Thanks to the Seinfeld Gang of Four, taxes, CALEA, CPNI, WTR, moratoria, universal service, E911 and swervey drivers have now been eclipsed as major headaches of the day for the wireless industry.
Phone etiquette is now numero uno. For the few who missed the series finale, Jerry chided-guilted-Elaine for checking on the health of her friend’s ailing father via her flip phone and thereby set a new standard for what calls should and should not be permitted over the handy dandy communicators.
This no doubt will cut into the bottom line of hundreds of carriers as airtime usage drops. The industry is studying its options, one of which is to siphon off some Seinfeld syndication revenue to make up for any shortfall of $1.5 billion projected from federal-land antenna siting fees for E911 upgrades.
On the bright side, the jailing of the Gang of Four for breaking the Latham, Mass., good Samaritan law should send the strongest signal to all wireless yada-yadas out there.
Want real role models? Look to the 57 wireless Samaritans honored by CTIA last week who prove, in the words of Tom Wheeler, that, “Quick thinking and a wireless phone can save lives.”
Still, New Yorkers are fuming. Seinfeld is gone. Rude cabbies are dissing Rudy and rude New Yorkers. The Bronx bombers are brawling with the Orioles. Long forgotten in the city that never sleeps or stops arguing is the perfect game pitched by pin striper David Wells. Watch, they’ll be booing him and calling him a bum in no time.
Etiquette went out the door, too, for millions of real-estate agents, doctors, lawyers, drug dealers and others whose dependence on pagers was undermined by a wayward satellite. While engineers wrack their brains over what knocked the bird off course, it’s obvious who is to blame: St. Louis Cardinals slugger Mark McGwire.
Even as America mourned the loss of Sinatra and Indonesians cheered the sacking of Suharto last week, satellite stress of another kind consumed official Washington.
The GOP-led Congress, after licking another self-inflicted wound (this one compliments of the bombastic Burton), pressed feverishly ahead to cash in politically on alleged satellite technology transfers to China from U.S. wireless firms.
Republicans, pointing to Clinton’s satellite export policy, now say the president is to blame for nuclear buildup in Asia and for the smashing success of Viagra.
All this looks pretty bad until you consider Jerry Springer, who had lawmakers really up in arms by week’s end for Friday’s scrapped “I Married a Horse” episode.
The show had nothing to do with the new Redford flick.
