Posted by: Aamir Attaa on August 6, 2008 at 2:46 AM
Nokia has announced price cut for many of its handsets this week and putting further pressure on its rivals’ already thin profits.
Mobile phone manufacturers are already going through an increasingly tight battle for market share as demand for pricey phones has started to slow in developed and even in developing countries.
Nokia made the steepest price reductions of up to 10 percent for selected music and media phones, while it made smaller cuts across the portfolio.
The price cuts from Nokia, which controls 40 percent of the cellphone market, will put further pressure on its smaller rivals like Sony Ericsson, which has focused on music and camera phones.
Struggling Motorola, the third-largest phone maker, has made losses since its flagship phone Razr lost appeal among consumers.
Nokia has a dominant market position in many emerging markets like India, Pakistan, Bangladesh helping it increase phone sales volumes.
Samsung’s market share increased to 15.3 percent in the quarter, while LG’s declined to 9.3 percent.
[Via Reuters]
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on August 5, 2008 at 5:32 PM
All cellular companies of Pakistan have proposed Ministry of IT and Telecom to eliminate USF’s share in APC (Access Promotion Charge) and let cellular companies enjoy all of APC to increase their revenues and lowering ARPU levels.
APC or Access Promotion Charge is the portion of revenue that currently equals US 0.05 $ per minute on all international calls terminating on landline or cellular networks of Pakistan. Fixed line operator, that is PTCL, grabs all of APC (US 0.05$) for all calls that are being terminated on its network. However, cellular companies are getting only 1.57 cents per minute on all calls that terminate on cellular networks. This 1.57 cents or Rs. 1.10 is PTA’s determined termination rate per minute for all calls that land on cellular networks. Hence, cellular companies are entertained with Rs. 1.10 for calls that land on its network weather domestic or international. Remaining cost of US 3.43 cents per minute (for international traffic) goes to USF. (Regulation for this share of USF is given in this document)
Proposal said that mobile companies share the largest amount of incoming international traffic that is being terminated on mobile networks, it is only fair that the portion of APC, which is being currently mopped up as USF contribution, be granted to mobile companies, so that they can further increase their revenues and support expanding network demands through out the country.
All Mobile companies through this proposal believe that they are already contributing 1.5 percent of their revenues to USF is much beyond the amount that could be actually spent by USF company.
Proposal that was sent to Ministry of IT and Telecom and Pakistan Telecommunication Authority was signed by CEOs of all mobile companies and PTCL. Proposal requested the authority to approval for implementation with immediate effect.
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on August 1, 2008 at 9:37 PM
Islamabad Traffic Police, at last has made this a rule that “Any driver caught on mobile while driving will be fined a sum of Rs. 500 per instance from Today (August 1st, 2008)”.
Due to this ban, we may see a rise in hands free phone devices.
Via [Islamabad Metblogs]
law is introduced to minimize the accidents caused.
A driver will be fined a sum of Rs. 300 for violation of these laws (which IMO is a very low amount - more the better).
BTW, I heard of laws in Sharjah and Dubai (not first hand news so cant really confirm if the situation is actually such) where the police just notes down the registration number of cars and send them heavy amount on tickets direct to their homes. They wont stop you asking why are you speaking on your mobile or why’s the seat belt hanging around. Perfect way to treat our people here as well. I wish.
So be careful next time you hear a ring tone in your car. Dont be tempted to pick it. Good Luck~
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on July 29, 2008 at 4:21 PM
Cuil, (pronounced as cool) a web based search engine that claims an index of 120 billion web pages, making them arguably the most comprehensive search engine on the web (Google doesn’t disclose the size of their index, although they claim to know about a trillion unique web pages) has been launched today morning (Pakistan Time). Cuil was founded by very esteemed search experts. Husband and wife team Tom Costello (CEO) and Anna Patterson (VP Engineering).
Cuil claims that it can index web pages significantly faster and cheaper than Google. It says that its indexing costs will be 1/10th of Google’s, based on new search architectures and relevance methods. By some estimates, Google spends a billion dollars a year to run the back end infrastructure of its search business.
Cuil is experimenting with a new type of search interface as well. Results are shown in three columns and contain an image and more summary text than existing search engines.
In my personal openion, cuil is no way near to Google, or its maybe just the sense of easeness that we are familiar with Google’s interface.
Reasons Cuil is not better than Google
- Page navigation is more easy with Google compared to cuil’s relatively smaller page numbers at bottom left
- I tried various keywords, and found that Google had what i was looking for, instead cuil displayed irrelevant results
- No image/video search yet on cuil
- and the interface… no way near to Google!
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on July 28, 2008 at 4:21 PM
Protected by President Musharraf, and duly extended tenure of Ex-Chairman Pakistan Telecommunication Autority (PTA) Maj. Gen (R) Shahzada Alam Malik at last reached to an end when he was shown the way to home by PPP government through premature termination of their contracts.
Following our national history and democratic culture, merit was assaulted yet another time in the bureaucratic front of Pakistan when Dr. Mohammed Yaseen overtook his senior colleague and member PTA Syed Nasurl Karim Ahmed Ghaznavi and became the chairman of Pakistan Telecommunication Authority.
As per Pakistan Telecommunication (Re-Organization) Act, 1996, Federal Government is responsible for the appointment of Chairman PTA. Government can select from Two Members of PTA board.
Dr Yaseen joined PTA board as member technical in October 2006 while Syed Nasurl Karim Ahmed Ghaznavi is a civil servant from 1974 batch, clearly getting a lead in terms of seniority.
Sources, familiar with the scenario, commented that this appointment can be termed as a true translation of Dr. Yaseen’s affiliation with PPP and his background from Sindh (though Dr. Yaseen was born in Gujranwala but moved to Sindh in his early childhood). Sources further unveiled that Dr. Yaseen joined PTA as 19th grade officer and was promoted to grade 21 in 2006 and now he is the head of a department in just 2 years, where as Mr. Ghaznavi was promoted to 21st grade in year 2001.
When contacted Federal Government, they responded with a justification that PTA is a technical department, hence requires more technical orientation and abilities instead of finance, so Dr. Yaseen was chosen unanimously by the committee.
Telecom analysts are opining other way; they firmly believe that Syed Nasurl Karim Ahmed Ghaznavi deserved this office as Chairmanship is not an engineering slot instead the head is responsible for regulate the telecom sector. Moreover, member technical is always there to look into technical matters if they ever arise. “Whatever the case is, there is no doubt that the supremacy of merit has been compromised” said a telecom analyst.
Mr. Ghazhnavi has been associated with telecom sector since 1992. Who can be a better regulator than him? Being an officer of Pakistan Audit and Account, which are trained in the art of regarding the public sector organization.
It is learned through reliable sources in PTA that authority is making massive changes in PTA in the name of “Reconstruction”, while remove senior and trained officers from their responsibilities and deputing less experiences and new people on a very delicate and important job slots.
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on July 24, 2008 at 1:57 PM
Google Knol has made its debut after six months of its announcement. Google Knol is a service that some say will one day overthrow the Wikipedia, but in my opinion, it won’t be that easy.
Wikipedia is the largest internet encyclopedia is mainly editable and allows anyone to publish articles, edit them, and many other free for all functions, while on other hands, Google Knol does not allow everyone to edit, or publish article. It requires that you have a Google account (well no problem, most of us have 1), but that’s not all, you must be be verified via phone or credit card to confirm the article writers are identified and only than can you share your Knol with the world.
The idea may not convince you at first but what Google is trying to do is provide a reliable and more authentic source of information, and an effort to restrain some 12 year old editing and deleting information as such as with Wikipedia.
Google Knol or GKnol might be a good source for good and accurate information from real people rather than some young kid giving advice and acting his older than his age. Gknol is no way going to fight or defeat Wikipedia anytime soon and Google isn’t trying to take over the internet it’s just trying to give us internet users more on the net compared to other providers.
When Gmail was launched, no one knew that it could overtake Hotmail or Yahoo in just 2/3 years; hence Wikipedia can be beaten as well in only couple of years. GKnol is another service to Mankind from Google.
[Via Jayed]
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on July 24, 2008 at 1:28 PM
There are multiple examples in Pakistan, where unknown people intercept cellular voice and SMS communication of mobile users; afterwards they blackmail them and earn some bucks. I have received mails from at least 4 of my readers who have reported such instances happening with them. One of such mail was also made public, whose number was being intercepted by someone and the issue is still unresolved.
Earlier on, we thought that this can be some hacker who had compromised the security of GSM network, however latter it was discovered there hacking of GSM network is not possible. like a reader left his comment, which reads, “Mobile hacking is not possible in a GSM network…..Only operator can listen user’s calls or if someone have duplicate SIM with same IMEI, there are some security algorithms and no one can break it”
Now, here is the situation, victim mobile users raised their voice that cellular companies’ staffers listen and record their voice and data communication and then they blackmail them.
A very reliable source, requesting anonymity has told that the issue reached and it was discussed in Federal Cabinet that cellular companies’ staffers are bothering youngsters and threatening them to either give them money or they will provide their parents with their voice tapes.
Now a high member from Ministry of IT and Telecom has written a letter to Pakistan Telecommunication Authority to seriously look into matter and make sure to stop such practices and culprits involved should be penalized.
On other hands we know that in the name of security, there are multiple authorities, which can track our very personal voice calls. Issue must be addressed very clearing defining the regulations so that un-authorized may not reach our voice conversations in any way. (We are in Pakistan, so I am not raising any voice against Interior Ministry of Intelligence Agencies, however their act of listening to anyone’s voice conversation over phone is against very basic human rights)
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Posted by: Aamir Attaa on July 22, 2008 at 4:34 PM
PTCL employees are on strike for almost a week now. They are protesting against Unified Pay Scale introduced by PTCL administration, despite of assurance through a notification from SEVP Finance, that administration is taking back Unified Pay Scale and agreeing on all other demands asked by PTCL employees.
However, employees carry on protests as they think this is a total drama instead of any serious attitude from PTCL administration. PTCL’s spokesman’s statment reflected this as well, as he showed ignorance over any such notification by SEVP Finance, reported Geo TV.
On other hands, all internet service providers in the country are struck in middle of no where. They are facing extensive pressure from their customers for new DSL installations and infected line rectifications.
Even faulty PTCL phone lines are lying dead and no one knows when they will be restored.
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The price cuts from Nokia, which controls 40 percent of the cellphone market, will put further pressure on its smaller rivals like Sony Ericsson, which has focused on music and camera phones.
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