T-Mobile's Embedded SIM Cards: Great For Connected Devices, Bad For Consumers?

from the what's-the-real-motivation? dept

T-Mobile got a lot of press last week when it announced a new, tiny embedded SIM card to be used in connected devices like "smart" electrical meters. The new SIM is much smaller than the traditional stamp-sized cards, and the company says it can withstand exposure to the elements, making it ideal for machine-to-machine communications with outdoor devices, or in connected consumer electronic devices. However, The Register has a slightly different take on the new SIM, wondering if it's really driven by a desire to do away with removable SIM cards -- meaning T-Mobile could sell devices that it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to use on other operators. As the site notes, the electronics on SIM cards are actually minuscule, but they're packaged in a bigger plastic housing to make them easier for people to handle. Theoretically, T-Mobile could use the new, smaller SIM in devices instead of today's standard SIMs, and encourage manufacturers to build them in such a way so that the tiny SIM was essentially impossible to remove. This might not make a lot of sense for handsets, but for other connected electronic devices, it could prove very attractive to operators, particularly if they're subsidizing those devices. It should be noted that this is purely speculation at this point, but given mobile operators' undying love of trying to lock in their customers, it wouldn't be too surprising to see it happen.

Carlo Longino is an expert at the Insight Community. To get insight and analysis from Carlo Longino and other experts on challenges your company faces, click here.

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Yet Another Microsoft White Space Device Stops Working

from the er...-maybe-test-that-a-bit-longer dept

A bunch of tech firms are asking the FCC to allow them to make use of valuable spectrum that is unused, but controlled by television broadcasters (who don't want to give it up). The FCC has been open to such an idea for many years. Broadcasters own a ridiculously large portion of spectrum, with large parts of it totally unused. The "white space" was designed to prevent interference by not letting anything work on spectrum anywhere near broadcast spectrum. However, many are pointing out that with today's technology, that spectrum could be put to use without any interference. Microsoft and Google have both been big proponents of opening up that white space for use. In order to help show that the interference bogeyman wasn't a real issue, they've sent prototype devices to the FCC to test. Unfortunately, they seem to have trouble keeping those devices in operation. Back in August the FCC noted that the device didn't work, and now a new device from Microsoft has also stopped working.

Now, to be totally clear, the problems with these devices have nothing to do with causing interference. The devices haven't been shown to cause interference -- just to have trouble working. But, of course, the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) quickly used these failures to slam the idea of freeing up the whitespace, even though there's still no evidence of interference. With the way the NAB has acted around this issue and the recent XM-Sirius merger debate, you have to conclude that the NAB thinks everyone out there is just completely stupid, and will believe any false or misleading statement it makes. Otherwise it makes no sense for the NAB to make the types of claims it makes on a regular basis. These devices are prototypes, and production devices will be totally different. Either way, the point is not whether the prototypes can keep working, but whether there's interference. That said, it would probably make sense for Microsoft to test these devices a bit more before tossing them over the wall to the FCC.

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