Cellular Wars

The reckless year of 2011 could be described by any of the following adjectives ~ volatile; tumulus; chaotic; liberating. From the rise of the Arab spring to the eviction of Occupy Wall Street, from Big Bank bailouts to BP blow out, from dictator deaths to Head-of-State turnovers, this year has seen more action than a Herman Cain fundraiser for Single Moms.




Even if the Mayan calender promises mankind one more year on earth, could we still manage to happily and mutually exist without the luxury and comfort of our mobile smart devices?

The question is not at all rhetorical, nor is it unrealistic. For example, just in this month alone, cellular phone manufacturers, patent troll firms and convoluted legal decisions worldwide have produced a tangled skein of myriad court orders, rulings and injunctions that threaten to short circuit the Global Wireless Network as we know it.

Research In (slow)Motion

Blackberry may have put RIM in the yellow pages, so to speak, as the Canadian handset manufacturer had dominated the corporate wireless market throughout the 1990's. But the hardware giant has now been sacked in the back field in regards to their newly released Playbook Tablet, when RIM announced that - because of market saturation - the new tablet would be dumped on holiday consumers for nearly half the target price, a stock write off of $485 million.

Call it bad luck, or call it uninformed tech thieves; and if not, call it the most brilliant product debut ever devised, but the theft of $1.7 million worth of Playbook tablets from a truck stop in Illinois is hardly even worth mentioning, if it were not for the related fact that the most popular handset in history, the HTC, is banned in the U.S. beginning next year.

If it makes sense to steal flawed devices that nobody wants - and in the same week ban superior smart phones that are in high demand - then chalk my vote up for Newt Gingrich, because ying is yang, up is down and cellular signals really are driving the population of this planet batshit crazy.

Given the recent gunslinger behavior of RIM execs here and here, it is quite plausible that the Playbook - of which freight seemed to fall off the shelf before it was even thrown up - may indeed be an inside job, as RIM had stated neither the truck, the container, nor the pallets contained a single tracking device.

This is curious, considering that the rate of Christmas cargo high-jacking in the United States is trending. Gadget techies the world over salivate at the thought of acquiring pre-release smart devices, knowing full well that every second to crack it is one more second ahead of the rest of the field.

It is almost as if RIM wanted those tablets to go away.

Motorola vs. Handset Industry

Motorola, the mobile device manufacturer whose patented technology had always seemed to be on the defense side of litigation, suddenly came thundering out of the Europeans courts last week with a patent infringement ruling against roughly 85% of it's competitors, basically those of whom incorporated iOS operating systems for android. The list was far reaching, including - quite neatly - Apple.

In fact, it was safe to say that Apple had had their asses handed to them in a court of law.

Perhaps Apple's legal counsel had been ready for this, for Digitude Innovations had stepped onto the playing field by altering the landscape of legal precedent in a fashion deserving of hired goons. The patent infringement suits, filed with the International Trade Commission, included patents which had previously belonged to hardware manufacturers but were loaned or sold to Digitute in a loosely defined consortium, or cabal, who would then litigate on their behalf of the client in the event of a dispute.

Digitude is a new kind of patent investment vehicle because it seeks to team up with strategic players that can invest in Digitude not with money, but by contributing patents. The contributing entity would then get a license for all of Digitude’s patents, according to Digitude Chairman Robert Kramer.

Curiously, of the patents held by Digitude Innovations, four in particular had previously belonged to Apple. In a quiet move back in 2010 these were transferred to Cliff Islands LLC, a shell corporation whose non-exist offices included a mailing address located within the very same building of Digitude.

Founded in 2010, Digitude raised $50 million from Altitude Capital Partners, "with aims to acquire, aggregate, and license key technology areas within the consumer electronics and related technology fields in a patent consortium” — in other words, to buy up patents and then sue other companies until they settle and agree to pay licensing fees.

This, in case you've been living under a rock, is called "patent trolling".

Apple, as most of the world already knows, has recently cast aside their rosy shroud of innocence, embracing a role predominately held by Microsoft Corporation. Perhaps through the Redmond behemoth's early lessons Apple had learned the value (or profit margins) of crushing one's competition through patent law. In any event, Apple's legal counsel have been hard at work earning those salaries in courtroom battles, dispensing the so-called bitter pill - the one of which used to be Apple's drug of choice.

For Apple, negative press noise and saber-rattling is suppose to be a thing of the past, but with the waves they are us making, it's hard to believe Digitude did not stir the pot in the first place. Digitude issued a press release in April:

“Given the significant nature of this partnership and the other discussions underway, we expect to secure only one or two more such strategic partnerships in the coming months before we aggressively begin our licensing efforts.”

It is by these suits that injunctions are in place to de-stabize the current cellular network from anyone retaining a critical mass of technology licensing to operate.

Blood On Their Hand(sets) - The North Korean Wireless Cellular Network

It's hard to imagine life behind the iron curtain, such as the NKPR, or the North Korean despot government. Even after the recent passing death-by-fatigue of Kim Jong il, the reclusive peninsula still shines about as bright as a flashlight from outer space under watch of his son, Kim Jong un.

This is not to say Pyongyang is without wireless communications. In a country where hunger, strife and cruelty prevail on every level of human existence, even possession of a cell phone just as recently as four years ago was a crime punishable by death. It is astonishing now that, at a cost equal to a years' worth of wages, over 1 million cell phones are active among the Pyongyang social elite.

Of course, TMI is an acronym as alien to the North Korean as...well, let's just say they can certainly use some accurate information.

Kim Jong un, who is a self-proclaimed Internet expert, has an ear to the ground in that all Internet traffic is limited to the confines of the state, which offer about 1,500 crap sites - much akin to cable television in the United States.

These are quality sites for the tired, the weak, the spiritless, a propaganda machine that draws uncanny parallels when loosely compared to life in the West (granted, one really has to squint to see it).

Freedom lies along the borders: China, a source of illegal smart phone smuggling and leaky wi-fi networks, provide the Korean free-thinker with a signal into the world, to sanity, to their loved ones. However, one is certain to be quick about it. Signal triangulation can result in public execution.

Unlike China's own state sponsored cellular carriers, North Korea contracts out the service. Legal phones in North Korea are operated by Cairo-based Orascom Telecom Holding SAE and cannot be used for international calls.

The Arab Spring

Going into Iraq in 2002, President George W. Bush proclaimed, "Let America bring Democracy to Iraq, and it will spread like wildfire throughout the Middle East". It was looked on as incredibly jingoistic.
Today, however, that statement may well be viewed as 'visionary', giving credit where it is surprisingly due. Egypt and Libya, both who managed to break their bonds, continue to negotiate new Democratic government, while Syria and Tunisia are embattled, but spirited.

Uprisings and protests were spurred on by a burdening government, while hostilities stirred to life from unjust deaths, and in spite of this, coordination of a community comprising an entire country joined together as one. Organizing themselves into One Voice and with the use of communication tools such as twitter and facebook, demonstrators, with the aid of a google employee, managed to pry President Mubarak out of office in front of a world audience - Revolution-Style.

Of Egypt, many factors contributed to the successful revolt, including droves of classified documents released by Wiki-leaks. The U.S. State Department analysis of facebook protest group Kefaya showed that American officials thought little of the Egypt uprisings. It read: “The stated goal of replacing the current regime with a parliamentary democracy prior to the 2011 presidential elections is highly unrealistic, and is not supported by the mainstream opposition.”

Egyptian "thank you" postcards are no doubt flooding Hillary Clinton's mailbox.

Bay Area Protest Plunge

When online hacker group 'Anonymous' called for a San Fransisco Bay Area protest in August, instructions were to assemble within the tubes of the Bay Area Rapid Transit System. Dubbed 'No Justice, No BART',  it perhaps modeled itself after Flashmob modus operandi, the entire unit of the protest organization hinging a signal to be received via twitter and facbook.

Those instructions never came, because management for BART - who had caught wind of the demonstration beforehand - had ordered wireless wi-fi networks at specific locations to be switched off.

While detractors worldwide cried foul, transit management reserved the right by reinforcing this policy in a recent review.

This had marked the first time that cellular antennas were switched off to prevent a public demonstration anywhere in the world. It's also ironic to point out that this had occurred in a country that actually has a constitution protecting free speech, whereas many Middle Eastern monarchies sentence protesters to death.

NTSB Guidelines For Cell Phones

Take a look at the most recent recommendation from the National Transportation Safety Board. It seems that our Dearly Beloved Leader, Big Brother, would like to gently remind americans that it might be a wise idea to support legislation banning the use of mobile devices while operating motor vehicles.

While we could applaud this as a genuine, conscience effort to raise awareness, the fear instilled by the possibility of an inattentive texting driver is a joyride by comparison to the absolute terror when police have the right to search and copy your mobile devices at any time, including pictures and video.

Anything can and will be used against you in a court of law.

According to IQ Carrier, your smart phone does record and track locations by GPS, and - only for the purposes of improving research - keeps a running log of websites visited, with no known removal or opt out privilege. However, don't fret: digital rights in the 21st century include your 1st amendment right to a password, and the right to shut up about it.

The computer brain in every motor vehicle can be used as evidence in a court of law, and in some states, even basic individual protections from illegal search are stripped from arrestees. Much the same case law can be equally applied to cell phones.

In theory, the only way to prove that a driver was not texting is to examine every device in the passenger compartment. If a texting ban were to be strictly enforced, then a simple Police backup application will hang all of our dirty laundry out to dry.

Cellular Towers And Our Health

To recap, one can easily understand the social risks that come with possession of a mobile device. But these only address outside influences who attempt to control by the use of sheer force.

It should be noted that the effects of cellular signals on other species who inhabitate this planet are having a time of it. The disappearing honey bees have been a subject of controversy for a decade, attributing the decreasing populations to Colony Collapse Disorder. Studies can be done with your own handset to prove how cellular signals can affect bees.

Cellular towers that are erected in populated areas often spawn skin rashes, diseased cattle, infertile ducks, spinning children and E.P.A. quotes that would scare any Mobile Giant.

And, just as Herman Cain had said; "It still ain't over yet..."