Entries Tagged 'Uncategorized' ↓

I watched a show on TV Ontario last night about “the cloud” and it’s impact on the internet population. I had never thought of it, but I store and update data in the cloud every day when I log into Gmail or Google Docs. The cloud is a term for the collective storage space out there on the internet, typically managed in large data centers run by companies with too much money to spend on hardware and square footage. One such company is Google, who recently spent a couple billion dollars on new server farms in the United States. When you you update your documents stored on Google Documents, they are are saved somewhere out there, out of your control, but safe from hackers and such.

But are they really? We assume that companies will be responsible with our data; that they will protect it from malicious people who might abuse the information to their advantage. We also tend to forget to read the fine print about ownership of said information. Does Google own my spreadsheets since I store them on their portion of the cloud? Or are they just storing them for me? I better go back and read the terms of service…

This past week, Rogers introduced a new unlimited data plan for a flat rate of $20. This move helped align Rogers with the other major cell providers in Canada (Telus and Bell Canada) by offering low-cost, add-on plans for data users. Until now, Rogers had one of the most expensive data usage rates around, charging hundreds of dollars to the power users. My personal experience with the cost of data on the Rogers network was when I first purchased my SMT 5600 smartphone. I decided to try the online connectivity by signing into Mobile MSN from my phone. I was logged on for no more than 30 seconds, so I thought I would not be hit too hard with data costs. When I received my bill in the mail, the cost for my experiment was almost $14 CAD!

The speculation is that Rogers may have introduced the flat rate as a precursor to the iPhone being released in Canada. I think Rogers is testing the waters to see how the flat-rate plan is adopted across it’s subscriber base. The problem is that they have excluded arguably their largest subscriber populations - Blackberry users and customers with smartphones. The plan is tailored to a specific phone (Rogers Vision). The fine print for the flat-rate plan reads (bolding is my own):

Important: This plan includes unlimited on-device mobile browsing only. Plan is available on select phones only (PDAs such as Blackberry or Windows Mobile devices, PC cards and non-Rogers certified devices are not eligible). Data usage incurred on ineligible devices, incurred while tethering (using device as wireless modem for laptop) or incurred using non-Rogers (3rd party) applications downloaded to your device will be subject to pay-per-use charges of 5 cents/KB.

So, if you own a smartphone or Blackberry, you aren’t any further ahead. You still pay $0.05 / KB for ad-hoc data usage. And even if you could apply it against your Blackberry account, you would not qualify for the unlimited data for external applications that reply on always-on internet connections (Google Maps, Google Talk, etc).

Why bother introducing the plan at all? The plan is a step in the right direction, but until it is mated to a device that is useful (iPhone?), it won’t be too appealing to me.

I’m posting this via Windows Live Writer.  It has a nice, clean interface and simple ways of doing things like adding images, links, etc.  

To the left you can see an inline image of my kids.  Normally this kind of alignment is a pain to accomplish, but with Windows Live Writer, it seems to be very easy.  We’ll see how this post looks once it’s live - that is the true test!  The photo should link to the original sized image, and if all goes well, you’ll be able to click on the image to see a larger version.

Hi there!