Wireless

The Federal Communications Commission voted Tuesday to bring its subsidy programs for low income families into the 21st century by offering funds for basic broadband service for financially disadvantaged Americans.

In its January open meeting Tuesday, the FCC adopted an order that will eliminate the FCC's Link Up program, which offers a one-time $30 credit for the installation of landlines or activation fee for cell phones. And it announced a new pilot program that will direct universal service funds collected for these subsidy programs to offer subsidies for basic broadband service.

The commission also pledged to root out waste, … Read more

AT&T announced today a rejiggering of its management team, in what looks like a move to better align executives to AT&T's various business units.

The company created a new position for John Stankey, who had previously been president and CEO of AT&T Business Solutions. Now Stankey will be group president and chief strategy officer in charge of developing AT&T's road map for future growth. This includes corporate development and addressing AT&T's long-term wireless capacity needs.

What could be worse than a surprise overage fee? For some people it's having their wireless carrier put the brakes on their data service.

In this edition of Ask Maggie, one reader wants to know whether it's worth keeping his AT&T unlimited data plan after AT&T has warned him that his service will be slowed down because he's in the top 5 percent of data users. Ask Maggie also offers advice on whether to buy the lower priced iPhone 4 or the newer iPhone 4S.

Is AT&T giving me a hint … Read more

AT&T appears to be laying groundwork for a potential deal with Dish Network to get its hands on the satellite provider's newly acquired wireless spectrum.

Last week, AT&T flexed some muscle with the federal government in an attempt to make Dish's wireless spectrum--which it acquired last year for $2.8 billion via deals with two failed wireless companies, DBSD North America and TerreStar Networks--harder for Dish to use and easier for some other company to acquire.

Specifically, AT&T asked the FCC not to place any "restrictions on the transfer and/… Read more

Verizon Wireless may soon introduce a new service plan that allows families to share data among multiple subscribers across a single account, according to a post on Engadget.

The gadget blog said today that it has received employee training material from a source that indicates there is a new version of the data plan that will soon be introduced. In a screen shot on the blog, there is a section labeled "account level data plans" and a charge of $9.99 charge per additional line.

Engadget said it doesn't know when Verizon will introduce the new billing … Read more

When two people decide to get married, they merge their lives, often combining families, finances, and worldly possessions. But should this also include their wireless plans?

In this edition of Ask Maggie I explore the answer to a question that many newly engaged couples might be asking themselves: do we sign up for the wireless family plan? Or do we go it alone?

Since I am facing this very issue right now, I decided to ask my own question and share my thought-process with my Ask Maggie readers.

The things we do for love

Over the holidays, my boyfriend Mark … Read more

If indie bands can dress like Fleetwood Mac circa 1975, and women in New York City can sport leg warmers like "Flashdance" extras, why can't Samsung bring back the stylus pen for tablets and smartphones?

It seems like the company just might try to revive this old trend, much like those indie rockers and fashionable hipsters of New York City are bringing back bygone fashion trends many of us who lived through them the first time wish we could forget.

Ryan Bidan, a product marketing manager for Samsung, told Laptop in an interview published this week that that the company may bring the Galaxy Note's S Pen stylus to tablets, along with some "3D gesture" technology.

"I think a pen interface continues to make a lot of sense across a number of screen sizes, like the larger is more obvious of those," Bidan said in the interview. "That's about as specific as I can be without announcing a product."… Read more

Change is never easy. Just ask Nokia, which today posted its third consecutive quarter of hefty losses, despite strong sales of its new Windows Phone portfolio.

In the fourth quarter, the Finnish handset maker said it lost 1.07 billion euros, or $1.4 billion. During the same period a year ago, the company posted a 745 euro profit.

Overall handset sales dropped by 29 percent compared with a year ago. The company sold 19.6 million smartphones during the quarter and 93.9 million feature phones. In total, it sold 113.5 million devices, which is down from 123.… Read more

Nokia's CEO Stephen Elop wasn't kidding when he said at the launch of the new Lumia 900 Windows Phone at CES that pricing for the device would be competitive.

The new Lumia 900, which had been announced earlier this month at CES for AT&T's network, will sell for $99.99 with a two-year service contract starting March 18, sources with knowledge of the launch plans told CNET. The Boy Genius Report first reported the pricing and launch date of the device as part of a leaked road map from AT&T the site said … Read more