I was perusing the transcript of a Verizon webcast the other day (yes, I am that lame), and ran across two interesting and related points. First, Ron Lataille, Verizon SVP of IR, acknowledged that many young people don’t get wireline phone service when they move, but rather stick with just a cell phone. Not surprising in itself, but Mr. Lataille also suggested that starting a family seems to be a trigger point for converting from a cell-phone-only residence to one with a landline.I seem to be just past the cell-phone-only demographic, or at least among people living outside of NYC. However, I have to admit that if I had only had a cell phone a few years ago, that would have changed when I had my daughter. It’s not so much that I worry about the wireless infrastructure. Any phone system can go down with enough traffic overload. No, I worry about leaving my phone uncharged and then discovering that my power adapter doesn’t work. (It’s happened. Several times.) I also still worry about the issue of dialing 911. Until my cell phone is GPS-enabled, I want a landline the police can track my location on. (VoIP discussion, anyone?)
PVRWire Shutting Down
AOL has decided to shutter PVRWire and several other blogs in the Weblogs, Inc network on 1/31. According to Jason Calacanis, former head of Weblogs, it sounds like their blogs need a million monthly page views to “scale” as a viable business model. Not only is there plenty of room for long-tail content, but I … Read more