First Qualcomm (QCOM), now Apple (AAPL). Remember the GSM vs CDMA phone standards wars some 15+ years ago? The European Union [EU] at that time turned against Qualcomm in favor of the Nokia (NOK)-Ericsson (ERIC)-Alcatel (ALU)-Siemens (SI) backed GSM standard, mandating it in Europe and therefore limiting what would have been an even greater potential for Qualcomm.
Fast forward some 15+ years, and they’re baaack! The EU is now mandating that all cell phones be compatible with 3rd-party MicroUSB chargers by January 1, 2012. I first wrote about this subject on SeekingAlpha on December 24, 2008, and this development is now reaching its final stages of lawmaking in Europe.
This new EU mandate isn’t a big deal at all for essentially every cell phone maker in the world, including Nokia, SonyEricsson (SNE), RIM (RIMM), Samsung, LG, HTC and Motorola (MOT), because they are in most cases already well underway of implementing the MicroUSB standard in all of their products. Just walk into your neighborhood AT&T (T), Verizon Wireless (VZ), Sprint (S) or T-Mobile USA store, and look for yourself – we will probably approach 90% MicroUSB exiting this year.
For Apple, however, this represents an ugly inconvenience. The iPhone uses Apple’s proprietary 30 pin connector, and there is a vast jungle of devices and docks built around this engineering decision. Therefore, it isn’t so easy for Apple to “just switch” to MicroUSB as it was for all the other cell phone makers. Apple at this point has two options:
1. Simply rid itself of its 30-pin connector in favor of MicroUSB. Most people seem to suggest that this is as unlikely as an Obama budget cut. Apple wouldn’t want to jettison its accessory ecosystem.
2. Add a MicroUSB connector elsewhere on the device, presumably on top or on one of the sides. This appears more likely. It does, however, impose cost and an engineering problem with all sorts of ramifications, including aesthetics. Apple would do this kicking and screaming.
It has been suggested that there is a third way for Apple to comply with this new law. That would be to offer a 30-pin to MicroUSB adapter. This has the obvious advantage of not dealing with the painful two alternatives listed above. However, it has two deficiencies: (1) One more thing to carry and (2) It’s not clear whether this would comply with the EU mandate. I think it would be unlikely to comply, because it would be against the spirit of standardization and would require a piece of equipment that would largely negate the purpose of the law. The EU would also seize the opportunity to make life difficult for Apple by interpreting the EU ambition in this way, thereby further favoring their home area companies such as Nokia.
For Apple, “The European Problem” also becomes a global problem, because Apple doesn’t want to design two different iPhones – one for Europe and one for the US. Apple will eventually add more models, but this is an unnecessary degree of duplication it will not want to engineer.
Qualcomm more than survived the EU’s attempts to make life difficult for it, many years ago. Likewise, Apple will more than survive this attempt as well. That said, this represents a road bump in Apple’s product road map, of which I have not heard much to date. It’s over a year into the future, and whatever Apple decides to do, I don’t expect an implementation until June 2010 at the earliest.
There are many political ironies in this story. First and foremost, this is part of an industrial policy in the EU. We are being told day in and day out that industrial policy is such a good thing, despite that it’s been proven to be one of the greatest disasters of mankind. Now, Washington DC gets a taste of its own self-defeating medicine.
Another irony is that Apple, of course, is a product of as much of an industrial policy-free entrepreneurial environment as it gets. If Apple had been run out of Washington DC, it would have looked like the US Post Office competing with FedEx. Instead, Apple has proven itself to be perhaps the greatest innovator of its kind, yielding more success than imagined years ago precisely because of the lack of any
government mandates deciding its business. Walk into any Apple Store, Mr and Mrs America, and you will find that Apple offers its own insurance policy for some $99 per year (“AppleCare”), which is completely privately funded and completely unregulated. And customers love it.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Palm Pre review - June 6, 2009
Anton’s Palm Pre review
I played with the Palm Pre for a few hours today, at two different Sprint Stores. My review below is not a comprehensive review (go to www.engadget.com and equivalent for that), but it does point out my observations and comparisons.
First, what are the positives?
1. Unlike iPhone, it uses the same standard MicroUSB as the newest Blackberries and for that matter all other new handhelds. This is the standard for the next decade and means a lot of simplicity and savings.
2. The screen is beautiful and it seems to render web pages very well, better than Blackberry version 4.6 anyway (soon-to-be-released 5.0 is another thing). It seems similar to iPhone in the web browsing department.
3. The user interface uses “cards” that is in my opinion better than the iPhone. It is the most elegant operating system on the market today. Extremely impressive, extraordinarily elegant interface. This blows the iPhone out of the water and sets a new bar.
4. The address book seems clearly better than the juvenile and generally limited one in the iPhone, which is only good if you have perhaps 100 or 200 entries. The Pre address book seems capable of handling 20,000 or more entries, such as sorting the entries well (“company name, followed by last name and first name”) seemingly similar to the Blackberry.
5. True multitasking, just like Blackberry, Google/Android and Microsoft – and unlike iPhone.
6. Sprint has a great “everything you can eat” plan for $100/month and it includes the great SprintTV service. In addition, Sprint is the only carrier that can give you a combo EVDO/WiMax modem for your laptop/PC/computer.
7. Over-the-air updates, unlike the iPhone and as of yet all-but-two Blackberries (8350 and 9530).
What are the negatives?
1. The sliding keyboard means it is difficult (impossible?) to use a protective cover of any kind – rubber, silicone, plastic, whatever. Somehow I expect a lot of complaints from people dropping it on the ground and scratching it.
2. The keyboard sure beats iPhone, but it’s not nearly as good as a Blackberry 8300 model and up. It is extremely small and has a nasty edge to it.
3. No GSM/HSPA for international travel, unlike the vital Blackberry models sold at Verizon and Sprint.
4. The battery is small, and is likely to generate inferior performance compared to the Blackberry 8800 models and up.
5. It doesn’t allow for secure communications (PIN-to-PIN) and truly encrypted emails. In other words, just as with the iPhone, Microsoft and Google, it can’t compete with the Blackberry in the area of security. As with all the other non-Blackberry platforms, you won’t be seeing this phone used by the Department of Defense, CIA, FBI, White House, Congress, investment banks and consultancies anytime soon.
6. There is no expandable memory, compared to Blackberry where 8900 models and up can handle 32 gig.
7. It can’t record video, unlike the Blackberry.
8. It can’t be used as a modem for your laptop/PC/computer, unlike the Blackberry.
Bottom line: This is a very attractive phone. In my opinion, it beats the current iPhone (launched July 2008 and expiring June 8, 2009) in every single category except two (no GSM and limited AppStore selection as of yet). The “cards” interface is revolutionary – in a positive way! I have no doubt that Palm will take significant market share with this device, and for good reason. That said, I don’t see why a Blackberry user should switch, especially given that all current Blackberries refresh between July 2009 and November, providing superior hardware with a much-improved browser. By the time we find out the level of maturity of this new Pre platform, the outstanding new Blackberries will be in the market. Now that both Palm Pre and Blackberry synchronize with iTunes, the rationale for getting an iPhone is a lot weaker. Blackberry’s AppWorld is on a path to match Apple’s AppStore, and the Palm Pre shouldn’t be too far behind in coming months. That said, Apple will be introducing new products on June 8, 2009, and that could in turn change the game soon enough.
I played with the Palm Pre for a few hours today, at two different Sprint Stores. My review below is not a comprehensive review (go to www.engadget.com and equivalent for that), but it does point out my observations and comparisons.
First, what are the positives?
1. Unlike iPhone, it uses the same standard MicroUSB as the newest Blackberries and for that matter all other new handhelds. This is the standard for the next decade and means a lot of simplicity and savings.
2. The screen is beautiful and it seems to render web pages very well, better than Blackberry version 4.6 anyway (soon-to-be-released 5.0 is another thing). It seems similar to iPhone in the web browsing department.
3. The user interface uses “cards” that is in my opinion better than the iPhone. It is the most elegant operating system on the market today. Extremely impressive, extraordinarily elegant interface. This blows the iPhone out of the water and sets a new bar.
4. The address book seems clearly better than the juvenile and generally limited one in the iPhone, which is only good if you have perhaps 100 or 200 entries. The Pre address book seems capable of handling 20,000 or more entries, such as sorting the entries well (“company name, followed by last name and first name”) seemingly similar to the Blackberry.
5. True multitasking, just like Blackberry, Google/Android and Microsoft – and unlike iPhone.
6. Sprint has a great “everything you can eat” plan for $100/month and it includes the great SprintTV service. In addition, Sprint is the only carrier that can give you a combo EVDO/WiMax modem for your laptop/PC/computer.
7. Over-the-air updates, unlike the iPhone and as of yet all-but-two Blackberries (8350 and 9530).
What are the negatives?
1. The sliding keyboard means it is difficult (impossible?) to use a protective cover of any kind – rubber, silicone, plastic, whatever. Somehow I expect a lot of complaints from people dropping it on the ground and scratching it.
2. The keyboard sure beats iPhone, but it’s not nearly as good as a Blackberry 8300 model and up. It is extremely small and has a nasty edge to it.
3. No GSM/HSPA for international travel, unlike the vital Blackberry models sold at Verizon and Sprint.
4. The battery is small, and is likely to generate inferior performance compared to the Blackberry 8800 models and up.
5. It doesn’t allow for secure communications (PIN-to-PIN) and truly encrypted emails. In other words, just as with the iPhone, Microsoft and Google, it can’t compete with the Blackberry in the area of security. As with all the other non-Blackberry platforms, you won’t be seeing this phone used by the Department of Defense, CIA, FBI, White House, Congress, investment banks and consultancies anytime soon.
6. There is no expandable memory, compared to Blackberry where 8900 models and up can handle 32 gig.
7. It can’t record video, unlike the Blackberry.
8. It can’t be used as a modem for your laptop/PC/computer, unlike the Blackberry.
Bottom line: This is a very attractive phone. In my opinion, it beats the current iPhone (launched July 2008 and expiring June 8, 2009) in every single category except two (no GSM and limited AppStore selection as of yet). The “cards” interface is revolutionary – in a positive way! I have no doubt that Palm will take significant market share with this device, and for good reason. That said, I don’t see why a Blackberry user should switch, especially given that all current Blackberries refresh between July 2009 and November, providing superior hardware with a much-improved browser. By the time we find out the level of maturity of this new Pre platform, the outstanding new Blackberries will be in the market. Now that both Palm Pre and Blackberry synchronize with iTunes, the rationale for getting an iPhone is a lot weaker. Blackberry’s AppWorld is on a path to match Apple’s AppStore, and the Palm Pre shouldn’t be too far behind in coming months. That said, Apple will be introducing new products on June 8, 2009, and that could in turn change the game soon enough.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Should We Have Saved LA?
We learned two things from the release of the legal memos supporting the EITs (Enhanced Interrogation Techniques):
1. We didn’t come even close to torturing anyone. The kid-glove treatment detailed in these memos is far surpassed by our own military training, especially in our special forces such as the Navy SEALs. Our special forces not only have to look at a bug – they have to eat it.
2. The EITs yielded tangible results, specifically the uncovering of a plot that would probably have killed thousands of people in downtown Los Angeles. Surely more such examples from the relevant 2002-06 period are likely to be revealed in the future.
The latter revelation puts the Obama administration in a very dangerous position, if any journalist would bother to ask him or his amazingly and constantly clueless Press Secretary Robert Gibbs. The President has stated repeatedly and consistently over the years that he would never have approved these interrogations, and one of his first acts as President was to indeed ban them. At least from the President, there has been no lack of clarity on this policy position.
In light of the fact that Obama opposed the methods that saved thousands of lives in this one planned attack on LA alone, this yields a very radical conclusion: Obama is effectively saying that he doesn’t regret that his policy would have killed thousands of innocent civilians working in downtown LA. Even after the fact – when we know with the hindsight of history – that this was the outcome of his proposed policy, he says that it would still have been the right thing to do.
This is shocking. Would someone be angry with George Bush if he had deliberately and knowingly agreed to let 9/11 happen, just in order to avoid inconveniencing a blood-thirsty terrorist who was already responsible for killing 3,000 US civilians? You bet! Hopefully 100% of Americans would have been outraged and called for the impeachment of George Bush, if that had been his policy.
Yet this is now not only the new policy by the Obama administration, but also a confession about what it was willing to sacrifice in the months and years following 9/11. Thousands of innocent civilians working in downtown LA, just for starters. Why isn’t there dramatic outrage about this?
Even for Obama himself, who had proven to be politically cunning in a new and unique way, this is a forfeit of dramatic proportions. Unlike the economic debates, where one economics professor’s word against the next economics professor, can be complicated and confusing to a majority of the electorate, this is relatively easy to understand – and that’s just the historical part!
Going forward, this is a ticking time bomb for Obama in more ways than one. He is now making the same mistake John McCain made in the 2008 election: agreeing to fight with one hand behind his back. McCain – for no good reason whatsoever – decided to campaign with a lot less than half the money of his opponent. In this case, Obama has told us that he is now fighting with less than half of the intelligence he could otherwise have. Why less than half? We know this because the CIA says that it obtained more than half of its critical intelligence on the relevant subjects from the EITs.
This Obama forfeit now means that in the event of another terrorist attack, the rage and blame will show up at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue immediately, and for good reason. Unlike 9/11, which was a game-changer that had been building up comparatively quietly since the mid-1990s, after 9/11 we now know a lot about the motives of our opponents. They have shown what they will do for a starter, and they say they want to eradicate our entire country, preferably with the heavy hammer of nuclear bombs. Obama’s answer? Let’s not inconvenience the masterminds of these terrorist acts by showing a caterpillar bug to them, so that they could get scared and help us prevent mass murder of innocent American civilians, perhaps to the tune of millions.
Interestingly, CIA Director Leon Panetta has a different take on all of this, when compared to his boss Obama. Panetta advised against releasing these memos, partially because the act to do so was plain outright unnecessary. Even more interestingly, in his confirmation hearings Panatta introduced an exception to this no-EIT policy: Basically, if we have to do it, we will do it. Apply EITs, that is. So if this is the policy, then there really hasn’t been any change in policy, has it? Yes, if Panetta had his way, but that’s not the policy as of January 22 of this year! Obama banned EITs, and with no exceptions. Then again, that’s not to say that Obama couldn’t approve any exceptions as he goes along. Gee, my head is spinning already. Isn’t it sad when the only hope for the government to save innocent lives rests on a hope that it will act inconsistently with its current policy?
Panetta’s desired exception policy has one particular deficiency: He says would like to apply EITs only if they are “necessary.” How will we possibly know if they are necessary? If there is the proverbial ticking time-bomb, is he really saying that we will somehow already know about it, and that’s precisely imminent – but not know enough to diffuse it? That seems like an almost impossibly unique scenario. Isn’t it more likely that we simply capture a really bad guy and we ought do simply squeeze anything and everything out of him, no matter whether we know that there is a ticking time bomb somewhere out there or not? It appears from Panetta’s language that this wouldn’t be good enough. And certainly Obama hasn’t left an exception even for the ticking time bomb, at least not in the executive order he signed, which constitutes the current policy.
The fact that we have now revealed what we did, and thereby identified the outer boundaries of what we have been willing to do, means that it will be all that much harder to get information from any captured terrorist in the future. Let’s say that Obama changes his policy, or that another President reverses the policy – what will this mean for EITs? For one thing, we couldn’t just go back to the EITs as stated in the 2002-05 memos. We would have to apply far harsher methods, because the terrorists now know we were unwilling to hurt them in the past. In other words, the release of these memos only made certain that we will have no choice in the future but to graduate from these almost laughable kid-glove methods, to something that looks and sounds a lot more like actual torture. The irony…
In the meantime, in LA they now know something new about the guy they elected: In Obama’s opinion, he would rather have sacrificed thousands of you in a catastrophic 9/11 attack, than – God forbid! – having the mastermind of 9/11 share a room with a bug. This is comical in its simplicity, but revealingly serious. Regrets, anyone?
Finally, one argument often voiced needs to be killed, once and for all. It is often said by Obama and his supporters that our EIT policy served to recruit more terrorists, and was therefore counterproductive. While in theory we can never know for sure, because you can’t prove what would have happened, or will happen, if you did or do something different, we can know one thing for sure: The EITs became – per definition! – sources of rumor and debate well after 9/11. You could argue it happened five years later, in 2006. So all of these other things, including the first WTC bombing 1993, the attacks in Saudi Arabia, Tanzania and Kenya, as well as the USS Cole, Danny Pearl, the other beheadings and of course 9/11 itself, all happened before it became known that we showed a bug – or waterboarded, or smacked around – a small handful of the worst terrorists in the history of the human race. And after that time? Not a single significant terrorist attack on US soil. With the new policies, we will see how long that lasts. Obama now owns any terrorist attack that we hope doesn’t happen. And he has chosen to fight for us with one hand behind his back. That’s a dangerous political gamble.
1. We didn’t come even close to torturing anyone. The kid-glove treatment detailed in these memos is far surpassed by our own military training, especially in our special forces such as the Navy SEALs. Our special forces not only have to look at a bug – they have to eat it.
2. The EITs yielded tangible results, specifically the uncovering of a plot that would probably have killed thousands of people in downtown Los Angeles. Surely more such examples from the relevant 2002-06 period are likely to be revealed in the future.
The latter revelation puts the Obama administration in a very dangerous position, if any journalist would bother to ask him or his amazingly and constantly clueless Press Secretary Robert Gibbs. The President has stated repeatedly and consistently over the years that he would never have approved these interrogations, and one of his first acts as President was to indeed ban them. At least from the President, there has been no lack of clarity on this policy position.
In light of the fact that Obama opposed the methods that saved thousands of lives in this one planned attack on LA alone, this yields a very radical conclusion: Obama is effectively saying that he doesn’t regret that his policy would have killed thousands of innocent civilians working in downtown LA. Even after the fact – when we know with the hindsight of history – that this was the outcome of his proposed policy, he says that it would still have been the right thing to do.
This is shocking. Would someone be angry with George Bush if he had deliberately and knowingly agreed to let 9/11 happen, just in order to avoid inconveniencing a blood-thirsty terrorist who was already responsible for killing 3,000 US civilians? You bet! Hopefully 100% of Americans would have been outraged and called for the impeachment of George Bush, if that had been his policy.
Yet this is now not only the new policy by the Obama administration, but also a confession about what it was willing to sacrifice in the months and years following 9/11. Thousands of innocent civilians working in downtown LA, just for starters. Why isn’t there dramatic outrage about this?
Even for Obama himself, who had proven to be politically cunning in a new and unique way, this is a forfeit of dramatic proportions. Unlike the economic debates, where one economics professor’s word against the next economics professor, can be complicated and confusing to a majority of the electorate, this is relatively easy to understand – and that’s just the historical part!
Going forward, this is a ticking time bomb for Obama in more ways than one. He is now making the same mistake John McCain made in the 2008 election: agreeing to fight with one hand behind his back. McCain – for no good reason whatsoever – decided to campaign with a lot less than half the money of his opponent. In this case, Obama has told us that he is now fighting with less than half of the intelligence he could otherwise have. Why less than half? We know this because the CIA says that it obtained more than half of its critical intelligence on the relevant subjects from the EITs.
This Obama forfeit now means that in the event of another terrorist attack, the rage and blame will show up at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue immediately, and for good reason. Unlike 9/11, which was a game-changer that had been building up comparatively quietly since the mid-1990s, after 9/11 we now know a lot about the motives of our opponents. They have shown what they will do for a starter, and they say they want to eradicate our entire country, preferably with the heavy hammer of nuclear bombs. Obama’s answer? Let’s not inconvenience the masterminds of these terrorist acts by showing a caterpillar bug to them, so that they could get scared and help us prevent mass murder of innocent American civilians, perhaps to the tune of millions.
Interestingly, CIA Director Leon Panetta has a different take on all of this, when compared to his boss Obama. Panetta advised against releasing these memos, partially because the act to do so was plain outright unnecessary. Even more interestingly, in his confirmation hearings Panatta introduced an exception to this no-EIT policy: Basically, if we have to do it, we will do it. Apply EITs, that is. So if this is the policy, then there really hasn’t been any change in policy, has it? Yes, if Panetta had his way, but that’s not the policy as of January 22 of this year! Obama banned EITs, and with no exceptions. Then again, that’s not to say that Obama couldn’t approve any exceptions as he goes along. Gee, my head is spinning already. Isn’t it sad when the only hope for the government to save innocent lives rests on a hope that it will act inconsistently with its current policy?
Panetta’s desired exception policy has one particular deficiency: He says would like to apply EITs only if they are “necessary.” How will we possibly know if they are necessary? If there is the proverbial ticking time-bomb, is he really saying that we will somehow already know about it, and that’s precisely imminent – but not know enough to diffuse it? That seems like an almost impossibly unique scenario. Isn’t it more likely that we simply capture a really bad guy and we ought do simply squeeze anything and everything out of him, no matter whether we know that there is a ticking time bomb somewhere out there or not? It appears from Panetta’s language that this wouldn’t be good enough. And certainly Obama hasn’t left an exception even for the ticking time bomb, at least not in the executive order he signed, which constitutes the current policy.
The fact that we have now revealed what we did, and thereby identified the outer boundaries of what we have been willing to do, means that it will be all that much harder to get information from any captured terrorist in the future. Let’s say that Obama changes his policy, or that another President reverses the policy – what will this mean for EITs? For one thing, we couldn’t just go back to the EITs as stated in the 2002-05 memos. We would have to apply far harsher methods, because the terrorists now know we were unwilling to hurt them in the past. In other words, the release of these memos only made certain that we will have no choice in the future but to graduate from these almost laughable kid-glove methods, to something that looks and sounds a lot more like actual torture. The irony…
In the meantime, in LA they now know something new about the guy they elected: In Obama’s opinion, he would rather have sacrificed thousands of you in a catastrophic 9/11 attack, than – God forbid! – having the mastermind of 9/11 share a room with a bug. This is comical in its simplicity, but revealingly serious. Regrets, anyone?
Finally, one argument often voiced needs to be killed, once and for all. It is often said by Obama and his supporters that our EIT policy served to recruit more terrorists, and was therefore counterproductive. While in theory we can never know for sure, because you can’t prove what would have happened, or will happen, if you did or do something different, we can know one thing for sure: The EITs became – per definition! – sources of rumor and debate well after 9/11. You could argue it happened five years later, in 2006. So all of these other things, including the first WTC bombing 1993, the attacks in Saudi Arabia, Tanzania and Kenya, as well as the USS Cole, Danny Pearl, the other beheadings and of course 9/11 itself, all happened before it became known that we showed a bug – or waterboarded, or smacked around – a small handful of the worst terrorists in the history of the human race. And after that time? Not a single significant terrorist attack on US soil. With the new policies, we will see how long that lasts. Obama now owns any terrorist attack that we hope doesn’t happen. And he has chosen to fight for us with one hand behind his back. That’s a dangerous political gamble.
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