>> Natali Del Conte: We have inauguration coverage here at CBS, Microsoft is in trouble with the EU again, and a new study shows why you should never share your ear buds. It's Tuesday, January 20th. I'm Natali Del Conte coming to you today from the CBS.com newsroom, and it's time to get loaded.
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>> Natali Del Conte: It's too bad that the inauguration couldn't happen on a day when we were all off like yesterday so if you're back at work today, and you want to try and figure out where to watch the event online, I can tell you that. CBS, of course. Go to CBSnews.com/inauguration for live streaming coverage all day. We'll also have a webcast with Katie Couric just like the ones we did during the debate, conventions, and election. And, of course, to be fair, there will be several online networks with live inauguration coverage, Hulu and Juice just to name a few, but come to CBSnews.com. We'll have Twitter feeds, Flicker albums, user-generated video, and the one and only Katie Couric who, by the way, has recently joined Twitter. Users on the DC Mall are reporting slow mobile service today. That's because they're a lot of people out there crowding up the network. We traveled to DC last Thursday to talk to Sprint/Nextel about how they are prepared for the influx of users on inauguration day. Take a look.
>> It's safe to say each of the millions of people here on the National Mall will have at least one cell phone with them. My producer and I have six between the two of us. With that many devices in such a small space, the phone companies are preparing for 10 to 15 times more traffic on their network.
>> Natali Del Conte: So what is all this data, and how is it going to help you prepare for inauguration day?
>> You bet. So you're sitting at the heart of the, the ER for the wireless network, if you will, for Sprint/Nextel. This is an At A Glance, the national level. You know, we're very color-code centric, right. You know, red is bad. Yellow is major. Green is good, right. So this is a very At A Glance national view.
>> Natali Del Conte: So what can users expect? Reliable data but just slower?
>> I, yeah, I would anticipate as the crowd gets larger, you may have, experience some slower data speeds. Retry your text message. You know, we queue those up, and they will be delivered.
>> Natali Del Conte: When you use your phone on Capitol Hill, the call will be routed through one of these mobile cellular towers that's attached to the satellite truck that we're sitting on right now.
>> So what we're able to do is we're able to bring this type of vehicle in, park it, push a couple of buttons. The tower will raise to about 65 feet. The dish will turn around, and then we can actually bring it on air as an actual cell site.
>> So we'll actually have somebody sleeping overnight here.
>> Natali Del Conte: Oh, really.
>> The night of and in our, in our mobile command vehicle.
>> We brought this vehicle in for support of the inauguration because not only did it bring you the additional coverage and capacity, the additional highway lanes, if you would, for the cell phone traffic to, to drive on, but it also has a satellite dish to bring redundancies so. But this is your full cell site equipment here, and then are your satellite controllers there. So this vehicle has that generator. It also has battery, batteries here so it's battery backup.
>> If the local telco or telephone carriers go down, or if there's not a T1 available, we can shoot to a satellite and actually bring down a, a satellite T1 and power this vehicle. It would still be an operational cell site if there were to be an event or something were to happen to the local infrastructure.
>> Natali Del Conte: You may never make it to Rome to see the Pope give Wednesday Mass, but you soon will be able to watch it live on YouTube. The Vatican will soon have its own YouTube channel where they will broadcast public events for the world to see. The Church will release details later this week, but we know now that the network will involve Google, the Vatican television center, and Vatican radio. This, of course, isn't the first time an organized religion has taken to the YouTube. The Church of Scientology has had one for a few months now. YouStream launched an iPhone application today. This will let users watch YouStream videos but not broadcast themselves over YouStream because, of course, the iPhone doesn't capture video. You can watch whatever is being broadcast on YouStream and even participate in chat rooms. It doesn't have 3G support, through, so you have to be on a WiFi connection just like the Juice application. That's a drawback because it doesn't really allow for mobile TV viewing if you're tied to a WiFi network. Close but not quite perfect. At least it's free. TMobile is still pushing the G1. The carrier will be bringing it to Germany and Poland in February. We don't have a price or contract details yet. Up til now, it's only been available in the U.S. and the U.K. That's all well and good, but I think most of us agree. We want to see Android on more phones than just the G1. Apple has started to sell used products in China in an effort to gain market share there. The new resale site has discounts of up to 22 percent on refurbished products. CNET couldn't find out how many products are available just yet on the site, though. Microsoft looks ready to take on Mobile Me once and for all. The company is reported to be launching Skybox at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in a few weeks. Skybox is the mobile version of Windows Live Mesh, which was announced just last April. It syncs your pictures, calendars, contacts, e-mails, and even text messages from Windows PCs to a mobile device. We'll be on the lookout for that when our mobile reviewers head to Barcelona, and what's more, we'll hope it works better than Mobile Me. In other Microsoft news, the company is in hot antitrust water again. The European Union is taking the software company to task for linking Internet Explorer to the Windows operating system. In a statement, the EU said, "Microsoft's tying of Internet Explorer to the Windows operating system harms competition between the web browsers, undermines product innovation, and ultimately reduces consumer choice." Microsoft knows how to do the antitrust tango, though. They paid $600 million dollars in fines in 2004 for linking their media player to Windows. This should go without saying, but do not share your ear buds. It's gross and dangerous. A new study confirms this bit of common sense. Researchers at Manipal University in India found that bacteria can easily transfer from one person's ear to another's when you share ear buds. Harmful bacteria was found on 92 percent of ear swabs taken from people who had been sharing their ear buds. Only 8 percent of people who did not share their ear buds had similar bacteria on their swabs. Gross. Those are your headlines for today. I will see you tomorrow back on the Loaded set, or at least that's the plan for now. Thank you for watching. I'm Natali Del Conte with CNET TV, and you've just been loaded.
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