Growth in the African mobile industry surpassed estimates 4 years ago, the ITU said in a report of telecom indicators released Monday. The goal of 200 million users by 2010 was reached in 2006, and furthered by another 65 million in 2007, the report said. Africa has the world’s highest growth in mobile subscribers, the ITU said. The sub-Sahara region had the highest growth rate on the continent since 2004, it said. Africa remains far behind other regions with a mere 3.1 fixed telephone lines per 100 Africans and 4.8 Internet users per 100 inhabitants in 2006, the report said. Broadband penetration is low across Africa. Only five African countries had more than 1 percent of the population with broadband, the report said. By comparison, average broadband penetration in Organization for Economic Co- operation and Development countries was 18.8 percent of inhabitants. Of OECD countries, Mexico, the lowest at 4.6 percent penetration, was 38 times better than Africa’s, the report said.
Americans watched 13 percent more online videos in March than in February, said comScore. U.S. Internet users dialed up a collective 11.5 billion online videos during the month, a 64 percent jump from the year earlier. Google, and its YouTube video portal, increased the share of those views to 38 percent, from 35.6 percent in February. The next-closest competitor, Fox Interactive Media, handled 4.2 percent of the online video traffic. Google drew 85.7 million viewers in March, compared to Fox’s 54.3 million, Yahoo’s 37.5 million and Viacom’s 26.6 million.
The FCC should reject proposals for addressing white- spaces interference by Google, Motorola and others, Shure said in ex partes filed Tuesday. The plans require a “leap of faith” the FCC should avoid, the microphone maker said. The Google concept supports “is particularly troubling because it wrongly requires incumbent users to shoulder the burden for interference protection from new devices,” Shure said. The burden of persuasion should be on “the companies proposing to introduce new interfering devices,” it said. Shure urged the commission “to scrutinize and test” a disabling-beacon idea raised by Motorola. The Motorola beacons “suffer from many technical hurdles that have not yet been addressed,” it said. Motorola’s notion has “cumbersome operational requirements” wasteful of spectrum and reliant on unproven spectrum-sensing tools, Shure said. The system wouldn’t protect most wireless microphones from interference, it said. Shure also criticized Google’s proposal for a microphone “safe harbor” in channels 36 to 38 off-limits to other white-spaces devices (CD March 25 p2). That plan would give “little protection to wireless microphones because it involves channels that are either unavailable under the [FCC] rules to wireless microphone use (channel 37) or are already significantly populated by DTV stations throughout the country,” Shure said. Rather than proceed with any portable white-spaces plan, the FCC should “refocus” on fixed service proposals, Shure said. Fixed services “present fewer interference issues,” creating a “truly safe harbor” for microphones, it said.
Cisco, Motorola and others had total 2007 set-top box sales exceeding $6 billion, up 25 percent from the previous year, In-Stat said Wednesday. More than 41 million devices shipped worldwide in 2007, a 38 percent increase. Of those, 11 million had PVR or other advanced features, a 30 percent increase from 2006, the researcher said.
Three daytime music video shows on Viacom’s BET and MTV cable networks wallow in sexual, violent, profane and obscene content, the Parents TV Council said Thursday. Deconstructing four weeks of BET’s Rap City and 106 & Park and Sucker Free on MTV, the group tallied 2,989 instances of offensive or adult content, the report said. During March, the shows averaged one display of mature content -- vulgarities, scenes of a “sexual nature” and the like -- every 38 seconds, it said. In December, the average was one per minute, it said. Officials at BET and MTV didn’t immediately return messages to comment.
Broadband technology can play a big role in empowering minorities, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, said on a panel hosted by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. Representatives of the Pew Internet Project, the Alliance for Public Technology and the Internet Innovation Alliance urged Congress and business to improve broadband access among the underprivileged.
Media General will pay off about $38 million in debt with proceeds from its sale of SP Newsprint to White Birch Paper Co., it said late Monday. Media General will pay off $60 million to $65 million more in debt after pending sales of five TV stations close, it said. By year-end, Media General expects its debt to total about $770 million. Less debt and lower interest rates will let the company save about $17 million this year, it said. Media General plans to cut capital spending by more than half to $20 million in 2008. “We are also actively focused on performance improvements that will counter the current advertising environment challenges, especially the impact of the deep recession in Florida,” Media General CEO Marshall Morton said in a release. The company’s stock surged 14 percent Tuesday.
VSAT service provider Gilat Satellite Networks agreed to sell the company to a group of investors led by Mivtach Shamir Holdings for $475 million, the company said. Gilat shareholders will get $11.40 per share cash, a 38 percent premium over the stock’s average closing price before Mivtach first made its offer. Other investors in the proposed sale include Gores Group and companies affiliated with Roy Ben- Yami, Ami Lustig and Eytan Stibbe and DGB Investments, Gilat said. Gilat’s board approved the agreement and the sale is expected to be completed by September, the company said. Gilat claims a 20.5 percent share of the VSAT market in the U.S. through its subsidiary Spacenet, which lists Dollar General, Goodyear and Kroger among its customers. It recently agreed to provide 1,964 VSAT terminals to Latin American CE retailer Grupo Electra.
More American women than men watch streaming video, use DVRs, play online games and use social networking sites, said Solutions Research Group. About 15 percent of online women viewed streaming video last month, compared to 11 percent of males. Women with DVRs are “more enthusiastic” about them than males, averaging nine uses per week, compared to about eight for men, Solutions said. About 70 percent of women said they played a PC game in the last month vs. 69 percent of men. Men still lead console gaming, with half participating. However, that gap is narrowing, Solutions said. About 38 percent of women played a console game in the last month, up from 35% a year before. And about 42 percent of online women visited a social networking site in the last month, up from 30 percent the year before.
An MIT study said cellphones could be major economic empowerment tools in U.S. It said providing cellphones to the 38 percent of America’s 45 million poorest households now without them could help them get work or make money worth $2.9 billion to $11 billion. The report was by Nicholas Sullivan of MIT’s Center for Developmental Communications. The research was based on a scientific national sampling of 1,005 households by Opinion Research Center and a statistically large online sampling of 110,000 TracFone prepaid phone users, said ORC. A separate ORC survey said 31 percent of those working either full-or part-time said their “cell phone has helped make money, get work, or get new customers.” Sullivan told a phone conference that “far more blue collar (40 percent) than white collar professionals (27 percent) say their cell phone has helped them make money.” About 62 percent of those who had earned money thanks to their cellphone said they had earned more than $500 in the previous year -- and 50 percent had made more than $1,000. More than half the men in the $500-plus category attributed earnings of more than $1,000 to their cellphone. The overall average income gain was $748.