Cellular Networks or Why America Sucks

[Yegolev]

Fact is that I usually had 4-5 bars with Cingular

Are bars a uniform system of measurement?  I have pretty much come to the conclusion that if you get any signal at all Cingular starts counting at 3.

It's the only measuring tool I have.  However your description fits with my experience.

[shiznitz]

Well, the one thing we do have over Europe is better broadband. Or at least we used to. Lots of residential customers in continental Europe are stuck with ADSL (1.5Mbs) and there is no FiOS effort over there. The best TV is still satellite. The cable plant is slowing catching up to satellite, but it is not there yet.  Strange since the landmass of North America favors satellite while the density of Europe would seem to favor cable.

[veredus]

You shouldn't be on the phone while driving anyways.  The intersection is just looking out for you by telling you to hang up and drive.

The busiest section of the busiest freeway at 5:00pm goes like 5 miles an hour and being a freeway it has no intersections. 

It's still functionally equivalent to driving around with a .08 blood alcohol level

So you're saying it's perfectly safe? 

[Venkman]

Nobody's allowed to make laws that provide for "within reason", because it only takes one yutz shaving while eating while on the cell to screw up a whole highway worth of days. Politicians get to pat themselves on the back with joke-easy laws like "no talking while driving", when the result is not actually solving the "problem" as it is forcing people back to retail to by headsets.

Some people are better equipped to drive while talking than others. If someone's gonna get in an accident because they were distracted on the phone (even with an earpiece), chances are they'd have gotten in that accident arguing with their wife, or loading a CD into the dash, or yelling at the kids, or any of a hundred other things that people do in a car when they're a) stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic; or, b) traveling on a laser-straight road for an hour.

[Righ]

Well, the one thing we do have over Europe is better broadband.

[Sheepherder]

Does the Canada figure include Satellite?  Because right now I am not playing WoW because grinding single mobs in the overworld exceeds my bandwidth capabilities.

[Polysorbate80]

Some people are better equipped to drive while talking than others. If someone's gonna get in an accident because they were distracted on the phone (even with an earpiece), chances are they'd have gotten in that accident arguing with their wife, or loading a CD into the dash, or yelling at the kids, or any of a hundred other things that people do in a car when they're a) stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic; or, b) traveling on a laser-straight road for an hour.

We recently had Strayer here in the studio to discuss his research for some online material for a psychology course relating to cognition and attention.  I haven't finished the postproduction yet, but some tidbits from the material:

Some 2-3% of the population can hold a cellphone conversation while driving without impairment.  Problem is, the other ~97% of the population is convinced that they're all part of that 3%.  It's also apparently not something you can train yourself to do; that is, you don't get better at it with practice.

The actual accident risk increase is about 4x normal, which is about the same as being over the legal limit.  Texting while driving?  Not surprisingly, about 8x the normal danger.

Having a conversation with an adult (who is aware of the driving conditions and rules of the road) does not impair driving.  Having a conversation with a child *can* increase your risk, because the child doesn't really know what's going on and may actively seek to divert your attention--so strap the li'l pests down and duct-tape their mouths shut (Ok, he didn't say that part... )

Incidentally, talking with a blind passenger poses the same risk as a cell phone conversation.

[Oban]

Incidentally, talking with a blind passenger poses the same risk as a cell phone conversation.

This is interesting, is it because the driver is focusing on the blind person to gauge their reaction to the conversation?  I tried to do a google search, but nothing came up other than the dangers of hybrid cars smooshing blind people.

[Polysorbate80]

Normally, passengers will adjust their conversation if the driving conditions demand it, and can even act as extra eyes (or completely back-seat drive, for that matter).  Blind passengers don't have that same situational awareness of the driving conditions and the driver's needs, so tend not to know when they should stop distracting the driver. 

Edit:  just a guess, do hybrid cars sound different enough to catch blind pedestrians unaware?

[Trippy]

Hybrids that can run on the electric-motor only (like the Prius) are very very quiet in that mode.

[Lantyssa]

Yeah.  My Corolla often catches people unaware (much, much worse now that all college students walk around parking lots not paying any attention with their damn ipods).  Electric cars though?  Whisper silent.  When you're used to hearing an engine it can be quite eerie.

[Jeff Kelly]

Well I can only comment for Germany.

We have 4 Providers here. All of them provide Service to 99% of the Population (roughly 96% of the Area). 2 Providers only operate in the 1800 MHz Band (because they started a few years after the first two when the 900 MHz Frequencies were already sold), the other two operate in the 900 MHz bands.

All of them provide very good to decent indoor coverage, even in the 1800 MHz bands although Germany has a lot of trees and most buildings are concrete or brick and mortar.

All providers provide nationwide 3G coverage and all metropolitan areas are now HSPA capable (7.5 MBit/s up and 5 MBit/s down). Vodafone and O2 even offer DSL-like intrenet access over 3G networks.

All of them tried music subscription services, internet portal services and other crap for sometime but all of their efforts tanked so nowadays they tend to offer bandwidth packages or even flatrates and even stopped selling crippled branded phones (except logos and background images).

T-Mobile even ofers a VoIP package for their contracts.

The euivalent of an AT&T iPhone contract (1000 Minutes, unlimited texts, internet flatrate) costs 79 Euro, 100 Minutes are available for 10 Eur, 1 GB also.

The networks are already planning their LTE introduction in 2010 and 2011. Cellular service in Germany is so good that a lot of people actually abolished their landlines and just use cellular services for phone and internet access.

You can also get DSL only services (not bundled to a cable TV or phone service) from any provider so a landline is not strictly necessary.

DSL coverage is also quite good and you usually get 16 MBit/s up/ 1 MBit/s down for as little as Eur 20 with 50/10 MBit/s VDSL being the upper limit at the moment.

TV on the other hand is quite bad in germany. No network offers HDTV broadcasts at the moment and most of them won't for at least another two to three years.

[Oban]

TV on the other hand is quite bad in germany.

[rattran]

Yeah.  My Corolla often catches people unaware (much, much worse now that all college students walk around parking lots not paying any attention with their damn ipods).  Electric cars though?  Whisper silent.  When you're used to hearing an engine it can be quite eerie.

I drive a loud, large car. It catches people unaware constantly on the campus of the local college. I blame it entirely on their ipods. And their inability to look either way before stepping into the street.

[RhyssaFireheart]

Yeah.  My Corolla often catches people unaware (much, much worse now that all college students walk around parking lots not paying any attention with their damn ipods).  Electric cars though?  Whisper silent.  When you're used to hearing an engine it can be quite eerie.

I drive a loud, large car. It catches people unaware constantly on the campus of the local college. I blame it entirely on their ipods. And their inability to look either way before stepping into the street.

During college, I drove a transit bus for work on the campus of Northern Illinois University.  It was one of the best jobs I've had, but the cluelessness of people in general, not just college students, was astounding.  The drivers used to make a game of seeing how close we come to missing someone who wasn't paying attention.  I still don't understand how people could be completely unaware of a 44' red-and-black bus bearing down on them, but it happened all the time. 

People driving around busses are just as clueless as well.  I also drove coaches (think Greyhounds) for charter jobs, which also included driving in downtown Chicago doing shuttle runs for conventions.  There wasn't one convention that went by without some sort of incident between a bus and a taxi.  Of the git on Lake Shore Drive one day sitting level with my back wheels who wouldn't give way for me to change lanes.  This was with plenty of room all around us and my blinkers being on for quite some time.  Let's just say they weren't too happy when I forced the issue and started to move over on them. 

/off topic
/on topic

Buying cell phones anymore these days just makes me nuts.  Our contract is up at the end of the year and the husband wants to change phones (again) to get a Blackberry Storm.  He's done research on phones and on this model from Verizon and thinks it's what he wants.  He has trouble using the small qwerty keyboards on most phones (we both have enV's right now) because his hands are so huge, but testing with the Storm seems to be fine for him.  I just hate the whole process of picking from the gazillions of plans, poking through phone after phone after phone trying to find one that suits me and the whole enticement purchase of models to choose from.  What if he wants a Blackberry but I prefer the LG touch screen phone instead?  Oh, but you can't mix models or plans when you're doing the family plan thing.  Annoying.  So chances are, I'll be getting a Blackberry of some flavor by the end of the year, and I'm not even sure I need something with that much "power" since I work from home and pretty much always have access to the internet that way.