make the case FOR nationalization, so I thought I’d get the case for nationalization out there as a public service so that everyone will have the correct information to make a judgment when that day comes.

First, let’s make a couple of points…

(1) Wireless has become more important than electricity for many people around the globe. No, seriously, it has. 85% of the planet’s population has wireless connectivity compared with only 80% of the planet having electricity. And the 85% is increasing. At some point this year, the number of wireless connections around the globe will exceed the number of people in the world. Furthermore, at it’s present projections, the number of wireless connections on Earth will exceed 50 billion by 2025. Although people will still use wireless to communicate, wireless connections will become more and more based on machine to machine communications. Every appliance in your home will have some type of internet connectivity, passing data back to other machines, allowing smarter machine to mange things that have become tedious in our eyes. In short, the internet has become less an internet of documents and more an internet of things. The change in definition is significant.

(2) The mobile phone has become more than just a phone or internet device. In many parts of the world, it has become money itself, either as a credit card or as a tool to hold money. In addition, plans include making the mobile phone a way to monitor personal health stats, and a way to share locations and information between people. Some kids today have become so dependent on their smartphones from everything in their lives that they cannot function without it.

(3) Even though the world has finally adopted a global technology in the form of LTE, the fragmentation of the World’s RF bands has made a global 4G device almost impossible—unless you want to go back to the days of a phone the size of a brick. There are about 40 RFs that have been approved for LTE use and let’s just say they all don’t play nicely with each other. Look at the recent problems Apple has had with LTE on the new iPad outside of the US.

Based on this and other pieces of information, the smartphone has gradually become an essential part of people’s lives. It has become as much of a necessity as food, air, water, and shelter. I’ve personally seen homeless people have smartphones and they prefer having a smartphone to a stable place to sleep. In fact, during the recent Occupy protests, some people decided it was more important to buy a new smartphone than eat so they could get their message out to the masses.

But there is a problem. The cell networks that have supported cell phones are on the verge of being overwhelmed and possibly melting down. They cell phone industry is trying to compensate for an exponential increase in use of the networks by increasing network efficiency, buying new spectrum, and putting up more cell towers, but it’s clear that at present projections, widespread daily outages on the network will be seen starting next year. And it’s only expected to get worse. By 2016, Yankee Group projects that mobile data will exceed network capacity by a 2:1 margin. Plus, most networks don’t work well with each other in the US. If you are an AT&T customer and your network is having problems, you can’t go use Sprint’s network because AT&T and Sprint’s phones are not compatible with each other.

So, how would a nationalized network work in the US, if it was implemented? That’s a little unclear. The first way would be obvious. All the networks would be forced into one government-owned company. The US government would buy back all the spectrum, then merge it all together producing larger bandwidth that could increase capacity in urban areas where lack of spectrum is a problem. The US would also standardize under one technology (likely 3GPP), focusing the engineers on the problems of that technology, instead of being spread out to focus on 5 or 6 different technologies. Would it work? Well, Europe did a similar thing when the western portion of the continent created a single technology called GSM. By working on the issues before releasing the standard in 1991, they created a Europe-wide technology standardized at 2 RFs (later expanded to 4) that allowed cell-phone makers to easily create devices that could work across the globe. We don’t have that with LTE at present. In addition, putting up cell towers would be less of a hassle, because the government would eliminate one layer of obstacles that is now prevalent in working out how to put up towers.

A second way to implement a “nationalized” network is similar to a model now being implemented by the Russians for LTE. Last year, 5 companies entered into a landmark agreement where you effectively have network sharing. Scartel, the largest WiMAX provider in Russia, agreed to build the LTE network at specific RF bands, and 4 other companies would provide services on that network with the option to buy into the network. In the US, you might have AT&T and Verizon build the network. All the US providers could then buy into AT&T and Verizon’s network, but everyone would use the same network, with much more cell towers at their disposal. But it would still have national capabilities and all the networks would have to agree to work together.

One big benefit of nationalizing the cell phone industry is that it would focus cell phone providers to build more towards a specific set of requirements. That would in the long run reduce the cost of building a cell phone, a cost benefit that would be required to be passed on to the consumer in the long run.

The second benefit is that unifying the US along a specific set of requirements would make producing a “world phone” feasible again. As of right now, there are about 6 different LTE frequencies being proposed, and that doesn’t even count Lightsquared’s proposal which was just thrown out. If the US could unify around 1 or 2 frequencies, the rest of the world (China and India possible exceptions) would be focused on opening that common spectrum up to cell phone use, thus paving the way for a global standard to be built.

There are other benefits to be considered, and yes, there are potential risks. Again, though, this is just the thoughts of someone who has dealt with standards bodies, and he is expressing frustration at the fragmentation of LTE networks around the world. While I disagree with the idea, I sympathize with his concerns. While nationalizing the cell phone is a bad idea as far as I’m concerned, it is a way to try and build a global LTE standard—something that could become more imperative as LTE-Advanced starts being released next year.

The rise and fall of restaurant chains…

Restaurant chains are strange creatures to be sure. Some chains have succeeded to the point where they are universally recognized, like McDonalds, Burger King, Wendy’s, Subway, KFC, and more. Others are not as prevalent, but become cult favorites like In-n-Out. Others start out hot, but as time progresses, the novelty wears off, and many places either shrink in numbers or disappear all together as newer restaurants become the hot items. For every Chick-Fil-A rising, a Hardee’s is losing restaurants. Sometimes it’s location, other times it’s the food, and other times it’s the service.

Just recently, I found out that Mrs. Winner’s Chicken and Biscuits has all but closed up shop with just a handful of franchise stores scattered in North Carolina and 1 or 2 left in Georgia. The Website has been taken down without fanfare, and it took a Facebook link to figure out why. In the last Facebook page from the Mrs. Winner’s Company, they stated that all the corporate locations had closed in August of 2011 and that only franchises were left to carry on the name. This departure saddened me personally. My family had regularly visited the location in Lawrenceville when I was younger. Unfortunately, they got caught in an era of increasing competition. KFC is the king of Fried Chicken, but pressure from traditional Fried Chicken places like Popeye’s, Bojangles’ and Church’s, plus new chicken entities such as Chick-Fil-A and El Pollo Loco seemed to push the largely metro Atlanta chain to bankruptcy and ultimately to near extinction.

Mrs. Winner’s is just the latest restaurant I grew up with in Atlanta, Chicago, and Baltimore that developed a national or regional following once upon a time, only to shrink back and/or disappear completely for a number of reasons. How many longtime metro Atlanta residents remember that Sizzler used to be in Atlanta? I vaguely remember a Sizzler on Memorial Drive near Hambrick. However, Sizzler left Atlanta and I thought they were gone until a passing reference in the movie “White Men Can’t Jump” pointed me to the fact the Sizzler had retreated back to its origins in the West Coast.

How many people also remember Bonanza or Ponderosa in Atlanta? The chain of buffet restaurants used to be in metro Atlanta before disappearing in the 1980s. I found them again in the 1990s in Valparaiso, but I guess that I ate them out of town. Bonanzas and Ponderosas still exist, but they are few and far between these days.

Steak and Ale used to be the place to get a good steak—or at least an expensive one. For the longest time, they were the national steak chain. But competition from family steak houses like Outback, Longhorn, and Texas Roadhouse and fine dining steak houses like Mortons, Ruth’s Chris, and Flemings drove Steak and Ale to Chapter 7 liquidation.

Bennigan’s was founded in Atlanta in the 1970s and was a great place to get Burgers, Sandwiches like Monte Cristos, and the famous Death by Chocolate dessert. But several competitors also drove the corporate locations to extinction leaving a handful of franchise places scattered throughout the country.

Shoney’s was part of the Big Boy group, then struck out on its own to compete outside the Southeast, and appeared to be doing well. But the all-you-can-eat buffets could not be sustained nationally and, just like Sizzler and Bonanza/Ponderosa before it, Shoney’s started disappearing rapidly. All of the corporate restaurants closed leaving just franchise locations scattered across the southeast—about a quarter of the number of restaurants Shoney’s had at their peak. You can still find them around, but not at the levels they once were.

Damon’s was one of the first to have giant TVs for customers to enjoy sporting events, but it also had a back room where large dinner groups could be housed away from the rest of the restaurant. In fact, when Liz and I got married in 2006, we had our rehearsal dinner at Damon’s and it was a wonderful affair. At one point, Damon’s had 5 restaurants in the Baltimore area and they had 2 dozen restaurants in Michigan. But a failure in further innovate and competition from national chains like Buffalo Wild Wings and regional competition like the Green Turtle drove the chain into bankruptcy in 2009 and by the end of 2011, there were no more Damon’s in the Baltimore area, just two in Michigan, and none in Columbus Ohio, which was Damon’s Headquarters.

Pizza Inn, Fazoli’s, The Blackeyed Pea, Chi-chi’s, Western Steer Steakhouse, and Po Folks are other examples of chains that once were popular in Atlanta, but have since left the Atlanta area. Many still survive, but at far fewer numbers than they once did. Chi-Chi’s disappeared in the US, but still lives on overseas.

Del Taco used to be the primary Mexican fast food place in Atlanta. Taco Bell bought out most of the stores in the late 1980s in Atlanta, but now it appears Del Taco is starting to make a comeback in Atlanta starting with Snellville. So, even when restaurants appear to die off, they sometimes have a way of coming back from exile.

What restaurant chains (national or regional) do you recall once being prevalent in your towns but are no more? What do you remember best about these chains? What chains would you like to see return? And what currently dominant restaurant do you think will/should eventually disappear from your area? I’d love to hear your thoughts…

Forgetting your roots…

Recently, when a powerful series of tornadoes rocked the Ohio Valley area causing multiple deaths and millions in damage, one of the hardest hit areas was the town of Henryville, IN, located north-northeast of Louisville.  The small town was featured in lots of news coverage, but I didn’t hear much about the town’s claim to fame:  it was the hometown of Colonel Harlan Sanders, the man who would go on to create the Kentucky Fried Chicken brand.  While Sanders didn’t actually build the first chain of KFC restaurants, he was their most famous spokesman until his death.

I have not heard much of KFC trying to help the town of Henryville out, and I should not have been surprised.  Still, it would help a company’s image if they occasionally remembered their roots.  Besides, the parent company of KFC, Yum! Brands is headquartered in Louisville.  How hard would it be to provide support to the town which is less than an hours’ drive away?

Forgetting ones’ roots is not a good idea for anyone, person or company.  When you stray away from your humble past, you lose your perspective.  Remembering the past provides you with perspective as you move forward.  And if something happens to your origins and you do nothing in response, what does it say to people about you remembering the lessons of today going forward?

I hope KFC is helping out the people of Henryville.  I might consider paying more visits to companies who remember their roots when those roots experience trouble.  It makes a company a good corporate citizen.

Rush’s Blunder…

By now, everyone has an opinion on the latest controversy regarding Rush Limbaugh.  When a Georgetown law student by the name of Sandra Fluke testified before Congress last week in favor of birth control being covered under health insurance plans, Limbaugh called Fluke a “slut” and “prostitute”.  The comments caused such a firestorm of controversy that Rush apologized last weekend for the “insulting” comments he made and did so again on Monday.  Fluke did not accept the apology, claiming that Rush was not sincere and his motives were largely to avoid losing sponsors, radio stations, and listeners.  As of the time of this blog, over 40 sponsors have decided to stop advertising on the show.  Two radio stations have stopped broadcasting his radio show, and two musician have demanded Rush stop playing their music on his radio show.

The reason that some advertisers have stopped sponsoring Rush’s show comes down to a basic reason:  some of the company CEOs have daughters of their own and don’t like the idea of anyone’s daughter being called a “slut”.  In short, the family values that Rush claims to embrace has been used against Mr. Limbaugh in this instance.  And they’re right.  Nobody likes their child to be denigrated in front of a national audience.  It’s one thing if they are famous:  denigration of celebrities comes with the territory of being famous.  But, from all accounts, Ms. Fluke was just making a point in front a Congressional committee as a private citizen.  Ironically, Rush’s denigration of Ms. Fluke might make her famous enough to be a future politician/celebrity that will almost certainly be progressive in her views.

Rush is without question the biggest radio personality in history by a wide margin.  It’s not even close.  The next biggest radio personality is Howard Stern, and Howard left standard radio airwaves 6 years ago for the uncensored world of pay satellite radio.  Yeah, Howard says worse things about women, but the difference is Howard goes mostly after celebrities or after those who want to appear on his radio show and take the abuse.  In short, you know what you are getting with Howard.  He’s not a nuclear family values guy.  Rush claims to be, however, so his comments on Ms. Fluke were viewed as worse than Howard’s usual shtick.

In the end Rush will survive because he owns his own network, and he can afford a smaller pay salary from sponsors if it means he can still speak his mind.  But this controversy is just another headache that Rush could have avoided if he had just avoided saying something stupid about a heretofore private citizen.  You may not agree with Ms. Fluke’s views, but calling her a slut is not a good way to try and win the people’s hearts and minds on the matter if you disagree with her.