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Follow-up: Verizon Wireless to open up in ’08

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BusinessWeek’s article, Verizon Embraces Google’s Android, discusses the sudden shift in Verizon Wireless’s business model, from tightly restricted to an open-access network, and how Google’s Android helped facilitate this shift. The article details how the open movement at the company was spearheaded by CEO Lowell McAdam.

Some highlights of Lowell McAdam from the article:

[Verizon Wireless’s] surprise embrace of an open-access model and of the Android software culminates a dramatic yearlong evolution in the company’s thinking. The effort, championed by McAdam, involved meetings with the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission and late-night bull sessions with the top two executives at Verizon Communications, which owns Verizon Wireless in partnership with Vodafone.

McAdam was more amenable to shifting gears thanks to time spent during the 1990s in Europe and Asia, where the wireless industry is more of a free-for-all. …[he] says he was impressed that European and Asian mobile carriers backed technologies that allow subscribers to switch to rivals with ease.


The BusinessWeek article goes on to discuss how the open-access move could help reduce Verizon’s costs and help to combat market saturation in the US. The upcoming FCC wireless spectrum auction is also covered. Particularly, how the auction (and lobbying from Google and other tech companies for open-access) got McAdam to consider that a move to an open-access business model was necessary.

According to McAdam, Android was the final key influence in Verizon adopting an open-access business model. This is, of course, why Verizon is now “embracing” the Android platform. However, when Google first announced the release of Android, Verizon (along with AT&T) were absent from the press release. According to McAdam, the reason they did not sign on and support Android from the beginning is two-fold, “To get into that press release really didn’t do anything [for Verizon]…We needed to understand the details of that operating system.”

As I mentioned in my previous VZW open-access post, Verizon’s new open initiative will offer increased flexibility for VZW’s customers by allowing them to choose between VZW’s full service offering or going with a third party device and mobile applications. It was clear to me at the time of my previous post that “These innovative [third party] mobile web applications will initially be developed through the Android Open Handset Alliance.” McAdam also sees the potential in the Android Platform by saying, “Clearly the Android system gives a lot of developers the opportunity to develop applications for a wide range of handsets.” Clearly, if a lot of developers start developing applications, we are bound to get at least a few very innovative and useful applications from Android. Right? I can’t wait to see how much the US wireless market changes in the next few years.

Gmail Chat Can Now Use AIM

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Recently Google rolled out some upgrades to its mail platform Gmail. This is a great one. Up until now the chat functionality within Gmail has been limited to other Gmail and Google Talk users. Now Gmail users can reconnect with their friends on AOL Instant Messenger, AIM. Thanks for opening up Google!

10 million AIM accounts were resurrected from the dead today as a result! That’s a guess but I’m sure it was a lot. Thanks again Google.

Source Article

Google launches “My Location (beta)” for mobile devices

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Google has introduced the beta version of its new “My Location” feature for Google Maps for mobile devices. The My Location feature enables a mobile user to display their current location on the Google map on their device. The feature uses both GPS and non-GPS methods to determine a user’s location.

When GPS is available on a device the user will get a much more accurate reading of their location, indicated by a blue dot. If GPS is not available for whatever reason, the My Location feature takes information broadcast from mobile towers near you to approximate your current location on the map. Basically triangulation using cell phone towers. When the feature uses this method, it displays your location as a blue dot surrounded by a light blue circle. This light blue circle represents the amount of uncertainty about your location. Google claims that this method “comes pretty close (approximately 1000m close, on average).”

The My Location feature is available for most web-enabled mobile phones, including Java, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, and Nokia/Symbian devices.

I think the My Location feature will encourage more people to use Google Maps for Mobile. The feature will save mobile users time by allowing them to simply press a single button to find their location, instead of finding a nearby address and typing that into Google Maps as well as their search query.

The following is a video from Google about the My Location feature.

What do you think of the new My Location feature?

Verizon Wireless to open up in ’08

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Today Verizon Wireless announced a new open development initiative aimed at accelerating innovation and growth in the wireless market.

Verizon Wireless today announced that it will provide customers the option to use, on its nationwide wireless network, wireless devices, software and applications not offered by the company. Verizon Wireless plans to have this new choice available to customers throughout the country by the end of 2008.

Obviously, Verizon Wireless is feeling some pressure from the imminent arrival of Google in the wireless arena. This is a great decision by Verizon Wireless, because the decision makers at VZW had the foresight to see that fighting Google (and any potential partners) would be a losing proposition. In the long run they would simply lose subscribers looking for more device options and innovative mobile software and applications.

By giving their customers the choice of “bring-your-own” device service, Verizon Wireless is offering the best of both worlds. Customers bringing their own devices can enjoy the coverage and reliability of Verizon Wireless’s network, while also being able to pick and choose what software and applications they want to use. This option also offers a lot of flexibility and adaptability for business customers and mobile web users. These customers will be able to install and use the specific mobile applications they need to transact business and carry out other online activities that couldn’t be performed on a mobile device before. These innovative mobile web applications will initially be developed through the Android Open Handset Alliance.

The only question I have is “I wonder how long it would have taken Verizon to open up like this if Google had not made the move into the wireless market?” 😉

An introduction to search snippets

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Google’s Matt Cutts uploaded the following video to his blog last night. In the video, Matt discusses the anatomy of a Google search result. In particular he discusses the search snippet and the many different ways that Google’s algorithm “generates” this snippet.

As you can see, the search snippet is a valuable indicator of relevancy for a searcher. It basically tells the searcher a little bit about what content is on the page in relation to their search query. As Matt mentioned, Google will sometimes generate this snippet using your page’s meta description tag or Google can pull some text from one or more areas of the page. By optimizing its meta description tags and the content on its pages, a franchise company can increase search engine traffic to its website. Including information such as an individual location’s physical address, areas served, etc. in that page’s meta description tag and body text, a searcher is much more likely to see relevant information in the snippet. Then (hopefully) they will visit your site.

Thanks to Matt for making this video.