By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  September 8th at 02:30 AM  | 

I’m in danger of repeating myself as the AT&T/T-Mobile saga goes on, so let me open up tonight’s post with to my latest analysis of the situation. Summary: the behavior of Sprint Nextel’s and Clearwire’s share prices, combined with Sprint Nextel’s decision to sue AT&T, should lead any observer to believe that the AT&T/T-Mobile deal benefits the 4G Internet-using public at the expense of Sprint | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  September 7th at 06:00 AM  | 

As I’ve previously covered, the Department of Justice is suing AT&T, claiming its planned merger with T-Mobile USA harms competition in America. My retort has been market reactions to the lawsuit suggest it is the lawsuit that is anti-competitive, benefiting the existing national 4G duopoly: Sprint Nextel and Verizon Wireless. That Sprint Nextel is jumping in with its own lawsuit now ends all doubt: the | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  September 6th at 02:30 AM  | 

As Labor Day winds up out here, we have a brief Tech at Night tonight. Something to watch: Eric Schmidt is downplaying talk of Google wanting Motorola’s phone patents after Larry Page pretty much said the opposite. Who’s in charge here? HP sues its own partner over its own idea. Who’s in charge there? A Dutch court only found Samsung phones, not tablets, to infringe | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  September 3rd at 01:30 AM  | 

This is one of those weeks when all the important stuff happens at once, and there’s much to cover. I’ll start with the big national story. As I previously covered, The Eric Holder/Barack Obama Justice Department is coming after AT&T, using its own odd brand of economics to claim that the merger with T-Mobile would make the wireless market less competitive. When in fact, as | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  September 1st at 01:00 AM  | 

So much going on suddenly this week. Barack Obama and Eric Holder’s DoJ has decided to come after AT&T for its plans to merge with T-Mobile, possibly doing the bidding of donors while hindering jobs growth in America as well as nationwide 4G wireless Internet competition. Sprint’s not doing much to keep Verizon in check; we need AT&T to have the spectrum needed to do | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 31st at 02:30 PM  | 

Updated below… Today it was announced that the Department of Justice will attempt to block AT&T’s acquisition of T-Mobile. The deal is needed for technical and regulatory reasons to allow AT&T to compete in the 4G wireless market with Verizon, Sprint/Clearwire, and with the upcoming competitor LightSquared. So why is the Department of Justice calling it bad for competition? Enter R. Gerard Salemme. It’s not | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 29th at 02:00 PM  | 

I mentioned recently that broader polling pools favor Democrats, so when a big new poll of adults comes out from Gallup that shows Barack Obama to be in trouble, I take notice.

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 25th at 02:30 AM  | 

Even as the FCC hems and haws about AT&T’s quest for spectrum via T-Mobile, new evidence has come out that we simply need more spectrum for wireless Internet. The overload of the wireless networks in the parts of the east coast the felt the Virginia earthquake says it all. And remember: new spectrum means new investment to use that spectrum, which means jobs and economic | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 22nd at 10:00 PM  | 

What would be a Monday without Democrats wanting to expand government by passing new laws and regulations? Some people aren’t careful with their things and/or their data, so Chuckie Schumer thinks there oughta be a law. I like CTIA’s response to that: CTIA understands that when consumers have their mobile devices lost or stolen, it is an unfortunate situation as they often contain a lot | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 22nd at 09:30 AM  | 

By request, we have a somewhat unusual poll: We Ask America asked Iowa Republicans which candidate they don’t want as the Republican Presidential nominee in 2012. As is usual this time of year, the poll is skewed by the inclusion of non-candidates. This time, overwhelmingly so.

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 18th at 03:00 AM  | 

No really, Governor Haslam, you do not want to bring California taxation to Tennessee. Have you seen our unemployment? That’s why we just might defeat it at referendum. PETA people are hijacking phones, sending malicious messages without consent, and running up text message bills. People need to be careful about what they install, but this sort of thing needs to send people to jail, as | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 16th at 03:30 AM  | 

Hello again to those I saw in Charleston over the weekend, and hope to see you next time to those who weren’t able to make it! While I return to California and get settled in again, it seems that some are leaving the state for good, and the hostile business climate is why. This includes the punitive Amazon Tax which has made it impossible for | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 6th at 03:00 AM  | 

The free market of Internet access, driven by constantly improving technology and heightening competition, is a driver of job creation and economic growth. Even Julius Genachowski, Obama’s FCC Chairman, has to admit that. This is just one reason we fight FCC power grabs. So when the government starts talking about new regulations in emerging fields such as “cloud computing”, just say no. And when Steve | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  August 4th at 03:00 AM  | 

South Korea has Net Neutrality activists in an uproar as, guess what? The government is considering asking a high-bandwidth Internet service to pay its fair share for the government-subsidized Internet in the country. Just more proof that when the radicals say “Net Neutrality,” they really mean “free stuff paid for by the taxpayers.” The radical left’s push for freeloading continues in America too, as Public | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  July 18th at 11:30 PM  | 

Short Tech at Night tonight, and boy do I need it. Unsurprisingly, when you’re running a massive calorie deficit to lose weight, exercise gets harder! I’m going to put two stories out here. If people are inspired to a course of vigilante action, well, then that’s not my fault. Anonymous’s Antisec is picking on the troops. Anonymous is launching a Google+ competitor for its members | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  July 14th at 03:30 AM  | 

Sorry if you’ve been missing Tech at Night this week. Monday I just ran out of time as I had to do a whole bunch of housekeeping*, and tonight I’m running late. So let’s go. In classic Tech at Night style, let’s talk about the FCC. They took forever to get the ball rolling on Net Neutrality, but it’s coming now and it’s a vehicle | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  July 9th at 02:30 AM  | 

Friday, Friday, Friday. Black Friday? Net Neutrality rules have become one step closer to official as the FCC finally delivered something to the OMB after months of stalling. Verizon, MetroPCS, Virginia AG Ken Cuccinelli, and others ended up unable sue to throw out the illegal power grab until it’s published, so the longer the FCC waited, the longer everyone else had to wait to begin | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  July 7th at 03:30 AM  | 

I remember when the Digital Millennium Copyright Act passed. It created a boatload of new rules and restrictions on Americans, in the name of tightening copyright online. One of the key provisions of the DMCA is the “safe harbor” rule, which effectively turns ISPs into agents of copyright, by making them honor so-called DMCA takedown notices in exchange for not being held responsible for what’s | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  June 30th at 02:00 AM  | 

Amazon’s not kidding one bit about punishing states that attempt to punish it. After Amazon sent a last ditch warning to Associates that all California Associates would be terminated in the event Governor Brown signed the budget with the Amazon Tax in it, the Governor went ahead and did it. So, every Amazon Associate in California just got terminated, including countless small businesses scraping by | Read More »

By: Neil Stevens (Diary)  |  June 18th at 02:30 AM  | 

So while there have been a number of genuine online attacks lately against the Senate, the CIA, PBS, Bioware, and more, the headlines have been full of reports of aftershocks. What seems to be going on is that existing account credentials leaked from previous attacks are being plugged into other sites, including Paypal. Anyone who reuses passwords is vulnerable to these secondary attacks. Be careful | Read More »