A beginner's guide to telecom jargon

Verizon Wireless executives are just a few of the telecom insiders who lovetheir jargon.
(Credit: Verizon Wireless)
The mobile world moves at abreakneck pace, and it's difficult to keep up--even without the technical jargonmost industry

insiders cheap ugg boots throw around. And they do love to toss thoseterms

about.

Whether it's the difference between CDMA and GSM,the importance of backhaul to the speed of your connection, or what

metering means, it's easy to have information blow over your head whenreading about this field.

So for some light Saturday reading, we thoughtit would be nice to explain what exactly telecom experts are talking about

when they use these terms they assume everyone understands.

4G:Blame the incessant commercials touting "blazing fast 4G service," aswell as the liberal use of the term 4G--everyone

thinks they've got anext-generation wireless device. According to cumer retail site Retrevo, morethan a third of iPhone

owners mistakenly believe they have 4G service.

There christian louboutin pumps are three flavors of 4G: LTE, WiMax,and

HSPA+. LTE, or Long-Term Evolution, is the Los Angeles Lakers of the4G world, acknowledged as the fastest existing

standard. It may befaster, but be wary of the lightning bolt commercials; it's not that fast. LTEis also the standard

that's attracting most wireless providers,including Verizon Wireless, AT&T, and eventually Sprint Nextel--so the termisn't

going away. I was the first to report that Verizon Wireless wouldcover 100 markets with LTE by next week.

Sprint is using an olderversion of 4G called WiMax. For years, WiMax was the only game in town, allowingSprint to boast

about its speed advantage. That edge has all butdisappeared with the rise of LTE. WiMax is like the Philadelphia 76ers: a

team with a strong history but that's faded into an also-ran.

That leaves HSPA+, which is what AT&T and T-Mobile use, as the LosAngeles Clippers of the wireless world; yeah, it's

technically a 4Gtechnology, but only begrudgingly so. Last year, T-Mobile kicked things off byrenaming its HSPA+ network a

4G one, prompting AT&T to do the same.AT&T is ready to move on though; it plans to launch 4G LTE in five citiesthis

summer.

The International Telecommunicati Union, astandards body affiliated with the U.N., initially ruled that none of these

technologies met its criteria for 4G. But the ITU has since backtrackedand has opened up the definition to include all

three. Even for theexperts, it's confusing.

Churn: The word refers to the rate at whichcustomers are running for the hills and away from a subscription service. It's

also one of the critical financial metrics investors use to grade acompany's performance.

Churn was a popular term to throw around thisweek when Netflix decided to hike up the price of its DVD plans, causing an

avalanche moncler sale of criticism and threats of cancellation. CNETfound

that 41 percent of Netflix customers polled wanted to cancel.Which is fitting, since churn is defined as "agitating with

violentmotion."

Cramming: It's the practice of adding third-party charges ontoa phone bill. Cumers hate it because they're getting

charged forservices they never signed up for, and in many cases don't even know about.Regulators and carriers hate it

because they have to deal with customercomplaints. Earlier this week I reported that the FCC voted to crack down on the

practice. Yet it continues to exist. Go figure.

NFC: Another ina long line of technology acronyms, this one stands for near-fieldcommunicati. The technology allows for

a quick burst of data sentfrom one NFC chip to another, and is the key to mobile transacti in thefield. This week,

PayPal showed off an NFC test at the MobileBeatconference that allowed one Nexus S smartphone to transfer funds to another

by way of a simple tapping together of the devices.

Credit cardcompanies, retailers, and technology companies like NFC because they seesimplifying the payment process as

another way to get money out of ourwallets faster.

Throttling: No, throttling doesn't cist of physicallychoking users, though I imagine some carriers have at least

cideredthis in regard to some of their more taxing customers. Throttling occurs when acustomer cumes some maximum

amount of data. wholesaleabercrombie and fitch Once that limit is

reached, the carrier willslow down the customer's connection speed, dropping it to a snail's pace. Thisphrase popped up

again when Virgin Mobile said on Wednesday that itplanned to start throttling users of excessive bandwidth.

Moreimportantly, throttling allows carriers to keep boasting that they offer"unlimited data" plans. While technically

accurate, customers who face2G speeds toward the end of the month would probably disagree.