Posts by DafyddG

Vodafone Access Gateway 3G

Too limiting and too expensive

Orange have been playing with femtocell technology in their labs in Issy Les Moulineaux France for around 2 years but when I went into an Orange shop last month and asked what they were doing about it, I may as well have asked in Martian. The salesman looked at me as if I'd just fallen out of a pram. The manager of the Vodafone shop in the same street knew just what I was talking about and confirmed what I expected. Firstly this device is expensive; secondly it is only for use with a small number of registered handsets; and thirdly, it can only be used on the Vodafone network.

Like many people I live in an area where mobile coverage is a hope for the 23rd century, not a reality in this one. BT are quietly pulling phone boxes out of rural and country areas and apart from landlines, there is no mobile phone coverage in huge swathes of Wales and Scotland. What a great sales opportunity for some enterprising mobile phone operator wouldn't you think?

If Vodafone used their little grey cells as well as their little femtocells, they could install femtocells in lots of currently dead areas - all they need are three things:

A broadband connection of more than 1MB/sec

A power supply

A more open approach to the femtocell client to make them Voda friendly (not just for 4 phones)

These femtocells could be installed in pubs, shops, post offices, just about anywhere - not a complete solution to dead areas, more reminiscent of the old Rabbit system, but it would put Vodafone way ahead of the competiton, at least until they learn to spell the word "femtocell".

Cameron escapes Twitter twat rap

Watch out Jonathan Ross!

Sounds like Davie Boy's trying to get as infamous as you with the same techniques.

Rhonda Farr said: ‘Publicity, darling. Just publicity. Any kind is better than none at all.’

Orange gets UK iPhone deal

Apples and Oranges?

Interesting that Steve Jobs, a really smart individual in so many ways still has this cockamany "exclusive" attitude towards his little iPhone. What he needs to do is look in his rear view mirror - the competition are not just closing on him, they're in a higher gear. If I were Apple I would have opened the door to all network operators to sell the baby before it falls out of the pram and is replaced by a nicer looking and less fussy infant.

Attack of the Killer Tits

Hungarians are not the only victims

Here in Wales we've also been victims of Great Tits - the weather brought them out in droves (is that the term - a drove of Tits?) - the beaches on Saturday around Barmouth were inundated with them. According to local news agencies, large numbers of males had to be treated for shock when a coachload of Great Tits hit the beach. Quotes like "you could have your eye out with them" were heard from temorarily blinded husbands as they were led away from the beach by their wives. I understand the female coach party was from Essex but that has yet to be confirmed.

Swedish military bras burst, melt during 'rigorous exercise'

Swedes and Hungarians

According to your excellent news service, I suggest the Hungarian bats meet up with the Swedish Armed Forces supply organisation - seems they have similar problems - Great Tits.....

O2 launches democratically-minded MVNO

Correction - coverage is what we're paying for

Ginger - if you visit the Nordic region and western Europe you will find that it doesn't matter where you are, you are almost always guaranteed a signal on all networks. This is the only country in Europe will massive network 'holes.'

Our European cousins are gobsmacked when they come to the UK and their calls drop or they can't obtain a signal - they can't believe it and ask 'why do you put up with it?' - we say, well, that's the way it is, this is Britain. And to make sure I'm not caning O2 only, I have agreements with T-Mobile and 3 as well. They're all the same when it comes to service. There's no signal anywhere around my home and for miles. Compare signal strength maps of Europe and the UK for all the mobile operators if you don't believe me. The problem is we're British, we're too polite and we don't complain loudly enough that we're getting second rate service at first rate prices.

O2 needs to sort out its priorities

Well, I've been in this business for a long time and seen some dippy things, but the O2 announcement takes the biscuit. Maybe Mike Fairman should do a simple calculation. O2 spends an inordinate amount of money on advertising its services, yet where I live I have to drive nearly 16 miles to get an O2 signal. No, I don't live in the Antarctic, I live on the border of England and Wales.

Mr Fairman should consider a much better method to beat his competition and win more customers. All he needs is add more base stations (or co-locate with existing base stations) in the rural and country areas of the UK. That will bring more new customers to his company and reduce churn at the same time. The best advertising is word of mouth, not massive trade show stands and pointless logo promotion.

Perhaps he hasn't noticed that dear old BT has been stealthily decommissioning phone boxes in the boondocks for some time, so mobile telephony is the only choice. He should also play catch-up with Vodafone before it's too late and invest in 3G Access Gateways before his competition force him to publicly flog his management team for wearing blindfolds.

Gmail de-goodened by contact list glitch

Cloud computing? - I don't think so

So Google Mail has gone tuts-ip again today. At one point this afternoon I thought all my contacts had evaporated into the wonderful cloud. Mild panic set in until I realized that I had a backup; no, not somewhere in 'the cloud' - it was on my dear old friend the server sitting quietly under the desk. Phew!

Recently I made the decision to ditch Outlook and make Googlemail my default contact list and calendar. It syncs so smoothly with my iPhone and I told all my business colleages that they should consider this option.

So many times in the past for one reason or another, my version of Outlook failed and I spent ages restoring content and putting everything back in order. No problem said I. This cloud computing is the way to go.

Now, I'm not so sure - hmm, somewhere in one of the drawers in my office there's an old Filofax - if I can just figure out how to boot it up, I might be able to save my contacts....