Mark Evans had an interesting post yesterday that captured some of the thoughts that have been bouncing around my mind recently.

He writes:

I’m not sure whether “paradox” is the right word but for all the digital chatter happening, people are still people with a desire/need to be analog. This explains the plethora of events, conferences (mesh is as much a social as a conference) and meet-ups, as well as why many people still flying around to meetings despite the time, energy and environmental impact involved.

There should be significant pressures to conduct more business using virtual on-line tools – as simple as IM and email through to sophisticated life size video conferencing.

But there still isn’t a satisfactory digital substitute for the ability of the human mind to assimilate the analog signals that can only be transmitted and processed with face-to-face communications: the handshake, the warmth of the smile, the nervous jitter.

While there are many meetings that can (and will) be replaced by digital communications, I agree with Mark that sometimes you just have stay analog.

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Mark Evans, conferences

In its official Answer to the CAIP application for Bell to cease network management of its DSL lines, Bell suggested that Google is the real internet gatekeeper.

At paragraph 15 of the executive summary, Bell wrote:

The Companies note the particular irony in Google accusing Bell Canada of playing the “gatekeeper role” by traffic shaping P2P and thereby impeding competition. If there is, indeed, any gatekeeping activity on the Internet, which is questionable, the gatekeeping is being performed by the Internet search engines, which are typically the users’ “window” to the near-infinite content available worldwide.

It appears that reports [see also here and here] are also suggesting that Google is taking on the role of Zuul in trickling out its software development kit for Android phones.

In its comments on the CAIP / Bell spat, Google said:

Google’s business is premised on making its services, content and applications available through the internet to any end user who chooses them, without restriction by any gatekeeper.

Maybe they meant “any gatekeeper, other than Google itself.”

Who you gonna call?

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Bell, Google, CAIP

Don’t believe everything you read on blogs – other than this one, of course.

The iPhone sold out in many Rogers stores this past weekend, delivering the best sales weekend in the company’s history, despite the hostility expressed towards Rogers on so many blogs and websites.

I have to wonder if this is a case of digerati being too inwardly focussed to have properly measured the pulse of the average person on the street.

Is this a reason that traffic shaping hasn’t attracted more public attention?

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Rogers, iPhone, Bell, traffic shaping

Last month, in our opening comments at The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit, Michael Sone and I called for the government to take some of the more than $2B windfall from the AWS spectrum auction to invest in initiatives to stimulate demand for broadband from under-serviced segments.

At the time, we also suggested a new approach to distributing the funds, in order to avoid picking winners by subsidizing one service provider over another. Since then, a number of other voices have joined our call for the proceeds from the AWS auction to be used for a new national broadband program.

Michael Geist wrote about it in his column.

Janet Yale, Michael Jannigan and I wrote an OpEd in last week’s Financial Post.

Now, Peter Nowak at the CBC reports that the Liberals and NDP have joined the chorus.

Anyone else want to sing along?

Ironically, I noticed that Industry Canada’s broadband website is scheduled to be closed in two weeks.

A week ago, I predicted the end of the the end of bidding in the AWS spectrum auction. I might as well have predicted the Leafs winning the Stanley Cup.

Just like the kids singing “This is the song that never ends” on a summer driving trip, it seems that this is the auction that never ends.

For the past week, we have watched bidding on a limited number of spectrum properties go back and forth, but continuing to hover in the neighbourhood of $4.2B. Out of 220 pieces of spectrum that are up for grabs, some rounds have seen activity on only one block. For a number of days, bidding changed by tens of thousands – rounding error when the total is measured in the billions.

Industry Canada is now running 15 auction rounds per day to try to bring this process to close.

In the meantime, uncertainty remains as a market overhang. Would-be new entrants can’t finalize their license approvals or get started building their networks, or finalizing their business plans.

Is something wrong with the auction design that is keeping us in limbo? Are there mechanical changes that could help bring the auction to a more timely conclusion?

As a side note, let me refer you to an article written last week by former CRTC vice-chair Rick French in the National Post, talking about changing the spectrum auction from a license to outright ownership.

Technorati Tags:
Industry Canada, AWS Spectrum Auction, Richard French