A great piece was Slashdotted yesterday and called to my attention on the drive in to work on the Slashdot Review podcast. An analysis of the costs associated with deploying a service on a neutral network versus a proprietary network was published under the nom de plum James Glass. I wonder if hes any relation to Jan Bradys boyfriend George Glass.
This piece at NewsForge compares what it costs to set up a service on the current neutral Internet versus the controlled, closed cellular networks. The comparison of the post-neutral Internet to the current state of affairs with wireless broadband offerings is a comparison I made some time ago in this blog. Others such as Om Malik and Total Telecom have provided glimpses into market research surveys that indicate wireless consumers are uninterested in mobile broadband content and applications. I still maintain that one of the main reasons this is the case is that carriers dont know what consumers want. But since they call all of the shots, there is no room for developers to wedge in to the mobile content space and give them what they want. Hence we have walled gardens filled with crap nobody really wants.
The article describes the cost and hassle of deploying an SMS-based application on US wireless networks. Take note, because this is essentially the simplest and easiest entry space in mobile content, so more engaging or complex applications are going to cost even more:
The first step would be to contact a company known as an aggregator. This company manages your relationships with the cell phone carriers — and that’s carriers, plural, because making an agreement with just one carrier ensures that your service will fail because it cannot effectively spread via word of mouth. The first requirement from an aggregator is a service charge, which starts at $1,000 per month. Then, you must buy a shortcode (which kind of serves as your Web site name) for an additional $500-$1,000 per month. But you’re not done.
The next step is satisfying the requirements of the cell phone companies. Many of these steps, such as requiring affirmative opt-in before a subscription can start, are not burdensome, and serve to protect the carriers’ customers. Others, however, border on ludicrous. Requirements vary by carrier, but some prohibit operators from offering games or sweepstakes, or require that subscription periods can only be monthly: not daily, weekly, or yearly. Others require that content, such as ringtones, be locked so users can’t forward them from their phones to their friends’ phones.
Other requirements are outright offensive: as of this writing, Cingular, Sprint/Nextel, T-Mobile and Verizon all prohibit charities from raising money though their Premium SMS services. Too bad for the United Way, Greenpeace, and the Red Cross.
I still hold that an un-neutral Internet is bad business for broadband providers. The walled garden doesnt work because the gardeners clearly dont know what customers want. Even cable operators have limited claim on knowing what customers want in video content as witnessed by the runaway success of YouTube, TiVo and the calls for more flexible channel subscription packages. Carriers and cable providers shouldtry to look surprised when customers don’t line up to subscribe to broadband services that apply proprietary limitations on how customers can use their connections.
Tags: Net Neutrality
