Not just a question of worse coverage and providers
While it's true that US mobile providers have worse coverage and price plans, I think the most important factor that's slowed growth in the US mobile sector is the fact that in the US you don't pay for local calls made on a landline. Given that any landline you pay for will have unlimited free local talk time - erm ... why would you bother with mobile call charges and texting, exactly? In addition, what counts as 'local' will sometimes cover something like 1/4 the size of the UK.
Chris C and Jach are absolutely right that search engines like Google and Yahoo. But the people responsible for the idea that they're anything but are Google and Yahoo themselves. Google's entire rhetoric and self-presentation is that they're NOT 'simply' a business, like, say, baddies like Microsoft: they're a public service of (near-messianic?) proportions.
This kind of malarkey in China is bad for democracy. And it's also ultimately bad for Google's self-image - and hopefully market share.
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3 posts • joined Monday 13th August 2007 20:50 GMT
Not just a question of worse coverage and providers
While it's true that US mobile providers have worse coverage and price plans, I think the most important factor that's slowed growth in the US mobile sector is the fact that in the US you don't pay for local calls made on a landline. Given that any landline you pay for will have unlimited free local talk time - erm ... why would you bother with mobile call charges and texting, exactly? In addition, what counts as 'local' will sometimes cover something like 1/4 the size of the UK.
Google? Yahoo? Businesses?
Chris C and Jach are absolutely right that search engines like Google and Yahoo. But the people responsible for the idea that they're anything but are Google and Yahoo themselves. Google's entire rhetoric and self-presentation is that they're NOT 'simply' a business, like, say, baddies like Microsoft: they're a public service of (near-messianic?) proportions.
This kind of malarkey in China is bad for democracy. And it's also ultimately bad for Google's self-image - and hopefully market share.
You know ...
... if I were her, I wouldn't *want* to go back to work after that.