from edupage

[David Farber <farber () central cis upenn edu>]

WIRELESS E-MAIL SERVICE
McCaw Cellular Communications Inc., now a division of AT&T, is slated to
begin offering its AirData Business Service, a cellular digital packet data
network geared toward handling short bursts of data, such as e-mail
messages and faxes.  The service, which is about 18 months behind schedule,
will start off in Miami, and by July will be available in nine more cities.
McCaw's competitive pricing plan charges for the amount of data sent,
rather than the connect time.  Estimates are AirData will cost as little as
8 cents per Kbyte, plus a $50-per-month service charge.  "McCaw is going to
come in 25% to 40% cheaper than RAM or Ardis.  That's much more aggressive
than we expected," says an industry analyst.  (Information Week 4/24/95
p.30)


"HEY, IT'S LOU GERSTNER ON THE PHONE!"
IBM CEO Louis Gerstner is making house calls these days -- phone calls,
that is.  Gerstner's been personally calling software developers in an
effort to persuade them to make products compatible with IBM's new Warp
operating system.  In addition, he's ordered his top 100 executives to each
call 10 of the top software developers worldwide.  Gerstner's plan is to
get software developers on board before the long-overdue Windows 95 comes out,
thus making the most of Microsoft's delays.  (Business Week 4/24/95 p.6)


ONLINE GAMBLING AND ABSOLUTION, TOO
A casino located on St. Maarten will offer online gambling, according to
the Report on Electronic Commerce.  Internet users who have opened an
account with the gaming establishment will be eligible to play electronic
blackjack, roulette, etc.  Meanwhile, the Diocese of Pittsburgh has a new
Internet-based electronic confessional, and the American Hebrew
Congregation this year offered a Passover service via Prodigy.
(Telecommunications Policy Review 4/16/95 p.8)