back to article Mobile industry begrudgingly accepts impacts of Apple, Google et al

It may not be happy about it, but the mobile industry has begrudgingly accepted that tech giants Apple, Google and Facebook are driving its industry. Just an hour before the launch of the new iPhone, director general of the Global System for Mobile Communications Association, Mats Granryd, took to the stage of the Mobile World …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    5G wont matter

    If net neutrality is gone along with classifying broadband as something over 3mbps, then what's the point? If you have a really fat pipe but are economically limited to just a trickle then it really doesn't do anyone any good to have a fatter pipe.

    Then again, there is a "rest of the world." Hope ya'll get to enjoy even faster net speeds! That FCC Ajit idiot is gonna make damned sure we're 3g for 1/2 a month at best.

    1. big_D Silver badge

      Re: 5G wont matter

      We have 300mpbs LTE here, but I'm usually lucky if I can get an Edge signal. I'm lucky, I don't have a company phone, those are on Vodafone and they are lucky if they get GPRS, if any data signal at all.

    2. DropBear
      Facepalm

      Re: 5G wont matter

      If only there would be any clue in the article on why 5G would be so revolutionary (beyond simply being presumably faster), and why it would usher in new players who apparently can do something in 5G they can't seem to do with 3G or LTE...

  2. SW10
    FAIL

    Do one thing well

    Mobile providers need to focus on pumping 1s and 0s through the air as far as possible, as quickly as possible and as densely as possible.

    Consumers will decide how they would like to use those 1s and 0s and device manufacturers will tempt the consumers with a range of conduits for doing so.

    Whinging about Apple, Facebook and Google is a bit like electricity utilities moaning that many white goods are manufactured by Samsung, Haier and Whirlpool.

    1. Psy-Q

      Re: Do one thing well

      Interesting, it's Electrolux, V-Zug and Miele for white goods here. So let's rejoice, there is one market left with real competition!

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The problem was...

    Mobile just tried to copy Facebook / Google et al... Slurp / Monetize, rinse and repeat. Some behaved even worse: Verizon super-cookies here's looking at you etc... But Mobile never learned to strike a balance between invasive tracking and offering compelling choices to consumers.... Maybe it was all just down to lack of imagination... But hey reap what you sow Industry, you're now all Facebook / Google bitches for the foreseeable future!

  4. EvaQ

    '"The market has moved to walled gardens instead of open platforms," he (=Granryd) said' ... really? I would say the pre-smartphone era, when the telco's were still in charge, was as open as North-Korea.

    And the telco still want "revenue sharing, or else!" with the else meaning throttling and walls.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      They mean "open" in the sense that it's THEIR walled garden and not someone else's. As for the revenue sharing crap, if your subscriber is paying you $A for B GB of data at C Mbps, what business is it of yours WHAT they use it for? If it wasn't for those same companies that they're griping about their customers wouldn't be needing as much of that nice shiny data at as fast a rate as they can afford.

      1. DropBear

        Let's not forget these are the ungodly bastards who got used to being able to charge a premium so you can use your phone's data connection to connect something else to the internet...

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Moved to walled gardens?

    Apple has far lower walls than the crap the carriers were slinging 10 years ago. There was nothing open about them, carriers controlled them completely - more like an iron cage around a desert than a walled garden back then!

    1. Psy-Q

      Re: Moved to walled gardens?

      I think (guess?) he was talking about the time when Android was new and open and upcoming, Google and Facebook actually endorsed open standards (XMPP etc.) and it all seemed like it was going to end well. At least that's what I like to assume in my happy dreams full of pink ponies and rainbows.

  6. Nimby
    WTF?

    Take with a Granryd of salt?

    I don't think there was a single sentiment, let alone pseudo-factual statement, that I could agree with in that recap of Granryd's MWC stage show. I mean you kind of expect that sort of nonsense, what with preaching to the choir setting the tone for these things and all, but ... wow ... this must set a new record for BS, damn BS, and sales-tistics. Apple would be proud ... if they weren't just dissed.

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