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Advocacy groups notify AT&T of net neutrality complaint with the FCC over FaceTime restrictions
Public advocacy groups aren't all that impressed with AT&T's justifications for limiting FaceTime access over 3G and 4G to those who spring for its costlier Mobile Share plans. Free Press, Public Knowledge and the Open Technology Institute have served formal notice to AT&T that they plan to file a net neutrality complaint with the FCC within 10 days. It's not hard to understand why, given the groups' existing pro-neutrality stances: the Free Press' policy lead Matt Wood argues that the carrier is unfairly pushing iOS users into plans they don't need, a particularly sore point for iPad-only customers that have no AT&T phones to share. We've reached out to AT&T for comment, although we're not expecting a change from its position that allowing app use over WiFi makes its restrictions okay. As for the FCC? It's mum on the current situation. A literal reading of its net neutrality rules, however, doesn't include a WiFi exemption and might not favor AT&T when Skype video is allowed and Verizon has no problems with unrestricted access.
US funds shadow networks, builds 'internet in a suitcase' for repressed protesters
Whether a repressive government, a buggy DNS server or a little old lady is behind your internet outage, it can't be much fun, but the US government sympathizes with your plight if you're dealing with reason number one. The New York Times reports that the US State Department will have spent upwards of $70 million on "shadow networks" which would allow protesters to communicate even if powers that be pull the traditional plug -- so far, it's spent at least $50 million on a independent cell phone network for Afghanistan, and given a $2 million grant to members of the New America Foundation creating the "internet in a suitcase" pictured above. It's a batch of mesh networking equipment designed to be spirited into a country to set up a private network. Last we'd heard, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had pledged $25 million for just this sort of internet freedom, and the New America Foundation had applied for some of those bucks -- see our more coverage links below -- but it sounds like the money is flowing fast, and in multiple directions now.
OTI report finds US and Canada have the most expensive cellphone plans, India and Hong Kong the cheapest
It's far from the first study to compare the cost of cellphone plans around the world, but this new report from the New America Foundation's Open Technology Initiative (which counts Google CEO Eric Schmidt as a board member) does look to be a bit more thorough than most, which might help to dissuade some of the criticism levied at past studies from the likes of the CTIA. Of course, the ultimate findings of the study aren't exactly a surprise, with the group again finding that the United States and Canada have the most expensive cellphone plans in the world. As you can see in the chart above, that takes into account voice, text and data rates, which added up to a minimum $67.70 and $59.99 per month for a "complete" postpaid cellphone package in Canada and the US, respectively. That's as opposed to just $13.50 and $12.90 per month in Hong Kong and India, which are considerably cheaper in large part because they ether rely on a pay-per-use business model or a combination of pay-per-use and a small preset limit. That's just scratching the surface though -- hit up the source link below for the complete report with charts aplenty.
