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AnchorDesk

Patrick Houston
Do you get the 'walkie-talkie' thing?

Patrick Houston
Editorial Director, AnchorDesk
Wednesday, September 3, 2003
TalkBack!Add your opinion
You know Detective Andy Sipowicz, the 15th Precinct cop in ABC's NYPD Blue? There's another TV character with whom you're probably familiar by now, too: the bespectacled geek who walks through every Verizon Wireless commercial, caricaturizing bad cell phone coverage with the same single question: "Can you hear me now?"

Direct connectors
Want Nextel's Direct Connect service? You'll need a specially equipped phone like one of these.

Nextel i90c

We know Sipowicz is played by Dennis Franz. We don't the name of the guy who plays Mr. Hear Me Now because Verizon won't say. (The company is reportedly worried about preserving the integrity of the advertising campaign--so worried that it not only requires the actor who plays Mr. Hear Me Now to remain anonymous, it forbids him from appearing as anyone other than his commercial character and from saying anything beyond the five words in his one line of dialogue.)

YOU'D PROBABLY NEVER cast Messrs. Franz and Hear Me Now together, but they're playing opposite each other right now, in the roles of dueling pitchmen for what's shaping up to become the next telecommunications craze: a service known as push-to-talk, or PTT, the service that allows a cell phone to double as a walkie-talkie.

Franz represents Nextel, the PTT leader that has been taking its walkie-talkie network nationwide over the past nine months. Mr. Hear Me Now has been pushing buttons in a new campaign to herald the August 18 rollout of Verizon's own new nationwide PTT service.

Along with Franz and Mr. Hear Me Now, there's a third guy relevant to this discussion. He's my friend, Brian Hamilton, a consummate geek who, surprisingly, says that, when it comes to push-to-talk, "I just don't get the walkie-talkie thing."

Maybe you don't either. I didn't. But I've been talking with Nextel and Verizon. I've also been using the Nextel network and a Motorola i90c PTT phone to walkie-talkie with a colleague of mine in New York City.

Based on that experience, I'm not prepared to declare push-to-talk the greatest communications service since instant messaging, especially on the basis of such a rudimentary trial. But I am prepared to urge more of you to put PTT on your radar. Here's why: As push-to-talk services become widespread (Sprint, AT&T, and Cingular all plan to offer it, too), you might come to consider them a practical addition to your business communications set-up, particularly when you require short, quick voice communications.

ALTHOUGH PTT comes in the form of a cell phone, it's really quite different. You don't dial to ring someone up. You alert them. And the conversation that ensues isn't synchronous. You can't talk while someone else is. You push a button and talk. The other party has to listen. When you're done, they can talk, but then you can't. It's a very linear, serial way of communicating, more akin to instant messaging than it is to a phone conversation.

It seems almost too rudimentary, almost pre-modern. But 12 million people can't be wrong. That's how many subscribers Nextel has claimed on its way to becoming a $8 billion company.

Granted, most of those folks wear blue or gray collars--tradesmen, truckers, limo drivers, police, firefighters and emergency workers. But with their new nationwide services, Nextel and Verizon both hope to expand the user base beyond those who use two-way radio communications now.

Verizon provides an enhancement that just might do that. Like Nextel, it allows you to walkie-talkie with one other person. But it also lets you communicate, at the press of a button, with a group. Even better, Verizon's phone indicates "presence": Like your instant messaging buddy list, the display actually shows you who's available to communicate with you.

Unlike regular cell phone service, it's not for everyone or for general business uses. For example, I can't see what use we'd find for it here in our office. For one thing, you need specially equipped phones. For another, as with a walkie-talkie, you have to push a button and keep it pushed to say anything. Third, there's that business about not being able to talk when someone else is. Those three reasons alone limit its general usefulness.

SO DOES the additional cost. Verizon is charging $59.99 for an unlimited push-to-talk plan that also provides the same conventionally cell phone service its offers for $39.99. Nextel has dozens of rate plans, but, generally, it's service has always been more expensive than a conventional cell phone only service.

Based on our trial here, I can attest to at least one thing about Nextel's service: It works as promised. Over several days, I was able to reliably and clearly walkie-talkie from San Francisco to my colleague in New York.

Nor was our back-and-forth dampened by unduly long pauses, or latencies, between transmissions. (That's been reported as an issue with Verizon's service.) But I can't say myself because I've yet to try the service. Verizon has promised to provide a trial. Once we do, I'll dig into both services more deeply and, more importantly, how they compare with each other.

Meanwhile, let's tap into your expertise. I don't doubt that many of you have used the Nextel service for real business purposes. Some of you may have already signed up for the Verizon service. Tell us what you think in our TalkBack section.

* * * * *



IPWireless widens broadband reach: Pat talks to IPWireless CEO Chris Gilbert about his company's technology, which could keep you connected anywhere.
 Watch now
FOLLOW UP: There was a good deal of interest in my column of last week about IPWireless, and its wireless broadband technology. Its technology promises widespread cell-phone like coverage--but for wireless data transmissions at speeds exceeding those capable by a cable modem or a DSL connection.

Many of you who can't get wired broadband services said you'd sign up for the service, right here and right now. I hate to fuel your frustrations, but please note that IPWireless doesn't sell the service itself. It had planned to do so earlier in its development, IPWireless CEO Chris Gilbert told me, but wisely abandoned the ambition, which would have put the company in competition with big established players--which would, in turn, have squished the company like a bug.

Instead, IPWireless is selling the technology to others who will actually sell the service. As I noted in the column, the service has reached commercial availability in a few places, like Maui, Jacksonville, Fla., and Missoula, Montana. But widespread deployment, if it occurs at all, will take some years.

If you want more, take a look at our four-minute video (see box above) of my visit with Gilbert and his demonstration of the system.

What do you think? Can you imagine a real-world business use for push-to-talk? What would it be? TalkBack to me!

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