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Why US Wireless Isn't Wide Open
Geoffery B tips a story in Business Week about why the US cellular carriers' talk about opening up their networks rings hollow. "Even as the wireless industry chants a new gospel about opening mobile phone networks to outside devices and applications, some of the biggest US carriers are quietly blocking new services that would compete with their own. Would-be mobile-service providers, ranging from startups to major banks to eBay's PayPal, have encountered these roadblocks, erected by the likes of AT&T and Verizon Wireless. In some cases, cellular carriers have backed down, but only after inflicting costly delays on the new services."
I think that's an oversimplified sensational exaggeration to the notion that a business is out to make money, and would hence not readily open the market to more competition and subsequent profit loss.
For the record, trying to make money != greed. Not relinquishing a dominated holding (what they're doing is legal) is not greedy, it's intelligent business. What do the companies have to gain by allowing more competition in an already competitive market?
The article is about "short codes" for text messaging (e.g., "Text 105312 to vote for the next American Idol!"). The telcos are slow to approve new short codes. This has little, if anything, to do with open network access.
Illustrative example: The wired phone network is an open-access network (i.e., you can call whomever you want using whatever phone you want and transmit whatever data you want), but that doesn't mean the phone company has to give me a 3-digit access number (ala 911, 411, etc) if I ask for one. This article is stupid.