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Zuckerberg Dines with European Telco Execs

posted by Dopefish on Friday February 28 2014, @08:00AM   Printer-friendly
from the nickle-and-dime dept.

strattitarius writes "Mark Zuckerberg met with top mobile and telco executives to address concerns that Internet providers are becoming "simple pipes" as apps like WhatsApp eat into high-margin over-the-top services such as text messaging and even voice communications. Orange SA CEO Stephane Richard stated "The risk for us is being excluded from the world of services".

It would seem that the telcos are realizing that they have been behind the curve as Richard stated "A service like WhatsApp, to be honest, that's something we could've and should've come up with before". Ironically in doing so, they basically make the case that they had every chance and advantage to create these apps and monetize them just as WhatsApp and Skype have done."

 
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  • (Score: 0) by Bill, Shooter Of Bul on Friday February 28 2014, @01:44PM

    by Bill, Shooter Of Bul (3170) on Friday February 28 2014, @01:44PM (#8636)

    Yup, this, in spades.
    They tried their way of running their own j2me app stores that sucked and charged more for a ring tone than itunes charged for the actual full song. They screwed it up, and there is no putting the genie back in the bottle or rewinding time.

    Also, this fear of being turned into a dumb pipe was why every other carrier turned down the iphone. They understood exactly what giving up control over the os on a powerful device would do to them.

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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by edIII on Friday February 28 2014, @04:23PM

    by edIII (791) on Friday February 28 2014, @04:23PM (#8744)

    I for one have no sympathy for them.

    If your revenue came from captive audiences and overpriced services, and not true innovation and delivering what the customer actually wants, you deserve to die. That's the *WHOLE* raison d'etre for capitalism and free markets right? Survival of the fittest?

    We cherish those ideals over in the US, but we clearly do not apply them. Anytime we can take down a monopoly and destroy a piece of the old guard is a time for celebration.

    What they don't understand is their complaint of being a dumb pipe falls on deaf ears. We are not better off with their monopolies and 'added services'. They will become, and absolutely should be, dump pipes.

    Data is just going to become something as banal as water or electricity, but hopefully with more options for connectivity.

    Common carriers and dump pipes is the only logical solution for an efficient infrastructure devoid of all the bullshit that lead to million % profit margins on SMS.