Tag Archives | Verizon

Home Automation for the Masses, Maybe?

Posted by Yardena Arar on October 12, 2011 at 3:29 am

Home automation means different things to different people, but generally speaking it covers remote control and monitoring technologies that most of us don’t have, either because they’ve been too expensive or too complicated to install and use. That may be changing: Verizon is launching a $10-a-month (OK, $9.99) service that will support scores of devices, from webcams to thermostats.

The service, initially available only to Verizon’s 4.5 million FIOS subscribers, will empower customers to use mobile devices (such as cell phones and tablets), computers, and/or FIOS TV to monitor and manage equipment based on Sigma Designs’ Z-Wave technology. Z-Wave devices use wireless mesh network technology (not Wi-Fi) to communicate with a base station or gateway that interfaces with the outside world through a broadband network.

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Carriers Pull Back on Mobile Wallet Plans

Posted by Ed Oswald on May 4, 2011 at 1:35 pm

It appears that T-Mobile, AT&T, and Verizon’s ambitious plans to create a mobile payment service may not happen, at least the way they’re hoping. The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that the carriers may now decide to partner with credit card companies instead to make the network happen.

Originally, the service (called “Isis”) was to bypass the traditional credit card companies altogether: charges would appear directly on consumer’s cellular phone bills. The abrupt 180 may be due to ensuring Isis has any chance of success — leveraging the power of Visa and MasterCard could go a long way.

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Court Throws Out Verizon, MetroPCS Suits Over Net Neutrality

Posted by Ed Oswald on April 4, 2011 at 12:56 pm

A federal judge has thrown out both Verizon and MetroPCS’ suits against the FCC over net neutrality, but don’t get your hopes up just yet. The decisions appear to revolve around a technicality: that both companies just filed way too early.

In order for the FCC to be sued over the rules, it must be in the 30 days following its publishing in the Federal Register. That has not happened yet. While the carriers attempted to deal with this issue by saying it was a move to protect its spectrum rights, the court just did not buy that.

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This Old House: Fiber Arrives

Posted by Dave Z on December 29, 2010 at 3:06 pm

If you recall, we recently picked up a new (old) house and our plate is full of projects – including some relevant to a digital media blog. So, on with the story…

I’ve continued to make progress removing and recycling speaker and aerial antenna wire as I encounter it. There’s no way I’ll extricate it all, and fortunately I’m not quite OCD enough to have to. But it’s no longer an eyesore in various built-ins and closets.

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The BlackBerry-Like Droid Pro

Posted by Harry McCracken on October 6, 2010 at 7:16 am

Once upon a time–like a decade ago–portrait-oriented, non-slider QWERTY keyboards were the newest, coolest thing in phones. In the post-iPhone era, however, they seemed to have been decisively trumped by full-touchscreen designs. But if you ask me, QWERTY got so rare that it looks cool all over again in Motorola’s new Droid Pro for Verizon, which was announced yesterday.

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So Was This the Verizon TV Tablet?

Posted by Ed Oswald on August 19, 2010 at 11:30 am

You may remember my post earlier this month on a supposed Verizon TV tablet. Well, it became reality I guess, somewhat. Verizon on Wednesday demoed an upcoming iPad app that would allow its users to watch live television from it’s FiOS service. The app would essentially stream whatever is being played on the users home FiOS box.

According to Verizon CIO Shaygan Kheradpir, the company is in the process of getting the go-ahead from the content owners — the technology to make this app a reality is already in place. If Verizon gets it out quick enough, it could be one of the first with live streaming capabilities.

Probably not though — Kheradpir said the app is targeted for a fourth quarter release. But it could be faster if the content owners move quickly to give Verizon the go ahead, his comments seem to suggest.

Dish has announced a Sling-based app for iOS and Blackberry, but that is not slated to debut until October. Other offerings, such as AT&T’s UVerse TV app, allow for streaming but it’s prerecorded content delivered from the company itself and not the user’s set-top box at home.

Now, I’m not saying that the Verizon TV tablet as reported is not going to materialize, but it looks clear that the company is at least ready to work with already existing platforms — which is a good business move overall.

[Hat tip: GigaOm]

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The N92 is the Verizon iPhone

Posted by Ed Oswald on August 12, 2010 at 11:01 am

The Verizon iPhone drumbeat continues as Daring Fireball’s John Gruber says that Apple is indeed working on a CDMA variant of the iPhone 4, dubbed internally the “N92.” While the device is not in device testing yet — that’s the level where engineers like Gray Powell take them out into the wild — it is at engineering-level testing right now.

Gruber speculates this is where the phone would need to be in order to make it to a January 2011 release, which seems to be the date many are fixated on for its release. He cautions however that the news does not necessarily mean Verizon’s getting it: there are other CDMA carriers after all.

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Google and Verizon's Network Neutrality Negotiation

Posted by Harry McCracken on August 9, 2010 at 12:33 pm

The rumored deal between Google and Verizon over Network Neutrality issues isn’t a deal–it’s a joint proposal to the FCC. It recommends rules that would prohibit the favoring of certain traffic over other traffic on the wired Internet. But Dan Gillmor, who knows way more about this stuff than I do, isn’t thrilled with the companies’ suggestions. And the proposal is pro-Network Neutrality only for wired traffic, not wireless data. Isn’t that a little bit as if it had advised for consumer-friendly regulations for dial-up–but not for broadband–in, say, 2000?

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