Thursday, October 25, 2007

Facebook's Moskovitz: Open up the wireless garden

As reported in SeattleTimes.com:

Standing where the mature, wireless CEO typically stands, young Dustin Moskovitz (Facebook co-founder) took the stage yesterday and offered his two cents to the CTIA attendees:

"...to remain successful wireless carriers must give developers greater access to their networks."
Great advice, and good luck with that.

All sarcasm intended.

Hey, look how long it took for something as simple as number portability to happen (no, I don't really believe it was all that simple). But now we're asking for the carriers to embrace a spirit of openness with regard to their networks?! C'mon, Steve Largent's ancestors are going to turn over in their graves if you keep talking that way!

Sarcasm aside, I applaud you, Sir Moskovitz - with you all the way, dude.

And I'm encouraged by the talk about Apple recognizing the importance of openness, and their plans to open up the iPhone in February to outside developers. And, that Google continues to be an outspoken advocate of open access (obviously, to their long-term benefit).

Hey, I'm on the carrier side of the biz, but I just can't see how openness would negatively impact the industry long-term, especially as it pertains to job growth for all things wireless.

As you'd expect, I'm an advocate for anything that is good for job growth ... specifically, wireless job growth.

So, while I don't expect that we carriers are going to open the proverbial network kimono overnight (given our history of maintaining the so-called walled gardens that restrict users from buying or using applications previously unapproved or those the carrier isn't selling), I am encouraged.

Here's to baby-steps toward openness.

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