Opinion

If I were to take anything from this week’s Consumer Electronics Show as an indicator of what to expect in 2012, that would be that there a lot of people interested in gadgets and that we can expect to be standing in more lines.

The most user-friendly ways for humans to interact with machines often center on something that every person is born with. One of the best-known recent examples is how smartphones quickly shed the stylus in favor of touch.

This week saw a couple of events that makes the conspiracy theorist in me go a bit bonkers, or at least a bit more bonkers than usual in what is the last year of our earthly existence. (Thanks for the heads up, Mayans.)

Having a few days off over the past week allowed me to get in some much needed afternoon television watching. While flipping through the multitude of television choices this modern age provides and finding nothing to actually watch, I couldn’t help but keep thinking of all the time and effort the wireless industry put in this year regarding AT&T’s attempt to acquire T-Mobile USA.

So, now what? AT&T’s pie-in-the-sky attempt to acquire T-Mobile USA came crashing down to earth this week in a heap that left many with at least some sort of pie filling in a place not designed to hold pie filling.

Editor’s Note: Welcome to our weekly Reality Check column. We’ve gathered a group of visionaries and veterans in the mobile industry to give their insights into the marketplace. Brazil has finally awoken to …

Editor’s Note: Welcome to our weekly Reality Check column. We’ve gathered a group of visionaries and veterans in the mobile industry to give their insights into the marketplace. Every once …

Hello! And welcome to our Friday column, Worst of the Week. There’s a lot of nutty stuff that goes on in this industry, so this column is a chance for …

The explosion in Brazil’s class C population — defined as families with monthly incomes of $660 to $2,850 — has been accompanied by changes in consumer spending habits by members of that class, especially in the mobile phone market.

Editor’s Note: Welcome to our weekly Reality Check column. We’ve gathered a group of visionaries and veterans in the mobile industry to give their insights into the marketplace. Fifteen years …

Hello! And welcome to our Friday column, Worst of the Week. There’s a lot of nutty stuff that goes on in this industry, so this column is a chance for …

Editor’s Note: Welcome to our weekly Reader Forum section. In an attempt to broaden our interaction with our readers, we have created this forum for those with something meaningful to say …

What the wireline Internet has taught the world is that eventually power shifts from the ones providing the pipes to the ones providing value-added service. Unless net neutrality goes away, I expect this same phenomenon will take place in the wireless domain.

Hello! And welcome to our Friday column, Worst of the Week. There’s a lot of nutty stuff that goes on in this industry, so this column is a chance for …