Weekly output: Google MWC updates, Nokia’s lunar LTE, anti-virus software, Bluetooth Auracast, fixed wireless 5G, most innovative robotics companies, Formic’s robots as a service, broadband and pay-TV subscribers, Microsoft’s plans for digital deserts

I wrote three of the items below between weeks and months ago, but I still feel a little tired looking at this list now. And yes, I have had a lot of naps since coming home from MWC Thursday–because I need to rest up before I head out to Austin for SXSW on Friday.

2/27/2023: Google Kicks Off MWC With Grab-Bag of Android, Wear OS, Chrome OS Updates, PCMag

Google PR sent this embargoed announcement to me and my PCMag colleague Eric Zeman. He had enough other things to write–as in, he somehow cranked out eight posts Monday–so it fell to me to cover this.

2/27/2023: How Do You Make LTE Relevant at MWC 2023? Fly It to the Moon, PCMag

I wrote about this project last year for Fast Company, but this time I could look at a life-size model of the rover and quiz one of the researchers face-to-face on the MWC show floor. And yet despite that acquaintance with the topic, we had to correct the story after publication.

AARP story, as seen in Safari on an iPad mini 6.2/27/2023: Should You Pay for Antivirus Software? These Experts Say No, AARP

My debut at AARP covers a topic I’ve been writing about since I was way too young to let myself think about AARP membership: Should you pay for a third-party anti-virus app or stick with the security tools that came with your desktop, laptop, tablet or phone?

2/28/2023: A Quick Listen With Bluetooth Auracast: Like a Hotspot, But for Audio, PCMag

I got a demo of this short-range audio broadcast technology Tuesday morning, then wrote it up after in the afternoon after multiple meetings and at least one nap.

3/1/2023: Questions over FWA capacity, competition dominate MWC, Light Reading

I watched this panel about fixed-wireless access late Monday morning and found time to write it up in the wee hours of Wednesday morning, when jet lag once again left me staring at the ceiling of my Airbnb and I gave up trying to sleep for a bit.

3/2/2023: The 10 most innovative companies in robotics of 2023, Fast Company

My introduction to the Most Innovative Companies feature consisted of judging candidates in this category, then narrowing my choices over a couple of rounds and finally writing up profiles of the 10 finalists. It was fascinating and educational work, and I hope I can do it again.

3/2/2023: This startup is reviving American manufacturing with robots as a service, Fast Company

One of those 10 “MIC” honorees in the robotics category, a Chicago startup called Formic, also earned a spot in the overall top 50, so I interviewed the CEO and wrote this profile that print Fast Co. readers can see in the March/April issue of the magazine.

3/3/2023: Brutal Year for Pay TV Sees Wireless Carrier Broadband Picking Up Steam, PCMag

The telecom consultancy Leichtman Research Group posted their summary of 2022 broadband subscriber trends on Thursday (when I was too tired to think about writing that up) and then posted their 2022 pay-TV recap Friday morning, allowing me to cover both in one post.

3/5/2023: Microsoft’s ambitions for digital deserts, Al Jazeera

Having covered this topic for PCMag in December, I was happy to accept AJ’s invitation to come into their D.C. studio for a quick interview (overdubbed live into Arabic as usual) about the ambitions of Microsoft and others to get hundreds of millions of people online in the world’s poorest countries.

Advertisement

Weekly output: mm-wave 5G, broadband and pay-TV subscriptions, Apple product events (x2), Firefox add-ons, White House cryptocurrency policy, Charter CEO, Paramount CEO, YouTube vs. Russia, Mark Vena podcast, public diplomacy via TikTok, Lifekey

AUSTIN–I’m clearly out of practice at keeping one foot in the conference reality-distortion field that is SXSW here and one foot in my real-world schedule, as I completely spaced on writing this post yesterday. I’m going to blame that on the Daylight Saving Time switch.

3/7/2022: mmWave 5G advocates try to refocus their sales pitch at MWC, Light Reading

My final bit of MWC coverage came in this recap of a two-hour session covering the possibilities of millimeter-wave 5G broadband.

3/7/2022: 2.95M Americans Added Broadband in 2021, and Almost All of Them Got Cable, PCMag

I wrote up a summary of 2021’s trends in broadband subscriptions from Leichtman Research Group that once again showed cable running away with most of the growth there.

Screenshot of the column as seen in USAT's iPad app3/8/2022: To time your Apple purchases wisely, shop to the rhythm of Apple’s events, USA Today

I wrote this reminder about Apple’s product-introduction patterns as a curtain-raiser for the Tuesday event at which it introduced the updated iPhone SE and iPad Air as well as the new Mac Studio.

3/8/2022: Still Got Cable? Pay TV Providers See Subscriber Exodus in 2021, PCMag

A day later, Leichtman released their 2021 report on pay-TV subscriptions.

3/9/2022: Mozilla: The Pandemic Expanded Our Appetite for These Browser Extensions, PCMag

Mozilla released a study of which browser add-ons saw the most downloads at the start of the pandemic two years earlier, and of course a Zoom extension topped that list.

3/9/2022: White House Executive Order Starts Wheels Turning on Cryptocurrency Policy, PCMag

The Biden administration’s executive order on cryptocurrency policy directs the Federal Reserve to consider issuing a government-backed digital currency.

3/10/2022: Charter CEO: The new bundle is broadband and mobile, FierceVideo

I filled in at my trade-pub client this week, the first such piece being a writeup of a cable exec’s talk at a Morgan Stanley conference.

3/10/2022: Paramount CEO touts two-fer strategy at Morgan Stanley, FierceVideo

I then wrote up a second interview streamed from this Morgan Stanley event, this one with much better audio quality.

3/10/2022: YouTube ices out Russian subscribers, joining other U.S. video services in boycotting the country over Ukraine invasion, FierceVideo

I was lucky enough to have an analyst I quizzed on short notice have some useful stats about the Russian streaming-video market.

3/11/2022: S02 E10 – SmartTechCheck Podcast, Mark Vena

This edition of the weekly podcast (also available in video form) focused on one issue: Apple’s product introductions.

3/11/2022: White House courts TikTok influencers, Al Jazeera

Right after I did this Skype interview from the house I’m renting here about the Biden administration’s understandable extension of public-diplomacy efforts to social media, I got a Facebook message from a friend with a picture of a TV showing my appearance–he was visiting family in Morocco and was surprised/amused to see me on the news.

3/13/2022: For Wearables, Doing a Thing Well Beats Trying to Do It All, Grit Daily House

I interviewed Lifekey CEO Jason Kintzler onstage at the media house set up offsite by my conference pal Jordan French’s startup-news publication.

Updated 3/23/2022 to fix formatting glitches and correct a site misidentification.