netneutrality

The mobile operators have made a huge mistake on the identity front. The one long-term point of value they have aside from being a bit pipe is the possession of validated identities tied to a mobile billing platform. But with their continuing efforts to maintain their walled gardens, they have passed on the opportunity to become the identity and billing providers of choice on the mobile.

Now there is another mobile player with this capability. Apple. Not only does the new iTunes wifi store not deliver music over the operator network, the billing is not enabled by the operator.

Oops.

An enlightened move by Apple would be to break the lock the operators have on billable mobile identities permanently wide open by giving every iTunes account an associated OpenID, and publishing an open payment API around OpenID identifiers. This would cause a few things to happen:

- a 100% uptake of OpenID within days by makers of iPhone apps
- a practical, simple billing mechanism for OpenID apps of all types
- overnight Apple could become the largest payment provider in the mobile space. Not just on the iPhone, but on any reasonably web capable phone owned by an iTunes user. Not just in the mobile space. Anyone with an iTunes account would be a payment-capable.

Will it happen?

Jeff
Chief Software Architect, EQO

"To see what is right in front of one's nose needs a constant struggle."
- George Orwell

Sometimes it's helpful to point out the obvious, to take stock of where we are.

The wired Internet is the real Internet. Geographic boundaries for nearly all purposes are irrelevant.

The wireless Internet is the Internet stillborn. Geographic boundaries are very real and impact everything you do. It is a 1960s long distance plan, only for data.

• Want to use the Internet on the mobile device you carry daily while traveling? Better watch out, outrageous bills ahead.
• Want to connect while traveling, via another provider with a prepaid SIM? Hope you understand APN settings. Hope you don't run into an especially restrictive carrier proxy that doesn't like your favorite application.
• Want to develop an application for phones that anyone can use, anywhere? Hope you've got the resources (like EQO does) to work around a multitude of deficiencies and roadblocks of the access networks, both incidental and intentional.

Like other wireless users, I want to use cutting-edge, revolutionary apps and services on my phone. There are a few out there... but there could be so many more.

The Internet is not a thing - it is an agreement. 3G will not bring the internet to your phone. Only a new system of agreements will.

The wireless Internet is broken - it is the internet 15 years behind the real Internet. In fact in the absence of the agreements that make the Internet work, it is not the Internet at all.

Jeff

You decide.

From the Toronto Star via Engadget Mobile:

[RIM Co-CEO Balsillie] is also intensely critical of what appears to be an effort by Apple to wrest control of the customer experience in the consumer market. For example, the iPhone is being sold through Apple's own stores, instead of strictly through AT&T Inc., which signed an exclusive U.S. deal with the computer maker. The phone is free of AT&T's logo and software and is tied closely to Apple's iTunes music store, which is where subscribers will need to go to activate their phones and browse rate plans.

"It's a dangerous strategy," says Balsillie. "It's a tremendous amount of control. And the more control of the platform that goes out of the carrier, the more they shift into a commodity pipe."

This post could alternately be titled "Blackberry CEO Whispers Sweet Nothings in Operators Ears".

This is really about trying to drive a wedge between Apple and its current and potential mobile network partners. Of all the big mobile device manufacturers, RIM has the least to gain if the industry moves to a more open mobile market with weakened operators, and enjoys a very comfortable position in the current operator-dominated environment. Unlike most mobile device manufacturers, RIM derives a large chunk of their revenue from service subscriptions. They sell into the least price-sensitive segment of the mobile market - business and government users. They have gotten their current market position by providing internet services on networks with poor data capabilities.

But all of this is changing. RIM's centralized email relay infrastructure is becoming dated and their services like push email and calendaring are in danger of becoming commoditized by copycat devices and internet cloud services.

I love my Blackberry Pearl and it's a great device. But I expect I'll be even happier as an iPhone user when it arrives in Canada...

Jeff