Reading Assignment: Thursday, 11-4

I apologize, but I had to take today off for family medical issues. The video below is a T Mobile ad that is mocking the iPhone 4 (the guy on the left) who is forced to carry the burden of the "slow" AT&T network on his back. The girl in pink represents T-Mobile, who claims that they can make video chats from pretty much everywhere, not just on WiFi.

Your assignment today is to read this article.  Keep in mind that AT&T had this response to this add yesterday:  "T-Mobile’s claims about 4G are based on the same HSPA+ technology we have deployed to 180 million people today, more than T-Mobile’s reported 140 million, and we’ll have it rolled out to 250 million people by the end of this month, substantially more than the 200 million T-Mobile says it will have by year-end." What does this basically mean? Nobody has a 4G network right now. 


BGR claims that the the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) has defined 4G as "for a service to qualify as 4G, it must deliver peak download speeds of approximately 100Mbps in high-mobility environments (cell phones)." Personally, from my cruddy link at home, my iPhone only gets .6 Mbps; not 6, certainly not 60, but "point" 6. 


On WiFi, on the other hand, my iPad gets 10.6 Mbps. My home computer, on a WIRED cable network gets 29, and here at Colony High School this morning, again on a WIRED connection, my computer managed to get 85 Mbps, which is the fastest I have ever personally seen.


Obviously, no cell phone connection anywhere in the country is anywhere near 100 Mbps (Mega bits per second).


Then, take this quiz based on the reading. 


If you wish, you may comment below for bonus points. Please make your comments specific and relevant to the topic.