Google Cloud Print: coming to a wireless device near you

The question of how to print from wireless devices has been thrust once again into the limelight recently thanks to the printing-anemic iPad. Longtime notebook and mobile device users are quite familiar with the printing conundrum—cables, drivers and all.

Google has announced that it's looking to address this problem in the form of Cloud Print. Part of the Chromium and Chromium OS projects, Cloud Print aims to allow any type of application to print to any printer. This includes Web, desktop, and mobile apps from any kind of device—potentially, this could be used on a BlackBerry, Windows machines, Macs, or even the iPad. (That is in addition to Google's own offerings: "Google Chrome OS will use Google Cloud Print for all printing. There is no print stack and there are no printer drivers on Google Chrome OS!" says the company.)

The devices would make use of a Web-based API to either communicate directly with cloud-aware printers, or to send signals to a proxy in order to communicate with "legacy" printers. Google says it's already developing software for Windows to perform this function, "and will support Mac and Linux later on as well."

Yes, there are already wireless printers that work over your local network without having to be tethered, but there are downsides to this solution (I say this as a semi-satisfied owner of one). The biggest hurdle is, of course, the fact that you must actually be on the same network in order to print. (I can't complete and print an expense report from this coffee shop now that I'm thinking about it, for example.) VPN is an option, but that's an extra step that could be eliminated.

Then there's the problem we discussed above: my wireless printer only has drivers for real computers. If I buy concert tickets on my phone or if I compose a document on my iPad, I have to wait till I have access to a computer to print them. These inconveniences could easily be addressed by cloud-based printing.

Google says that the Cloud Print project is still in the early stages, but, like with its other open source projects, the company has made the existing code and documentation open to the public. The documentation indicates that, in order to use Google's Cloud Print, users will have to associate their printers with their Google logins—a detail that might make some privacy advocates squirm. Still, Google stresses that it expects other companies to develop their own cloud printing solutions, so this is likely only the beginning of a trend.

Source: Arstechnica.com

Free wireless broadband plan is déjà vu all over again

As part of the grand hoopla-fest building up to the release of the Federal Communications Commission's National Broadband Plan this month, the agency hosted a Digital Inclusion Summit at Washington, DC's Newseum on Tuesday. Co-sponsored with the Knight Foundation, during the course of the event the FCC disclosed more components of The Plan. These include recommending the creation of a Digital Literacy Corps "to conduct skills training and outreach in communities with low rates of adoption," and tapping into the agency's Universal Service Fund to subsidize broadband for low income people.

But what really got our attention was this: the NBP will ask the government to "consider use of spectrum for a free or very low cost wireless broadband service.''

That's odd, we thought, since the FCC and Congress have been considering such an idea for years.

M2Z

Between 2006 and early 2009, the agency actively vetted a proposal by M2Z Networks to provide a free, wireless broadband across the United States. The FCC would lease a national spectrum license to M2Z in the Advanced Wireless Services-3 (AWS-3) band area (2155-2175MHz), and the company would offer a free, advertising-funded, 512Kpbs broadband service that filtered out indecent content. Consumers would be able to access the band area via an attachment device on their computer. The firm would also offer a faster, unfiltered premium service and pay the government 5 percent each year from its gross revenues. Once granted this band, M2Z would commit to rolling out the smut-free network to 95 percent of the US population over the course of a decade.

M2Z launched a spirited campaign to generate public interest in its proposal, which came complete with a small battalion of endorsers. "I know many Utahns would welcome the opportunity to provide their children with the educational and economic opportunity which broadband access can provide without having to become software engineers in order to protect their children," Senator Orin Hatch (R-UT) wrote to the FCC in 2007.

But while the idea received lots of shout-outs from family advocacy groups and members of Congress, the FCC rejected just granting the spectrum to a chosen entity. Then in 2008, agency chair and values voter Republican Kevin Martin came up with an alternative proposal to run an auction of that license zone—the winning bidder promising to abide by M2Z's commitments and rules.

Auction skewing

Various groups and companies quickly launched counter campaigns to stop or modify the Martin/M2Z plan. T-Mobile insisted that the service would interfere with spectrum it owned in a nearby band. And the wireless industry in general, led by CTIA - The Wireless Association, charged that the scheme would "skew an auction to the benefit of one entity or business model." Ironically, Key Republicans on Capitol Hill quickly took sides with big wireless, while Democrats backed Martin—with Rep. Anna Eschoo (D-CA) submitting a bill to the House that pretty much echoed what Martin proposed.

Meanwhile civil liberties groups and bookseller/publisher trade associations opposed the plan on different grounds. The service "would censor content far beyond anything ever upheld by any court for any medium," warned a coalition of 22 public interest groups in July of 2008. "This prohibition would plainly infringe on the rights of adults to access broad categories of lawful speech," they wrote.

In response to T-Mobile's concerns, the FCC's Office of Engineering Technology ran a battery of interference tests in Seattle that concluded that peaceful coexistence with T-Mobile's licenses was doable. As for the civil liberties concerns, to our delight, in December of that year Martin called Ars to announce that he was dropping the porn-filtering part of the plan from his proposal (Julius Genachowski, the present chair of the agency, should feel free to emulate this fine example by contacting us at his convenience).

None of these gestures did the cause much good, however. Wireless companies challenged the FCC's engineering report. And while those public interest groups were presumably assuaged by Martin's announcement, it's not as if they suddenly became big supporters of the plan overnight.

When Martin called us, we asked him what the prospects for the proposal now looked like. "This is an item that has been pending at the Commission for several years, that the Commissioners were originally critical of not having moved forward faster," he lamented. "Other commissioners said, 'We're overdue; we've got to do this.' But when an actual item is put forth where you have to make a hard decision, they say, 'Well, I'm not so sure what I want to do anymore.'"

In the end, the Commission never weighed in on the plan. Martin quit the agency the following year. To this day, the FCC has not voted on whether to launch the auction or not.

An open question

We contacted M2Z CEO John Muletta to ask him what he thought of the FCC's latest proposal for a free wireless service. His response was pretty magnanimous, given his recent fortunes with the agency.

"I think this a victory for Chairman Genachowski's data-driven process," Muletta told us, "which has independently confirmed that we have low broadband adoption in this country largely because broadband is too expensive. Certainly a free service would go a long way to addressing that issue."

But "since the FCC has yet to take action on the AWS-3 rulemaking, it's an open question as to whether the incumbent carriers will eventually hijack the process that is supposed to follow the National Broadband Plan and somehow delay the quick auction of the AWS-3 band (in the face of a spectrum crisis and drought)."

There is also some irony in the fact that the same wireless industry that once objected to skewing auctions for a single business model is now, in the name of a looming spectrum crisis, asking the FCC to coordinate the massive transfer of television license spectrum to wireless sector—essentially on the grounds that wireless broadband providers could more productively use those licenses than TV broadcasters. And where were all those Orin Hatch style Republicans once big wireless cried foul over Martin's smutless free broadband plan?

As the M2Z story indicates, anyone who proposes setting aside spectrum "for a free or very low cost wireless broadband service'' could quickly find themselves on very uncertain terrain, with positions shifting overnight, and supposedly solid allies disappearing at the last minute. We are talking, after all, about a service that consumers could get for free rather than buying it from AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, or Sprint. So here's some free advice: whoever launches the crusade at the FCC this time around better make sure they've really got the votes.

Source: Arstechnica.com

UK Bill Would Outlaw Open Public Wifi Hotspots

If passed, something called the Digital Economy Bill over in the U.K. could do the unthinkable in this, the digital age: Ban open wifi spots.

The ban comes as part of a bill that seeks to limit copyright infringement, or something. In summary, schools, small businesses and even libraries would have to effectively become their own ISP and manage the wifi hotspot—or face hefty fines. Even if a shop password-protected their wifi and posted the PW publicly (as they probably should be doing anyway), this "management" would also entail detailed record keeping, as the bill requires that hotspot providers log users who've been on their network. Sounds fun!

I'd love for any UK-based small business owners to weigh in on this debate, and the bill. Is it really as annoying as the ZDNet article makes it sound? Are daily, detailed user records really too much a burden for the corner coffee shop to bear? Light those torches and brandish your pitchforks in the comments! [ZDNET]

Source: Gizmodo.com

How smartphones are bogging down some wireless carriers

It's no secret that the iPhone has taxed AT&T's network in densely populated areas, especially New York and San Francisco. Reports of problems using iPhones at major tech conferences, like SXSWi, Macworld Expo, CES, and NAMM are not unusual. The iPhone's ease of use and focus on mobile media generally lead to higher data usage on average, but despite claims by AT&T Mobility CEO Ralph de la Vega, the amount of data being consumed is rarely the problem. The issue has to do with how modern smartphones—beginning with the iPhone—save power by disconnecting from the network whenever possible.

Even though AT&T has made improvements to its network over the last couple of years—including moving towers to an 850MHz spectrum that can more easily penetrate building walls, as well as upgrading to faster 7.2Mbps HSPA+ protocols—those improvements have done little to stem the tide of complaints from consumers in larger urban areas. Those users experience frequent dropped calls and an inability to make data connections, and in general they feel that service is spotty.

To make matters worse, AT&T has announced a number of initiatives to add a even greater number of 3G data devices to its network, including Android smartphones, e-book readers, mobile data modems, and now the iPad. Even if consumers aren't yet concerned about the effect of the increasing number of devices on the network, the FCC sure is.

"With the iPad pointing to even greater demand for mobile broadband on the horizon," wrote FCC director of scenario planning for Omnibus Broadband Initiative Phil Bellaria, "we must ensure that network congestion doesn't choke off a service that consumers clearly find so appealing or frustrate mobile broadband's ability to keep us competitive in the global broadband economy."

The fact that the US lags behind many other countries in both broadband capacity in general and wireless networks specifically is nothing new. But the fact that almost all of the complaints from iPhone users come from the US suggests that AT&T's network is at least partially to blame. In fact, users in other countries have told Ars that they don't experience the kinds of problems that US users often report. Well, other countries except one.

Several users in the UK, almost all in London, reported issues that were very similar to what we've heard from users in the US (and experienced ourselves): frequent dropped calls, lack of voice mail notifications, inability to make or receive calls even when the signal looks strong, and inability to make data connections. These problems were happening on the O2 network, which for several years was the UK's only iPhone carrier.

The carrier apologized to its customers late last year for the spotty service as it trumpeted network improvements meant to address the issues. An O2 employee contacted Ars to explain what caused the problem, and explained how newer smartphones are changing the assumptions that carriers use when configuring their network.

Good for the battery, but not so good for the network
The first problem that O2 encountered was that the iPhone uses more power saving features than previous smartphone designs. Most devices that use data do so in short bursts—a couple e-mails here, a tweet there, downloading a voicemail message, etc. Normally, devices that access the data network use an idling state that maintains the open data channel between the device and the network. However, to squeeze even more battery life from the iPhone, Apple configured the radio to simply drop the data connection as soon as any requested data is received. When the iPhone needs more data, it has to set up a new data connection.

The result is more efficient use of the battery, but it can cause problems with the signaling channels used to set up connections between a device and a cell node. Cell nodes use signaling channels to set up the data connection, as well as signaling phone calls, SMS messages, voicemails, and more. When enough iPhones are in a particular area, these signaling channels can become overloaded—there simply aren't enough to handle all the data requests along with all the calls and messages.

It's important to note, however, that this technique is not limited to the iPhone. Android and webOS devices also use a similar technique to increase battery life. While the iPhone was the first and currently most prolific device of this type, such smartphones are quickly becoming common, and represent the majority of growth in mobile phone sales in the past year.

Our source at O2 told us that network equipment that is configured to handle signaling traffic dynamically—shifting more spectrum to signaling channels when needed—can mitigate this problem. But even with more signaling capacity, network nodes may not be able to set up a data session, or may have problems getting a valid network address from an overloaded DHCP server. He said that data capacity is rarely the problem—nodes themselves can usually handle much more data than is flowing through them. However, the networks need to be configured to handle a growing number of devices connecting and disconnecting at a much higher rate than they've been accustomed to.

We spoke to another expert who works in the telecom field to find out why most European networks were not experiencing the problems that AT&T and O2 did. He told Ars that Europe embraced heavy text messaging and data use far earlier than users in the US. SMS and MMS messages rely heavily on signaling channels to operate, and so networks were generally configured to dynamically manage changes in signaling traffic.

O2 worked with its network equipment vendors to identify the problems and adjust the configuration to adapt to the changing needs of its smartphone users. For its part, AT&T has announced publicly that it is increasing backhaul capacity by running fiber to its cell sites, and plans an additional investment in network infrastructure—including adding up to 2,000 additional towers this year. The company would not comment on its efforts to address the kinds of issues described by our source at O2, though we know that O2 shared what it learned with AT&T and other carriers.

Apple has also stated that it is confident that AT&T can handle the additional network demands that the iPad would add to the growing tide of smartphone traffic. "As you know, AT&T has acknowledged that they are having some issues in a few cities and they have very detailed plans to address these," Apple COO Tim Cook said during the most recent quarterly earnings call. "We have personally reviewed these plans and we have very high confidence that they will make significant progress towards fixing them."

Source: Arstechnica.com