Blog of Leonid Mamchenkov

In the last two years, the well-known fact of Google offering free WiFi Internet access in Mountain View, California has almost been forgotten (except, of course, by people living in Mountain View and Googlers themselves).  At the time of news many were wondering about why Google is doing such a thing.  Not it all suddenly became obvious…

Slashdot reports that Google is preparing for a bid in the upcoming auction set up by FCC for a 700 Mhz radio frequency.  There are a few interesting twists about the offer – “open access” and “nation-wide”.  With these news, it’s hard to see the Mountain View setup as something else rather than a test platform.  With the recently released Android open mobile platform, the connections seem obvious.

The stakes for the band are high, and Google is planning to bid at least $4.6 billion USD dollars.  And they are paying this all out of their own pocket (not sharing with another company, etc).   Wh?  Because there are quiet a few things on Google’s agenda.

If you are like me, and need more information on this whole thing, here are a few pointers:

• Wikipedia : 700 Mhz wireless spectrum auction
• Engadget Mobile : posts tagged with 700mhz
• GigaOm : 700 Mhz explained in 10 steps
• GigaOm : Inside the 700 MHz spectrum land grab
• Daily Wireless : 700MHZ Goes Live
• Daily Wireless : Consumers to FCC: 700MHz Democracy Now!

P.S. : Now those Indian telecoms have to re-think their position.

P.P.S. : In the completely unrelated news,  Ubiquiti Networks announced world’s first 700 MHz WiFi radio.  Here is the official press release.

Web Worker Daily asks an interesting question – “How do you handle web rudeness?”

This is probably a nobrainer for people who have been on the web for some time, but newcomers, especially those to the blogosphere and the world of forums, are often puzzled.  It’s very easy to insult someone on the web.  Pick a forum or a blog.  Write a comment.  You’re done.  And sad fact of life is that many people do just that.

Having a blog (albeit not the most popular) for a few years now, I’ve seen some of that rudeness and some of those insults.  Both private and public.  And here is how I go about them.

First of all, I treat both private and public insults equally. I don’t differentiate.  If I can think of the way to make fun of it, I respond publicly. If I can’t, I just delete and ignore the comment.  If I get two or more insults in a row  from the same person, I ban, blacklist, and filter the originating username, IP address, and email.  And then I don’t care.

My thinking is that there is enough crap going on already, to take some more from the Web.  I consider the Internet to be the best thing since… since… since… since the beginning of times.  If something bad is coming out  of it, I either convert it into good (humor, smile, good mood), or I totally get rid of it.  It’s as simple as that.

P.S.: Just to make something crystal clear – with non-insulting comments I respond in the same scope.  If the message was private, I reply in private. If it was public, I reply in public.  Sometimes, if I feel like the public can benefit from a private discussion, I’d ask the permission of the other party to publish the conversation.  To be on the safe side, I’d often forward the preview of the post too, to clarify what exactly will be published.  Insulting comments never get a private reply – it’s either nothing, or a public joke.

Qatar is a country I know nothing about. And whenever I hear the name of a country that I know nothing about, the first thing I want to know is if they have Internet connectivity over there. It appears, that I should have be more careful with my Internet criteria evaluation – via via TechCrunch:

Qatar has a single ISP, Qtel, with a single IP address shared by the entire country.

So, the fact that there is Internet connectivity today does not necessarily imply that there will be Internet connectivity tomorrow…

Today I became a happy owner of PrimeTel PrimeHome installation, also known as Triple Play. Triple Play is this new way of bundling together loads of television channels, ADSL Internet connection, and really cheap telephony. It’s said to cost only 25 CYP month, but I got lucky and received a promotion offer of free installation and 3 month of service free of charge as well.

I didn’t have any time to play with it just yet, but it looks quite good. Here are the things that I’ve noticed during my short experience:

• Television has an electronic TV guide with a time schedule for all programs for all channels. This is very handy.
• Internet connection was way to easy to install. Just plugged the Ethernet cable straight into my laptop and I was done.
• Sound quality in the telephone is a bit less than CYTA’s. There is some minor background noise all the time. But it’s not as bad as it can sound.
• Switching channels on TV is a lot slower than before. This will need some getting used to. But it’s a fair trade for not having to configure any of the channels, crispy clear quality of image and sound, TV guide, and the selection of channels.

I’ll probably post more about it later, when I’d played more with it, but don’t hold your breath on that one.

P.S.: I might be somewhat biased being an employee of PrimeTel Ltd., and having received the package free of charge (installation + 3 month). Take my words with a grain of salt. And pepper.

A couple of weeks ago, Vladimir mentioned in his blog that he managed to pay road tax online. I have to agree, this is a technological breakthrough in functionality offered by Cyprus government’s websites.

While paying the tax is now possible, the website is still very confusing. It provided practically no information or instructions on what to do. Now the site looks a bit different though. Notice that ‘Here’ icon that blinks as fast as your computer can render it?

So many people wanted to do it online, and so many failed. Some of them even posted comments on Vladimir’s blog, providing their information (ID numbers and car registration numbers) in hopes that it would somehow work.

Technology gone wrong…

P.S.: As sad as it is, it’s also very funny. Hilarious even.

Let me do a little side note, before I start – Mom, you should really read this post! :)

Now, just a couple of days ago I wrote that I decided to try Skype. I downloaded it and installed on my computer. There were few nice things about it that I noticed immediately, but there are so many more that need a second look!

Here we go…

[Read the rest of this entry...]

I think I’ve heard about Skype from more people than there are in China. I’ve finally decided to download and try it out.

Cross-platform – nice.

RPM package is available for Fedora Core 3, which worked just fine on Fedora Core 4 – nice.

I don’t have not even a single microphone – not nice.

Even if I had, talking would have been difficult most times (office people or kid shouting or sleeping at home) – not nice.

Possibility to call regular/mobile phones from the computer for an extremely low price – nice.

Chat is built-in – nice.

User identification is based on nicknames, not emails (which change) or ugly long numbers (which are impossible to remember) – nice. (My nickname is mamchenkov, by the way).

Without any contacts and without microphone, I can’t really check the functionality or the interface thoroughly.

Do any of you, guys, use Skype? How do I contact you?

One of the thoughts that I had recently, due to a couple of projects that I am involved in:

It is practically impossible to comprehend the size of the web until there is a need to download and parse a large part of it.

I was taking one semi-funny semi-serious online test about Internet addiction. I went through all the questions and was about to press the submit button. There was a text under the button saying that after I press it, I will get the results of the test in the text area below. I pressed it. And the browser crashed.

At first I though it was a joke. Than I realized that it wasn’t. Than I started thinking of what I should do. If I went back and did the test again, I would knew without it that I was addicted. If I didn’t go back, I wouldn’t know if I am.

Finally, I decided that I am somewhat addicted and that I shouldn’t take the test anymore. In fact, I should probably take less online tests as most of them are as inaccurate as horoscopes printed in newspapers. Yeah. Amen to that.