Category: News

Late last year we heard that communications company 3 had won a government contract to provide broadband coverage to the remaining 30% of the country that currently has no coverage.  I just read on SiliconRepublic that this will be done using mobile broadband.  Hmm, that’s interesting.  I hope the coverage is better than what I get at my house.  I’m slap bang in between two antennas and I have almost no 3G coverage.  In fact, I have to stand beside one window to get a mobile phone signal.  It’s not like I live in the middle of a national park either.  I’m in a major commuter town, one mile from a motorway.  I had to get rid of my 3G phone when I moved here because it kept dropping phone calls.  That’s why I own a "brick".

We have this map to see where has coverage now (red) and where doesn’t (green).

This is funny.  My family home is in a red area.  I know for a fact that no house in that area has coverage now via land line because it’s 9KM from the nearest enabled exchange.  Mobile broadband is so slow that it takes around 20 seconds for Google to open.

So, I’m now to take it that the Irish government is going to spend €220million on bringing bad broadband to the country.  FANTASTIC!  And people wonder why I say we shouldn’t allow our government anywhere near technology?

EDIT:

The lack of bandwidth isn’t down to congestion either.  At my house I know I’ve a problem because I’ve asked the phone companies.  At my home area … well … there aren’t too many old farmers surfing the net if you know what I mean.

I think I smell another integrated Dublin ticketing system or PPARS in the works. Why the hell is our government still allowed to get involved in technology?  BTW, you might want to look into who and more importantly, who did not get involved in the tender process.

Microsoft posted their second quarter results today.  Desktop software sales were down 8%.  Server licensing was up 15%.  Games (X-Box) is doing well, as was reported in Irish media, bucking the general trend.   Due to market instability, MS is not providing guidance on performance for the rest of their fiscal year.

Some 5000 redundancies were also announced.  This is much less than the numbers that had been rumoured before.  20 out of 1200 are rumoured to be affected in Microsoft Ireland.

"In light of the further deterioration of global economic conditions, Microsoft announced additional steps to manage costs, including the reduction of headcount-related expenses, vendors and contingent staff, facilities, capital expenditures and marketing. As part of this plan, Microsoft will eliminate up to 5,000 jobs in R&D, marketing, sales, finance, legal, HR, and IT over the next 18 months, including 1,400 jobs today. These initiatives will reduce the company’s annual operating expense run rate by approximately $1.5 billion and reduce fiscal year 2009 capital expenditures by $700 million".

ENN is reporting that  Virgin Airlines is taking steps to ban the inflight use of most Dell and Apple laptops after the recent spate of exploding batteries that was followed by a recall.  Quantas and Korean Air have already done this.  Virgin is allowing up to 2 individually wrapped batteries to be carried but they cannot be put to use.

Given how rare these "explosions" have been, this seems like overkill.  Next they’ll be banning water on flights … oh!