The UpStream (Page 307)

The past 16 months have been interesting for T-Mobile USA. The wireless industry has changed around them and they have fought back with deceptive advertising instead of improvements. In October of 2010, T-Mobile's USA Chief Network Officer Neville Ray said that 4G Networks weren't important, which has certainly explained the company's direction of the last year or so.

At the time, Sprint had launched its Clearwire-powered WiMax 4G service nationwide and Verizon was building out its own LTE network for a tiered launch starting just 2 months in the future. T-Mobile, on the other hand, had just launched its own 3G+ network, the same technology AT&T was running almost its entire network on and was looking to replace. How was T-Mobile, the smallest nationwide carrier, going to compete with the big boys who were all working to abandon the technology they had just switched to? By calling HSPA+ (3G+) 4G, of course. That decision, which helped them for a while, might turn out to be the biggest mistake the company has made to date.

How is this all going to work for T-Mobile USA? Hit the break to find out my thoughts.

We all know that the wireless industry is a cut-throat business, and with everyone competing on who will get to a wide-spread LTE network first, it is no surprise that national carriers are considering purchasing regional carriers, or even smaller national carriers. We've seen AT&T purchase regional carriers like Dobson Cellular and, of course, Verizon's purchase of Alltel. Most recently, there was the failed attempt at an AT&T/T-Mobile merger, but there are always smaller deals in the works.

This week, one of those deals we didn't even know about fell through. Apparently Sprint Nextel and and MetroPCS have been in talks for months about MetroPCS, a smaller regional carrier, becoming part of the Sprint Nextel family. While the deal did not go through, it took right up to the last minute for it to fail. Apparently, within hours of the final signing, the Sprint board of directors decided to veto the buyout.

The decision, against CEO Dan Hesse's already signing off, seems to be surprising. Sprint has made the commitment to transition to LTE, but their original LTE partner, LightSquared has been hit with FCC issues political and their existing WiMax partner, Clearwire, has had nothing but trouble lately. The addition of MetroPCS to its network would have added MetroPCS's existing LTE footprint, as well as their spectrum, into the fold, giving Sprint their first big win in the LTE process.

Of course, Sprint's response to the rumor was, as always, "we never comment on rumors or speculation."

What do you think? Was killing off the deal a good or a bad move for Sprint Nextel and for MetroPCS? Let us know in the comments section.

For those who haven't been following along through the Clearwire story, the wireless company has been going through a bit of turmoil as of late. Uncertainty, some changes and some money issues have been troubling the company for more than a year. Let's quickly recap to catch you up to speed.

• Clearwire Gets Some Help from Sprint for Future and Existing 4G Networks
• Clearwire Loses 3 Resellers
• Clearwire Might Skip on Upcoming Debt Payment
• Sprint's 4G Technological Evolution

This week, we learned of an interesting story that is on the same strange level as that of Brazil arriving late to the PS2 party. Panasonic has announced that it has stopped producing VCRs in Japan. I had no clue they were still making them, but it is assuring to hear they have halted production of their antiquated effort. I suppose the realization of video content being streamed over the Internet or being stored on a DVR device has finally hit them. There aren't many places that even source the blank tapes anymore.

It should be noted that they have stopped production on the tape-playing machines in the domestic market at the end of 2011. Until inventory depletes, sales will continue on VCRs in Japan. However, Panasonic still does manufacture VCRs in China and Slovakia and they do still have plans to sell VCRs in other smaller countries, depending on the market environment.

This now puts the VCR to rest just like the Walkman and the 8-track. JVC had stopped production of the VCR back in 2006 and stopped selling them altogether shortly thereafter. Panasonic has not released sales numbers for their VCRs, and the Japan Electronics and Information Technology Industries Association (JEITIA) doesn't even track shipments of the devices, although it does track the car stereo cassette deck sales.

In the end, though, the VCR is now deceased. Rewind In Peace 1977-2012.

First there was Wii Motion Plus and now Hulu Plus. On February 16th, Nintendo inked a partnership with Hulu that will finally allow the Wii to stream movies and TV shows using Hulu Plus through the console. It took a while, but the good news is that the Wii now has the same popular lineup as that of the PS3 and the Xbox 360.

While it may be a little late in the game for the console platform, the 3DS will certainly get a boost with this move as consumers should expect Hulu Plus to hit the devices later this year.

What happens after you post record profits and then your production facility's documents were hacked because people are starting to learn about the downright awful working conditions of the employees? If you're Apple, you are investigated and audited to make sure these allegations aren't true, even though reports of suicides and other deaths have been coming out of the Foxconn production plant for almost a year now.

The Fair Labor Association (FLA) has taken on the task of auditing Foxconn's Apple manufacturing facility this week. Instead of actually going through a process and conduct a complete investigation, however, the head of the organization has already stated that things are probably fine inside the workplace and the injuries are more than likely due to "boredom" and not anything else.

We have all of the details on the absurdity after the break.