Abstract: Providing LTE connectivity to rural areas in Africa is a very challenging task
that has been addressed with many different solution-models over the years.
One model that seems to offer a sustainable business case is based on the
Google ‘Loon’ LTE project, which provides many advantages. This solution,
however, has a major disadvantage in form of a limited coverage, especially
within the homes where the wall attenuation disrupts the signal. This paper
provides a solution to this problem in form of deploying a cheap, simple, and
passive repeater that enables indoor communication. By simulating the LTE
radio-link between a Google ‘Loon’ base station and a user positioned inside
a home, it has been found that the passive repeater lowers the wall attenuation
considerably and thereby enables indoor communication.
Keywords: LTE-coverage, Passive-repeaters, Google-Loon, wall-attenuation
and path-loss.
Abstract: The paper provides an overview of the digital terrestrial TV in 11 selected
EU countries with different number of TV channels available in the terrestrial
networks. The idea is to discuss the reasons for these differences
and the parameters that affect the number of TV channels/services in
different countries. The paper discusses to what extent economic, social
and political interests, framing the analogue era, continue to influence
the organizational and institutional set-up when switching to digital TV.
From a purely technological point of view, one would expect that the
number of TV channels made available in the different countries with
given spectrum resources would vary only a little taking cross-border frequency
interference into consideration. In fact, there are large differences
between the various countries, which can be explained by the differences
in economic, social and political interests and a certain degree of pathdependence
in the organizational and institutional set-up in the different
countries.
Keywords: Digital TV, Convergence, Multiplex operator, Spectrum
resources, Digital dividend, Regulatory framework, MUX, HDTV.
Abstract: Drawing on institutional theory, the paper aims at improving the understanding
and explanation of the processes of reform of Ghana’s telecom industry as well
as the policy and governance initiatives that have contributed to shaping the
industry today. The research question of the paper is concerned with how
the developments of the policy and governance foundation have affected the
development trends and structures of the telecom industry in Ghana. This
involves a periodization of the different policy and governance initiatives.
The paper identifies two major periods and their various levels of governance,
from the decentral era where management of the sector was vested in the
traditional chiefs followed by the municipalities/districts to the centralization
era where powers were moved to, first, theWorks and Housing Department and
later the Ministry of Communications and the regulatory agency in connection
with the liberalization of the sector.
Within the era of liberalization, the paper identifies three main policy
directions: 1) A market liberalization period (1997–2007) where Westel Ltd.
was introduced into the fixed line market and where Spacefon, Celltell
and Mobitel all were introduced to the cellular telephony market; 2) an
infrastructure expansion period starting at the beginning of 2008, where the
overall policy was increasingly directed towards infrastructure development
with infrastructure licensing of international tower companies; and 3) a new
period having started recently from the beginning of 2011 and up to date, with
policy initiatives being directed at consumer protection and projects such as
mobile number portability and SIM card identification.
The application of institutional theory provides the basis for an improved
understanding of the sector reforms including the identification of poor
performance of the GP&T, strong government manipulation without any
opposition in parliament, weak workers’ unions, and a general policy apathy
as key endogenous factors affecting the reform process, while international
bodies, donor communities and other external agreements constitute important
exogenous factors.
Keywords: Institutional theory, telecom reform, transitional reform, nationalization,
denationalization.
Abstract: The paper describes an outline of selected issues connected with online privacy
management in Poland. It deals with the problem of theoretical contexts of the
subject and presents the concept of Individual Online Privacy Management.
It also shows the legal status concerning privacy regulations in Poland. The
article also provides a brief overview of research, concerning how Polish
society respond to changes in law, which are related to online privacy.
Keywords: Internet Privacy, Individual Privacy Management, cyber security,
privacy protection, personal data protection.
Abstract: The article attempts to answer the question regarding the implementation of
the smart city concept in the context of e-administration and its influence on
smart and sustainable development. It should be noted that the use of IT in the
public administration in Poland is at an early stage of development.1 The level
of e-services is still low, and the major part of the administration remains at the
second level of e-services maturity (Interaction – the user can communicate
electronically with individual offices, but offices do not always communicate
via the web with the user).
The analysis of the research material indicates that at the moment a vast
majority of Polish cities fits into the Smart City 2.0 model, in other words
their local administrations cautiously use modern technologies to improve the
quality of life for citizens. It is also possible to state that several of them aspires
to advance to the third generation of smart cities.
Keywords: public administration, e-government, e-administration, smart
city, new technologies, information society.
Abstract: Uber is just one of the many platform companies growing up currently, but it
is certainly one of the most prominent ones and one of the most discussed
examples. Uber has created a great deal of antagonism and labor market
conflicts around the world. The reason is that Uber-orchestrated services
directly substitute for existing taxi business models and regulations and
they undermine existing social arrangements including labor rights and tax
payments.
The approach taken in the paper is concerned with social contracting.
Social contracting and theories on social contracts have been known for long,
but there is also a new social contract theory discussion on how to deal with
labor markets where there is an increasing degree of seemingly ‘independent
contractors’. This is a development which has many societal roots among them
being that ICT platforms reduce transaction costs between individual agents in
markets and thus facilitate a larger degree of individualized ‘economic agents’
(laborers) in markets. This poses great challenges and even threats to existing
labor relations and regulations. The contribution of the paper is to make a first
attempt at grounding the discussion of these challenges and threats in a social
contract perspective.
Keywords: Social Contract Theories, ICT platforms, Transaction costs.