Small business, big benefit from online bookkeeping

31 August 2014 by Steve Blum
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The winner.

Once I’d decided to dump Quickbooks and figured out that other self-hosted software wasn’t any more functional, I took a hard look at the online alternatives. Six alternatives – FreeAgent, FreshBooks, Wave, GoDaddy (formerly Outright), Xero and Zoho – warranted hands on testing.

My needs, I thought, are simple. I bill a relatively short list of clients on an hourly or fixed price/milestone basis, and pay expenses through a checking account, a couple of credit cards and occasionally cash out of pocket.… More

Dodging the Quickbooks tax

30 August 2014 by Steve Blum
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Temple of doom.

The death sentence for Quickbooks came with the release of the Mavericks version of Mac OS X. Intuit wasn’t supporting the last version I bought – Quickbooks Pro 2010 – and online account downloads stopped working. I could spend a couple hundred bucks for the 2014 version, or find a better way to manage my business. I’d already done that with my personal finances. When Intuit torpedoed Quicken for Mac, I switched to iBank, which does the job at least as well.… More

Mobile operators are short term cure, long term cause of broadband divide

Wireline upgrades get low priority on the wrong side of the divide.

Mobile broadband networks are increasingly ubiquitous throughout the world, and are the most widely used way of accessing the Internet in developing countries. But that’s despite high costs and stingy caps on data transfer. As a solution for increasing primary household access to broadband and encouraging people to use it, mobile networks have limited potential, according to a South African broadband policy study

Of the access mechanisms, mobile coverage is the most extensive, but mobile broadband access is limited to lucrative urban areas and data costs are relatively high.

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U.S. supreme court considers limits on local barriers to broadband

28 August 2014 by Steve Blum
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Some Roswells understand advanced technology better than others.

The U.S. supreme court will decide whether or not to set practical limits on the ability of local governments to stall – sometimes indefinitely – cell towers and other mobile broadband infrastructure deployments. When the court reconvenes in October, it will be hearing a case brought by T-Mobile against the City of Roswell in Georgia, which denied permission to install a tower disguised as a pine tree.

The specific issue in the case is whether a local agency has to provide a written statement detailing why a particular wireless project was nixed, or can it just stamped denied on the application and leave it to others to figure out the reasons by reading through council minutes and memos.… More

No reform this year for California's environmental road blocks

27 August 2014 by Steve Blum
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One of the useful, if frustrating, aspects of the California Economic Summit’s state capitol conference earlier this month was listening to some lawmakers defend the California environmental quality act (CEQA). It’s universally considered to be a needlessly complex and economically damaging impediment to any kind of infrastructure project. Except by environmentalists and their allies in the legislature.

The core argument in favor of CEQA in its current form is that even though it’s cumbersome, it has saved California’s signature natural assets – you get the idea it’s the only thing standing between the redwoods and a horde of chainsaw wielding loggers.… More

$160 million still available for broadband infrastructure subsidies in California

26 August 2014 by Steve Blum
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When the California Public Utilities Commission starts accepting applications for broadband infrastructure grants later this year, there will be something like $160 million available to hand out. That’s my estimate, based on the amount approved to date and expected administrative costs.

The overall cap on the California Advanced Services Fund is $315 million. Of that, $10 million is set aside for infrastructure loans, $10 million for regional consortia and $25 million for public housing projects.… More

California cable TV franchise renewals still behind closed doors

25 August 2014 by Steve Blum
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Double secret probation.

A bare sliver of light will shine on cable (and telephone) companies when they renew statewide video franchises every 10 years. The California Public Utilities Commission is considering a process that effectively shuts out meaningful public scrutiny of cable companies when they file for renewal. The CPUC’s reasoning is that in writing California’s Digital Information and Video Competition Act, usually referred to as DIVCA, the legislature set a very low bar for granting and, consequently, renewing the statewide video franchises that replaced the original city-by-city and county-by-county process in 2006.… More

AT&T says up is the new down

24 August 2014 by Steve Blum
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The best kind goes both ways.

Call it GigaPower or GigaWeasel, AT&T is at least acknowledging that its much-hyped but little seen upgrade program needs to meet rising customer expectations for broadband speeds. And interestingly, according to a story by Sue Marek in Fierce Telecom, the company is also embracing the idea that upstream speeds are rapidly becoming at least as important to subscribers as downstream speeds…

AT&T Group President and Chief Strategy Officer John Stankey said that upstream traffic is growing at double the rate of downstream traffic thanks to so many users uploading photos and video content via social networking sites.

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Best Mac apps for blogging

23 August 2014 by Steve Blum
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I came for the logo, but stayed for the app.

It’s easy to take tools that work so well you barely notice them for granted. I want to recognise a few that have made daily blogging a joy. Byword, MarsEdit, Linode and WordPress top the list.

When I stepped up posting in 2012, it quickly became clear that Blogger, my original platform, wasn’t going to give me the degree of control over the end product that I wanted.… More

California Broadband Council leadership leaving the room

22 August 2014 by Steve Blum
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As the final days of the current legislature term winds down in Sacramento, two departing lawmakers who play a key role in broadband development reflected on the the past few years. Assemblyman Steven Bradford and senator Alex Padilla (both D – Los Angeles) were participating as members of the California Broadband Council for the last time on Monday.

Bradford spoke particularly about two critical bills that he pushed and prodded through the legislature last year, despite occasionally nasty opposition from incumbents, particularly lobbyists for Comcast and the California cable industry.… More