Sakaru Pasaule - Žurnāls par
modernām komunikācijām

  
  


Atpakaļ Jaunais numurs Arhīvs Par mums Meklēšana

ANNOTATION

   

ANNOTATION 5 535 z

The active business season is almost over and it is high time to have a rest. However, whether you will spend your summer vacation in Cyprus or in New Zealand, you still won’t be able to do without communication, even without your laptop. You would like to know how your company is doing without you, to send and receive e-mails, to play on-line games (at last you have time for it!). The best way to do it effectively is to use wireless Internet access in hotspots which become more and more popular  world-wide. Also in the present issue of Sakaru Pasaule one can find a lot of interesting information related to Internet access, Internet content, Internet journalists (bloggers), e-mail ethics, Nettiquette etc. Enjoy the summer together with us!

 

In this issue:

 

· Let’s not waste the national resource - numeration

(pages 32-33)

Latvia is the only state in Europe where telecommunication network operators do not have to pay for numeration resources. Optimal payment amount could be 5-10 santimes per year. If such a system would be introduced also in Latvia, telecommunication operators would use the numeration resources more economically.

Anyway at the present moment there are quite sufficient resources in Latvia both for fixed and mobile networks. However, to give an opportunity for the new entrants to compete more successfully, the Regulator has asked Lattelekom to reorganise numeration system in eight regions. These were the ones  where more than 90 per cent of numbers were occupied, but now - after number multiplexing procedure - there are 10 000 free numbers available for competitors in each of these regions.  Also in mobile networks the situation is rather stable - 1.7 million numbers for about a million mobile users. The situation could change within 5-7 years, and then we could start thinking about 8-figure numbers that are very topical in many other countries. 

 

· How to enrich the Internet content in Latvia?

(pages  34-37)

One of the key problems is that we do not have enough content in Latvian as the market is too narrow to invest more. Also the revenue from web advertising is not sufficient to develop content as it costs even more than technologies and software. The biggest Internet resources are the most popular portals - www.delfi.lv, www.apollo.lv and www.tvnet.lv, and, naturally, they bite the biggest piece of the advertisement pie.  Internet experts suppose that there are only two ways out - either to increase advertising budget or to find more attractive motive for sponsoring or subsidising new Internet resources (one of the most successful ones is portal www.politika.lv sponsored by Soros Foundation). 

On the other hand, there are quite a lot  web sites in Latvia that are developed and maintained by enthusiastic people without any investments. Also some car, computer, telecommunication industry, as well as real estate and finance resources are quite successful. But one of the ways how to make Internet content richer is - to pay for it. Also web users in Latvia start to understand that if they want qualitative content, quick browsing and good results, it is worth to pay.

 

·Are we ready for e-goverment?

(pages 42-43)

The electronic document law was passed  last autumn and according to it a practical exchange of e-documents in state institutions would have to start by January 1, 2004. It means that even each tiny rural municipality will have to be able to accept electronic documents from the inhabitants. However it is doubtful that it will be possible as neither state institutions nor society are not ready for it.

Some of the biggest municipalities try to implement elements of e-government and e-documents themselves. Ventspils  was ready for e-document implementation already a year ago. They have finished classification of all the services of the municipality,  the employees are trained in handling the Electronic document management system based on Microsoft .NET technology. The approximate investments in this project during five years could be as high as 1,9 million lats. But it is quite certain  that only a few municipalities in Latvia can afford to invest so much.

A very significant e-document is also a person’s identification card (IDC). It is planned that the first cards should be issued by May, 1, 2004. IDCs in Latvia are supposed to be very unique: in the IDC chip  a digital signature and also biometric data (finger prints) would be integrated. Sure, it is very progressive, but it most probably means that e-government solutions will be implemented in everyday life in a very distant future.

 

· Wi-Fi - hot Internet wireless access

(pages 66-67)

 

Wireless access to Internet became topical already in 1999 when the international  Wi-Fi Alliance was formed to certify interoperability of wireless LAN. Currently the Wi-Fi Alliance has 375 member companies from around the world, and 715 products have received Wi-Fi certification. The Wi-Fi wave  becomes higher and higher, - it has expanded all over the world and has reached also the costs  of Baltic sea. The industry analysts forecast that in 2005 there could be more than 118 000 public Internet access points (hotspots) world-wide.

The Wi-Fi pioneer in Latvia is Lattelekom which together with its partners installed the first public wireless Internet access point in September, 2002. At present there are more than 20  access points in Riga and Ventspils, by the end of  the year their amount could reach 50 but within three years - at least 1000. More information: lattelekom.lv/wifi,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Design and programming by Anton Alexandrov - 2001