Single-Chip GSM Phone on Virtual Horizon?

An anonymous reader writes "There's still the alphabet soup and corporate conflicts regarding cell phone standards in the U.S. but... there might be some hope for a single-chip GSM phone, which might open up some interesting possibilities."

Comments

Wow.

[CommieLib]

Slashdot posts a story I don't understand from a source I don't know on a technology I've never heard of...

America doesn't need GSM phones.

[typical geek]

On the surface, GSM phones sound neat, global connectivity anywhere you go in the world, but is that really the best thing for America?

Right now, most Americans have no need to travel outside North America, yes, Canada and Mexico (both old and new) are plenty foreign for us. The few Americans that do travel outside North America usually do so on the corporate dollar, and can afford Iridium phones or satellite phones. Basically, there's little market for GSM phones among Americans.

Also, there's the security issue involved. Right now, American phones can only be cracked by the American goverment, we wouldn't have that security if we adopted foreign standards like GSM. In a world that's growing increasingly hostile to Americans and American ideals like truth, justice and Capitalism, putting American phones on the GSM band is lot like slitting our throats.

So, let's leave GSM phones for our Europeans pals across the pond who live in those little dinky countries that you can cross in an hour in a Citrouen, it works for them hurrah. But just like the bidet and full frontal pornography on broadcast TV, what works in Europe doesn't necessarily work here.

Sad news ... Stephen King dead at 54

[Anonymous Coward]

I just heard some sad news on talk radio - Horror/Sci Fi writer Stephen King was found dead in his Maine home this morning. There weren't any more details. I'm sure everyone in the Slashdot community will miss him - even if you didn't enjoy his work, there's no denying his contributions to popular culture. Truly an American icon.

Out of date already.

[Quasar1999]

GPRS anyone?

GSM is analog switched technology... GPRS is packet based. Lets see... which one do we want? Since GSM never really took off in the US, why not work on getting GPRS standard accepted in the US (and north america for that matter)... why pus for GSM, which, as many others have pointed out is not as secure, has poor bandwidth usage, considering CDMA as a competitor, and suffers from insane 'big brother' cell tower syndrom (or whatever you wanna call it when the phone is constantly telling the tower where it is, and what it's doing).