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Tackling wireless network congestion
A man displays his iPhone 4 in New York City.
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TEXT OF STORY
Bill Radke: You know that Verizon ad, the "Can you hear me now" guy?
Verizon's "Can you hear me now?" guy: Can you hear me now? Good.
Yeah, that's the one. Verizon retired that ad campaign this summer, saying it's time to focus on all the other things people do with cell phones, besides making calls. That's right -- talking on your telephone is so quaint. But then, here's the question: Can the wireless infrastructure we have in place handle all that innovation?
We asked reporter Cathy Duchamp to check it out.
Cathy Duchamp: The strength of the nation's wireless networks may come down to one strange sentence.
Computer voice: These days a chicken leg is a rare dish.
This is what's called a "Harvard Sentence." It includes most of the variations in the human voice. It's one of dozens of phrases used by the telecom industry to test how wireless networks perform at the most basic level: A phone call.
The result:
Computer voice: These days a chicken leg is f... [garbled].
Habib Huq: So the quality of that was not good.
That's Habib Huq. He's operations director for Global Wireless Solutions, based in Dulles, Va. Think of him as the real world "Can you hear me now?" guy.
Huq: We are on the corner of Route 7 and the Georgetown Pike. So, we're going to be driving Georgetown Pike...
Huq's company owns a fleet of 60 mini-vans like the one we're in. Each has a bank of computers that benchmark the performance of the various wireless providers: AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile among them. Today, we're on a test drive of the northern Virginia suburbs outside of Washington D.C.
Huq: This is exactly the typical failure, they're trying to access their e-mail but could not.
Huq says 10 years ago, the quality of that chicken leg sentence was all that mattered. Today, as we heard, it's still an issue. But so is data speed.
Huq: It gets complicated. Who thought four, five years ago you'll be talking to someone on your cell phone, and at the same time, surfing the Internet. We didn't even think about it. Because of the new technology, new issues come along.
The new issues boil down to congestion. There isn't enough room on the wireless networks to handle the flood of data coming from people who upload photos, download videos or listen to public radio on their smart phones.
Greg Rosston: The business model has shifted from the networks determining everything that went on to device manufacturers having a much bigger say in what gets used on the network and what kinds of things are done.
That's Stanford University economist Greg Rosston. He says smart phonemakers have built devices based on unlimited data plans. But the networks haven't expanded fast enough to handle the tsunami of data.
Rosston: One of the things that AT&T has done has been to introduce bandwidth caps, or pricing for bandwidth.
Meaning, how much data you upload or download -- how much bandwidth you use. The more data you move, the more you pay. That's a way to control demand.
Or, you can increase capacity on the wireless networks. That doesn't mean building more cell towers. Most of those wars are over. You get more capacity by putting more powerful antennas and software on those towers, and by giving wireless companies more spectrum. That's the invisible part of the wireless system.
Rosston says television broadcasters have too much spectrum and should sell some to wireless companies.
Rosston: And allow it to be used for something much more useful than over-the-air television, which is watched only by about 10 percent of the country right now.
Until all of this gets sorted out, smart phones won't work as well as they could. But for the most part, consumers aren't rebelling.
Lee Vaughn: Well yeah, you're frustrated but what's the use?
Lee Vaughn works along the route we took on that drive test through northern Virginia. A dropped call?
Vaughn: You just pick back up and you go. If that's gonna blow your lid, you need to work on some other things than your cell plan.
Habib Huq with Global Wireless agrees. As we finish up our test drive, he explains that smart phones are really hand-held computers. We all have to reboot our laptops when they hiccup.
Huq: There are certain things in life you just have to live with, and a dropped call is one of those things. Doesn't matter what network you're on. You have your phone. You just have to live with it.
In other words, if you have problems with your cell phone, it's because you still think of it as a phone. If you want innovation, you have to accept imperfection.
Near Dulles, Va., I'm Cathy Duchamp for Marketplace.
The problem isn't TV spectrum that can be used for cellular, it is an architectural problem. Cellular is set up as a one-to-one architecture, while TV is set up as a one-to-many (one NY TV station can see 13M people from one tower). The congestion occurs when people are trying to watch bandwidth heavy video content. The solution is to allow broadcasters the right to carry the video portions along with their digital TV signals, which is easy to do. The further problem is that the FCC wants to take spectrum from TV and auction it--the catch is that the only companies that can afford the spectrum (Verizon & AT&T) will either sit on the spectrum, warehousing it, or use it in a cellular architecture, which means no matter how much spectrum they have, there will always be congestion. There are ways to have TV and mobile wireless while lessening network congestion, it is just a question of the FCC allowing the marketplace to take care of the needs.
I can't believe the idiocy of the spokespeople for the industry which makes and supports SmartPhones. They said that if poor voice quality and dropped calls irritate you, you should "get a life." And, so far as I can tell, your reporter was lapping up the industry Kool-Aid.
I am pretty well fed up with the unacceptable voice quality on my Verizon Android "phone." As a high tech toy it is OK, but a phone it is not. Most times when I get an incoming call, I have to call the caller back on my landline in order to have a conversation.
What are we supposed to do? Carry a DumbPhone as well as our expensive toy Smart(Un)Phone?
These guys should be working for BP, and as journalists who don't even challenge their assertions, maybe you should be thinking of a career change, too.
Marketplace:
I was annoyed when listening your August 25 story covering the wireless network congestion. One of your guests callously suggested that all the over-the-air television spectrum should be sold to free up more room for cellular phone spectrum because on a "pesky" 10% of viewers get their television over the air and it was a waste. That could be 15 to 25 million households.
So, millions of people should be giving up their television reception so others can have the convenience of watching Hulu on their cell phone in their car (or some other nonsense delivered via the web)?
During these recessionary times, many people have had to turn to over-the-air TV and this genius wants to preference those that can afford $30 a month data plans. Yeah, that's a great idea.
And for the record, I have cable, but did use over-the-air television for years.
Respectfully,
Randy Spears
Columbus, OH
The cellular networks do not want the TV spectrum to provide TV to the phone. They want the old TV spectrum because that section of spectrum can travel further and penetrate most objects. Then providing cellular service over that spectrum instead of the current spectrum. You have places now where you could have received the old TV spectrum but no cellular service. In the future, you would be able to have cellular service almost anywhere in the national.
Just before the introduction of the iPhone 4, AT&T admitted that since the introduction of the iPhone their data traffic had increased by 7000% - that's 70 times - and they had spent almost $20B trying to keep up with traffic. Problem is, they are not keeping up. Now the cellular companies want to capture some of the TV spectrum so they can use it to deliver - ta da - TV over the phone! That would mean there would be 4 ways you can get TV - broadcast the old fashioned way, CATV, IPTV over the internet and mobile TV over wireless. Make that 5 if you consider the Internet can be accessed over a landline (copper or fiber) or wireless (WiFi.)
Do we really need to deliver TV so many ways? Has anyone considered how inefficient that is?
And BTW, we still call them "cell phones" and many of us still make voice calls, when we can...but for how long?
Completely agree. There is TOO much bandwidth owned by TV and given most of what's on EVEN CABLE TV is crap (infomercials and endless miles of pointless BS reality show nonsense), those frequencies would be MUCH more sensibly put into use by those wanting to make a simple PHONE CALL to another human being.
The Atlantic recently wrote about how mobile phone coverage in many other countries is better than it is in the US. I think our poor service is unacceptable, and I think that the phone companies who say "that's life" are so non-customer focused that it's pathetic: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/01/how-america-can-rise...
No, we *don't* all have to reboot our laptops when they hiccup. Anyone who does is running an inferior operating system or truly shoddy applications. Any program that can't handle predictable but unexpected failures is simply badly written.
In regards to the assumption that dropped calls and poor wireless service should be acceptable.....
I spent close to $500 for the phone and over $2500 a year for service so yes, I feel that i have a right to be frustrated with the poor technology and service. If the technology hasn't been perfected, then it shouldn't be available. Especially at these prices.
